Tag: Matt McMahon

Mwani Wilkinson becomes the final member of the 2021-22 team to hit the transfer portal

And the LSU men’s basketball officially has no member of the 2021-22 roster on the team for next year.

The mass exodus for the LSU men’s basketball team has concluded on Friday. The last remaining member of the 2021-22 roster has officially put his name in the transfer portal according to Matt Zenitz of On3.

[autotag]Mwani Wilkinson[/autotag] started 30 games for the Tigers this past season and became the 11th member to join the portal following the firing of Will Wade and the abrupt exit from the NCAA Tournament.

Wilkinson finished out the season averaging 4.0 points, 3.7 rebounds, and 1.2 steals per game for LSU. This was his second season on the Bayou after playing in 27 games with 14 starts a season ago. This year he started 30 of the 34 games he played during the 2021-22 season.

After the Tigers started out 12-0, they struggled down the stretch due to injuries and just poor play. Once Wade was fired prior to the NCAA Tournament, it began to unravel for the Bayou Bengals with every member of the team leaving for the NBA draft or through the portal.

New head coach [autotag]Matt McMahon[/autotag] has a very tall task ahead of him with just two members on the roster. Both transfers coming into the program. The positive part is that with the transfer portal, he will have ample opportunity to refill the roster but usually, there is a core group of players already in place.

McMahon will be building this roster completely from scratch.

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LSU basketball transfer portal tracker: Who have the Tigers lost, gained this offseason?

Here’s every player who has left and joined LSU’s basketball program via the transfer portal this offseason.

It’s certainly shaping up to be a transitional offseason in Baton Rouge. Before LSU was eliminated in the NCAA Tournament by Iowa State in the first round, the program chose to fire men’s basketball coach [autotag]Will Wade[/autotag] after he was cited by the NCAA as part of its ongoing investigation.

College sports have now entered the transfer portal era. Players are now permitted to transfer without consequence, and whenever there’s a coaching change, you can expect that at least some roster attrition will follow.

That has been the case for LSU, which has already seen a number of players elect to transfer in the wake of Wade’s firing and the subsequent hiring of [autotag]Matt McMahon[/autotag] from Murray State. The Tigers have already brought in one of McMahon’s former Racers players, and more are likely to follow.

Here’s a rundown of each player LSU has lost and gained in the transfer portal. We’ll update this list as more decisions are made.

Report: LSU forward Shareef O’Neal enters transfer portal

The LSU legacy is heading to his third school.

The Tigers saw yet another departure from the program on Tuesday, as junior forward [autotag]Shareef O’Neal[/autotag] entered the transfer portal. His decision was first reported by Stadium’s Jeff Goodman.

O’Neal is the son of former LSU and NBA legend [autotag]Shaquille O’Neal[/autotag], who was inducted into the Basketball Hall of Fame in 2016. The younger O’Neal was a reserve player for the Tigers in 2021-22, averaging less than 10 minutes per game with 2.9 points and 2.1 rebounds.

He saw just five minutes in LSU’s first-round NCAA Tournament loss to Iowa State, registering a rebound and a turnover. He missed his only attempt from the field and was held off the scoreboard.

O’Neal is a native of Los Angeles, and the former four-star recruit and top-50 prospect in the 2018 recruiting class originally signed with nearby UCLA. However, after appearing in just 13 games with the Bruins as a true freshman and averaging 2.2 points per game, he opted to transfer.

In heading to his father’s alma mater, he hoped to see an increased role. However, that never really materialized. He appeared in just 24 games in two seasons with the Tigers, and he never started a game during his time in Baton Rouge.

LSU has now seen three players enter the transfer portal since coach [autotag]Will Wade[/autotag] was fired ahead of the NCAA Tournament. Guards [autotag]Brandon Murray[/autotag] and [autotag]Xavier Pinson[/autotag] also opted to transfer, while all three commits in 2022 and the lone commit in 2023 have decommitted.

New coach [autotag]Matt McMahon[/autotag] will certainly have his hands full rebuilding this roster.

O’Neal will enter the 2022-23 season as a senior, but he’ll have two remaining years of eligibility as a result of the COVID-19 pandemic in 2020. He’ll hope the next stop is the one where he can become a true-difference maker.

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Where does Matt McMahon stand among SEC coaching hires?

McMahon was listed by The State newspaper as the best new hire in the SEC.

It has been an absolutely wild start to the offseason so far for the SEC. In total, six of the 14 programs have made a coaching change.

Georgia fired coach Tom Crean and replaced him by hiring Mike White away from Florida. The Gators, in turn, hired Todd Golden from San Francisco. Missouri (Cleveland State’s Dennis Gates), Mississippi State (New Mexico State’s Chris Jans) and South Carolina (Chattanooga’s Lamont Paris) also made changes.

Included in that list is, of course, LSU. Unlike most other programs on this list, the Tigers fired [autotag]Will Wade[/autotag] in spite of guiding the team to the NCAA Tournament after he was cited in a Notice of Allegations. Replacing Wade is Murray State’s [autotag]Matt McMahon[/autotag].

McMahon has taken the Racers to three tournaments since taking over in 2015, and his 31-3 finish this season was the best of his career. In the rankings of the new SEC basketball coaches from The State newspaper in Columbia, South Carolina, McMahon stands atop the list.

McMahon had his name thrown around for just about every major college opening in America this cycle and with good reason.

He finishes his time at Murray State as the winningest head coach at the school since 1975, recruited Ja Morant and owns two of the Racers’ five second round NCAA tournament appearances.

There was some thought McMahon would land at South Carolina given, among other reasons, he and Gamecocks football coach Shane Beamer have been friends dating back to their time as graduate assistants at Tennessee. Instead, McMahon heads to Baton Rouge with LSU under a cloud of NCAA sanctions.

The Tigers fired Will Wade for a slew of major NCAA violations, and while it’s unclear what kind of punishment the school will face, it’s likely to be severe.

That said, LSU is one of the better basketball jobs in the league and will pay as such. McMahon is slated to make between $2.6 million and $3.2 million annually over the duration of his seven-year contract, per The Advocate.

This might take time for McMahon to build depending on how hard the NCAA cracks down, but he profiles like a home run if he’s given ample time.

McMahon wasn’t exactly the splashy hire athletics director Scott Woodward has become known for, but given LSU’s historical standing as a basketball program and the fact that there are likely some sanctions from the NCAA coming down the pipeline, it’s hard to imagine that he could have convinced a proven coach at a power program to make the jump right now.

Instead, the Tigers get a young candidate in McMahon with a high ceiling and progressive offensive coaching style. It’s a very solid if slightly underwhelming hire that should keep the newfound success going in Baton Rouge.

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Breaking down the 5 LSU teams that have undergone coaching changes since 2020

Each of LSU’s major sports has undergone coaching transitions in the last two years. Let’s take a look at all of them.

Since August 2020, what could be considered LSU’s five major sports have all undergone coaching changes.

Those five sports are football, men’s basketball, women’s basketball, baseball, and gymnastics.

The situations leading to each change were wildly different, and sometimes not even in the same stratosphere. Nonetheless, the changes did occur and the athletic department looks a whole lot different than it did when 2020 began.

Gymnastics was the first to transition and also the most seamless, when [autotag]D-D Breaux[/autotag] retired, associate head coach [autotag]Jay Clark[/autotag] was tabbed to assume the head position.

Next, in what was the most impressive hire, [autotag]Kim Mulkey[/autotag] came to LSU after building a dynasty at Baylor. Not long after that, [autotag]Jay Johnson[/autotag] was hired to helm the baseball program after the retirement of [autotag]Paul Mainieri[/autotag].

I doubt many people need refreshers on what happened in football or men’s basketball, given how dramatic and high-profile each situation was, but [autotag]Brian Kelly[/autotag] took over after a wild conclusion to the [autotag]Ed Orgeron[/autotag] era. Most recently, [autotag]Matt McMahon[/autotag] was hired after the [autotag]Will Wade[/autotag] saga came to an inevitable ending.

With all five coaches now in place, let’s take a look back at each transition, and where each sport stands going forward.

Report: Memphis assistant Cody Toppert to join LSU’s staff

Toppert has spent the last three seasons as an assistant under Penny Hardaway.

New LSU men’s basketball coach [autotag]Matt McMahon[/autotag] is close to making the first addition to his staff.

According to Stadium’s Jeff Goodman, the Tigers are close to finalizing a deal to bring Memphis Tigers assistant [autotag]Cody Toppert[/autotag] to Baton Rouge. The 39-year-old has coached under Penny Hardaway at Memphis since 2019.

Toppert has experience coaching at the NBA level. After graduating from Cornell in 2005, he had a playing career that lasted until 2012 — mostly overseas but also in the NBA minor leagues. Following his playing career, he served a stint as an assistant at Scottsdale Christian Academy in Phoenix before jumping to the NBA G League.

He was an assistant coach for the Rio Grande Valley Vipers from 2015-17 before serving as the head coach for the Northern Arizona Suns for one season. Toppert received a call-up after that and spent the following season as an assistant with the Phoenix Suns before heading to Memphis.

McMahon is a forward-thinking coach, and in Toppert, he lands a forward-thinking assistant. In his previous stop at Memphis, he created and oversaw one of college basketball’s top analytics programs.

The context of this move is also worth noting. On Saturday morning, it was reported that Memphis — and Hardaway, specifically — is facing multiple Level I and II charges from the NCAA. However, Toppert now joins another program with potential sanctions down the road, which resulted in the termination of previous coach [autotag]Will Wade[/autotag].

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LSU’s Xavier Pinson becomes next Tigers player to enter transfer portal

The Tigers have lost their starting backcourt duo from this past season to the transfer portal.

LSU continues to hemorrhage players in the wake of coach Will Wade’s firing. The Tigers lost every commit in both the 2022 and 2023 recruiting classes, and guard [autotag]Brandon Murray[/autotag] entered the transfer portal.

Now, LSU has another loss to replace as point guard [autotag]Xavier Pinson[/autotag] also entered the transfer portal on Thursday. Pinson is back in the portal after arriving in Baton Rouge this season as a transfer from Missouri.

In his lone season with the Tigers, Pinson started 27 of the 28 games he appeared in while averaging 9.8 points and 4.8 assists. Pinson is a senior but will use his one remaining year of eligibility due to COVID-19 elsewhere.

With the losses of Murray and Pinson, LSU now has to replace its entire starting backcourt. The Tigers will almost certainly have to hit the portal aggressively themselves, as their two signees in [autotag]Julian Phillips[/autotag] and [autotag]Devin Ree[/autotag] were released from their letters of intent, while hard commit [autotag]Yohan Traore[/autotag] backed off his pledge, too.

LSU also lost the commitment of its lone 2023 pledge, five-star point guard [autotag]Marvel Allen[/autotag].

Between the roster attrition and potential looming sanctions from the NCAA, this is certainly not an easy situation for new head coach [autotag]Matt McMahon[/autotag] to walk into. His first priority will be to simply fill out a roster that has taken major losses in the week since the offseason began.

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LSU basketball loses final commit in 2022 recruiting class

With Yohan Traore backing off his pledge, the Tigers’ current recruiting class sits vacant.

When Tigers athletic director Scott Woodward made the decision to fire men’s basketball coach Will Wade on March 13 as a result of the NCAA’s investigation into the program, it would have been reasonable to guess that some roster attrition was likely to follow.

What has happened since for LSU, however, could be deemed a worst-case scenario. The Tigers lost both of their 2022 signees in the wake of Wade’s departure when Julian Phillips and Devin Ree were released from their letters of intent and decommitted.

Now, LSU has lost the final piece of its 2022 class as five-star Glendale (Arizona) Dream City Christian center Yohan Traore backed off his pledge to the Tigers.

LSU also lost its lone commit in the 2023 class in five-star point guard Marvel Allen.

Now, the Tigers are left with a completely bare 2022 class with not much time to get things fixed. National signing day is on April 13, meaning new coach Matt McMahon has just over three weeks to try to find at least one player to add to the class.

Barring something unforeseen, the transfer portal will likely be this team’s best bet to rebuild for 2022-23, and given the state of college sports, it’s very likely McMahon could target some of his former Murray State players to make the jump to the power conference ranks.

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Five things to know about new LSU basketball coach Matt McMahon

Here are five things to know about LSU’s newest head coach

It was reported on Monday that LSU would be hiring Murray State’s Matt McMahon to fill the basketball opening.

McMahon was thought to be a strong candidate since the job came open after a seven-year run at Murray State, where he won multiple NCAA Tournament games in his tenure and won 25 games on three separate occasions.

McMahon is just 43 years old, when he first took the job at Murray State, he was one of the youngest head coaches in the country.

Murray State is coming off a year where the Racers went 31-3, which included an 18-0 conference record. The point is, he’s won a lot of basketball games.

It’s hard to imagine any LSU fans being upset with this hire in normal times, much less with the state the program is currently in.

McMahon didn’t build Murray State from scratch, it could be said he didn’t build it at all. Murray State had success before McMahon took over the program, but McMahon sustained it over a long period, which is not easy to do at a school of that stature.

LSU’s future remains murky but with McMahon in town, LSU seems to be in some competent hands it handles all the uncertainty headed its way.

Here are five things to know about Matt McMahon.

Social media reacts to LSU’s hiring of Matt McMahon as new men’s basketball coach

Fans were excited about LSU landing McMahon from Murray State.

LSU has hired a new leader for the men’s basketball program, and his name is Matt McMahon.

McMahon has been the coach of the Murray State Racers for the past seven years, racking up a 154-67 record and winning the Ohio Valley Conference three times. The Racers made three appearances in the NCAA Tournament with him at the helm, including this year, when No. 7-seeded Murray State beat No. 10-seeded San Francisco in Round 1 before losing to No. 15 seed Cinderella Saint Peter’s.

If you are wondering, yes, McMahon was also the coach that recruited the uber-talented Ja Morant to the Racers back in 2018. Coming off of his best year ever with a 31-3 record, I am excited to see how McMahon will try to right the ship in the bayou.

Tigers fans (and college basketball fans, in general) seem to be excited, as well. Here were some of the reactions on social media.