Coming off of a season of unmet expectations for the vast majority of teams, and the conference as a whole, the 2023 offseason will be critical to Atlantic 10 Basketball maintaining it’s place as one of the elite mid-major conferences and getting back to receiving NCAA Tournament at-large bids.
The first week and a half hasn’t been super eventful, aside from George Mason Coach Kim English likely leaving for Providence, but the next month will be filled with big transfer moves and the shaping of rosters around the league.
Here are five A-10 storylines to follow during that time, and into the next season.
*Note: Given the nature of the transfer portal, you can’t fully assume that anyone is returning. For the purposes of this piece, I am assuming that anyone who participated in Senior Day is leaving, any player not actively in the portal is staying (except Dayton’s DaRon Holmes II, who could leave for the NBA Draft) and that George Mason will lose some talented players if English does indeed depart.
1) Midwest Unrest
This isn’t the most important storyline in terms of on-court impact (see #2), but it is going to be the most talked about over the next twelve, and probably twenty-four, months. First off, it is eerie how similar the coaching situations at Dayton and Saint Louis are at the moment, as anything that is true of one, you can probably say about the other. After an offseason where both the Flyers and Billikens were frequently appearing in preseason Top 25 lists, both teams failed to make the NCAA Tournament or even the NIT. Now their respective fanbases have begun to grumble about the resumes of their coaches.
The two schools aren’t too different in terms of basketball resources and the expectations around the programs involve NCAA Tournament trips at least every few years for each. Yet, Anthony Grant has made one* in six years and never even got to play in it. Let it sink in that Dayton hasn’t played an NCAA Tournament game since 2017. It’s astounding given the team’s standing in the conference and the college basketball world. It hasn’t gone any better for Travis Ford, who took SLU to the promised land just once in his seven seasons at the helm.
Both coaches are consistent winners who always have respectable teams but haven’t been able to reach the summit. Dayton missed out twice with a dominant front court of DaRon Holmes II and Toumani Camara, and barring a surprising return from Holmes, will need to reload around a pair of guards in Malachi Smith and the uber-talented but wildly inconsistent Mike Sharavjamts. Saint Louis never developed a strong enough defense to compliment the A-10’s all-time assist leader Yuri Collins and his wing scoring partners Gibson Jimerson and Javonte Perkins. Now the Billikens cupboard is even more bare, mostly just some talented young guys who came off the bench.
Right now, the most likely scenario for next year involves both schools missing out on March Madness once again, although fast reloads can happen in the modern era and Dayton especially will be a very appealing option for quality transfers and freshmen. These next few months will be critical, as anything short of a 2025 NCAA Tournament appearance, along with a decent performance in a reload year before that, could lead to changes and will certainly lead to some significant fan unhappiness.