The incoming class was recently released, with 4 freshmen and 2 transfers: https://cornellbigred.com/news/2025/6/10/mens-basketball-six-to-join-big-red-mens-hoops-for-2025-26-season.aspx
Sepp, the transfer from Valparaiso, has been an excellent rebounder his 1st two years and will provide some much needed muscle under the boards. Fishburn, the JUCO transfer, is a big guard who can score; we'll see how well he transitions to the D1 level, but he looks like a guy who can be in the rotation. Burbach, who is a shooting guard, is a 3 star recruit by 247 and had several other D1 offers, including Dartmouth; he might be Cooper Noard's heir apparent. Griffin is a point guard who looks to have a nice all-around game. Abalos projects as a versatile small forward whose game is well suited to the Ivies. Like a lot of bigger guys, Lecklitner probably won't see a lot of court time the 1st year or two as he'll need to bulk up.
Looking at the league as a whole, Yale again looks like the favorite, with Cornell, Princeton and Dartmouth probably taking a step back. Harvard lost some great recruits to NIL, while Penn seems to have gone all-in with Fran McCaffrey as their new coach, and a former top-25 recruit transferring in from UVA. Columbia also has a new coach, and Brown is always tough, although they lost their top guard Keno Lilly to graduation.
Just hoping to sneak into Ivy madness as the four seed. When you're hosting anything can happen and I want to see Newman get louder than ever.
Nat Graham, late of Penn, named associate head coach of Cornell basketball. Interestingly, Graham was an assistant coach when Jon Jaques was playing. To quote Darth Vader "When I left you, I was but the learner, now I am the master."
If there were a totally generic basketball thread, I'd post there, but there isn't one active so I'll initiate some drift here. The "Cornell Chronicle" headlines "Better basketball through theoretical physics?" A Cornell prof and his team have "has adapted density-functional fluctuation theory (DFFT) to predict player positions and rank players based on their defensive contributions. They've also attempted to quantify "player gravity" – how strongly a player attracts defenders, indicating he's a scoring threat."
https://news.cornell.edu/stories/2025/06/better-basketball-through-theoretical-physics
It seems early to start a generic hoops thread, so more thread drift here.
Princeton's Caden Pierce, the 23-24 POY, is sitting out this upcoming season so he can take grad year somewhere else and get some sweet NIL money.
That's good news for Cornell's chances of making the ILT in its host year. Yale is lock to make the ILT, as they always are, Columbia is mess until proven otherwise, and everyone else is in the hopper with a chance to make the ILT (Penn fans have anointed their Quakers as clear #2, your mileage may vary).
Quote from: mountainredPrinceton's Caden Pierce, the 23-24 POY, is sitting out this upcoming season so he can take grad year somewhere else and get some sweet NIL money.
That's good news for Cornell's chances of making the ILT in its host year. Yale is lock to make the ILT, as they always are, Columbia is mess until proven otherwise, and everyone else is in the hopper with a chance to make the ILT (Penn fans have anointed their Quakers as clear #2, your mileage may vary).
If I read this correctly, he'll study at Princeton but not play in 2025-26, graduate with an Ivy degree, play for a more visible team (?) that comes with significant NIL money. Ivy players can receive NIL money — that is, the Ivy presidents and the league cannot bar it — but it's not at the level what a Kentucky might offer. He's majoring in computer science, which you wouldn't take if you wanted to glide through your classes. Family is a bunch of smart, high-performing athletes:
Quote from: Princeton PRPersonal: Greg Pierce (dad) played football at Northwestern, Stephanie Pierce (mom) played volleyball at Northwestern ... Justin Pierce (brother) played three years of college basketball at William and Mary, graduated in three years and transferred to University of North Carolina for final year and played under Roy Williams, now plays professional basketball overseas ... Alec Pierce (Brother) is a wide receiver for the Indianapolis Colts and was a second round pick in the 2022 NFL draft who played at University of Cincinnati ... majoring in computer science.
Not making a new thread for this but Chris Mañon had a very good summer league and was signed to a two-way deal by the Lakers (https://www.nba.com/news/lakers-sign-chris-manon). He'll probably wind up in the G but that's still cool.
Also, the NBA spells his name with a tilde which I don't think Cornell ever did.
Quote from: ugarteNot making a new thread for this but Chris Mañon had a very good summer league and was signed to a two-way deal by the Lakers (https://www.nba.com/news/lakers-sign-chris-manon). He'll probably wind up in the G but that's still cool.
Also, the NBA spells his name with a tilde which I don't think Cornell ever did.
The NBA is more PC than Cornell.
Guy Ragland Jr signed with Nitra Bluewings (Slovakia)
Quote from: ugarteNot making a new thread for this but Chris Mañon had a very good summer league and was signed to a two-way deal by the Lakers (https://www.nba.com/news/lakers-sign-chris-manon). He'll probably wind up in the G but that's still cool.
Also, the NBA spells his name with a tilde which I don't think Cornell ever did.
Vandy did too. I think Chris made the switch last year. I remember watching a Vandy game, maybe in the NCAAs, and the announcers were pronouncing his name slightly differently.