Xaria Wiggins

[jdelta02]

Xaria Wiggins has announced entering the transfer portal.

Best to Xaria as she moves forward. Have always felt that Xaria has a lot of potential. Her best basketball still ahead of her.

[99jc]

Xaria Wiggins has announced entering the transfer portal.

Best to Xaria as she moves forward. Have always felt that Xaria has a lot of potenial, her best basketball still ahead of her.

everyone's best basketball is ahead of them once they leave this suck coach.

[RocketDawg]

She seemed to be one of our most enthusiastic players, along with Myah.

I have a feeling she won't be the last to transfer.

[Coach34]

Think about this- she jumped into the portal before the NCAA Tourney before the field was announced. And we were expected to make it in. This tells you the state of our program.

[99jc]

i will personally donate just to her buy out.

[Irondawg]

Think about this- she jumped into the portal before the NCAA Tourney before the field was announced. And we were expected to make it in. This tells you the state of our program.

Yep the timing is interesting. Be interested to see where she and some others end up and how their careers play out

[basedog]

I hate seeing her go. I’ve always thought if Vic would would given her more playing time she would have emerged as a star bi lost interest in this team so I don’t know if she played much this year. I think she was hurt or sick.
Best of luck to her, can’t blame her or others.

[R2Dawg]

She seemed to be one of our most enthusiastic players, along with Myah.

I have a feeling she won't be the last to transfer.

Yep when one of the ones who seemed to play hard with a good attitude leaves first that tells you a lot of what is going on. She isn't going to be one of the few on the team that wants to work and win. I would be felt some better is some attitude was leaving but Wiggins wasn't an issue. She has some good skills. Wish her the best. Wish she could have finished strong at MSU. Oh well, the collapse continues.

[Irondawg]

I don?t know how much her injury affected her this year or what long term issues may be but she seemed to fit what coach wanted.

Quick, athletic, long playe that could play good defense and get out in transition. In some preseason post I had mentioned I thought she might be one that really blossomed under the new coach because the new style of play would favor her

[Ari Gold]

Think about this- she jumped into the portal before the NCAA Tourney before the field was announced. And we were expected to make it in. This tells you the state of our program.

Exactly... this is the red flag of all red flags...

[Offshore Dawg]

The snowball has started down the hill.

[KB21]

This program is about to be the worst in the conference like it was before Vic. A major rebuild is coming after Nikki destroys the program.

[Hambone]

I love how Nikki is taking all the heat....

How about the coach that left in the middle of the night and had underlying issues.....

The program was crumbling before Nikki took the job

[jdelta02]

Besides Matharu, the other guards aren't overly good scorers at this point in their careers. When Matharu isn't knocking down shots, scoring the basketball..the guard rotation normally struggles to score. Though, Myah Taylor stepping up scoring this season has helped to fill some of that void. Thing with Matharu is that she's small, and struggles in halfcourt defense, including often being out of position, late closing on shooters, ect. Same type things Coach Schaefer was dealing with regarding her last season. He indicated that defense prevented him from playing her more than he had been. Still, she has very quick hands, has very good on ball quickness (best on team), and is very good in ball pressue, pressing situations. Defensive upside is definitely there with her. Several of the new guards expected for next season appear capable of pushing for playing time and/or starting at the 2 spot. Just the same, Matharu capable of continuing to improve, holding on. Same opportunity with Mingo-Young.

Very important to the team's scoring for Matharu to be getting as many field goal attempts as needed. Not getting her enough shots at times has helped cost this team games. Same with not getting the ball inside (in good scoring position) enough to Jessika Carter.

Also more regarding Xaria...
She's currently more of a tweener, utility type player...guard/wing/forward. She was able to come in games, and give the team a boost in various different, areas, ways, and positions. Both defensively and offensively. Keep working on her game, she has potential. Will make for a very good pickup out of the transfer portal.

[Tbonewannabe]

I love how Nikki is taking all the heat....

How about the coach that left in the middle of the night and had underlying issues.....

The program was crumbling before Nikki took the job

What exactly was "crumbling"? We only got to the elite 8 and had to play Oregon on their home court to go to the 3rd straight Final Four. Vic had us as a top 10 program at a minimum. Are you saying Vic has the same record with these players?

[MadDawg]

What exactly was "crumbling"? We only got to the elite 8 and had to play Oregon on their home court to go to the 3rd straight Final Four. Vic had us as a top 10 program at a minimum. Are you saying Vic has the same record with these players?

With Vic we would be around 19-3 having just lost to USC in the sect championship game. We would be a 3 seed in tourney.

[R2Dawg]

With Vic we would be around 19-3 having just lost to USC in the sect championship game. We would be a 3 seed in tourney.

Probably agree with that. What a disaster this has been.

[ZedFedder]

I love how Nikki is taking all the heat....

How about the coach that left in the middle of the night and had underlying issues.....

The program was crumbling before Nikki took the job

*rolls eyes*

[Hambone]

Just saying there was more that was going on behind the scenes than what is being told.

Roll your eyes all you want.

[Quaoarsking]

With Vic we would be around 19-3 having just lost to USC in the sect championship game. We would be a 3 seed in tourney.

Probably more like 15-5 or so. Let's not forget that Vic had 2 losses last year worse than any that this year's team has had.

Obviously Vic is much, much better at getting the full potential out of his players, but it's not like there weren't any warning signs last year of taking a step back.

Even now, we have only 1 loss outside the top 40 (and sadly only 1 win inside the top 40).

[R2Dawg]

Probably more like 15-5 or so. Let's not forget that Vic had 2 losses last year worse than any that this year's team has had.

Obviously Vic is much, much better at getting the full potential out of his players, but it's not like there weren't any warning signs last year of taking a step back.

Even now, we have only 1 loss outside the top 40 (and sadly only 1 win inside the top 40).

Back up the wagon. What two losses did Vic have last year worse than any of the losses this year? Are you serious. We have got skull drug by terrible teams. Vic lost a few he shouldn't have but a leap year away from what happened this year.

[confucius say]

Just saying there was more that was going on behind the scenes than what is being told.

Roll your eyes all you want.

The difference is Vic would have fixed the problems.

[Hambone]

No, Vic got the hell out of town.

[Quaoarsking]

Back up the wagon. What two losses did Vic have last year worse than any of the losses this year? Are you serious. We have got skull drug by terrible teams. Vic lost a few he shouldn't have but a leap year away from what happened this year.

Please don't misinterpret this as me saying that Vic isn't a much, much better coach than NMP, as obviously he is. But these are our losses over the last 2 years:

2019-2020 - RPI
1 South Carolina (away)
1 South Carolina (neutral)
6 Stanford (neutral)
25 Kentucky (away)
71 Alabama (home)
78 West Virginia (home)

2020-2021 - NET
4 South Carolina (home)
12 Texas A&M (away)
19 Kentucky (home)
20 Arkansas (away)
29 South Florida (away)
34 Alabama (home)
34 Alabama (away)
38 Missouri (home)
61 LSU (neutral)

Note: I'm not trying to pull a fast one, switching from RPI to NET. The NCAA adopted NET this year, so that's what they put out there. Also it should be pointed out that the NET rankings as as of today and may drift a little before the field is selected.

All I'm saying is that:

Vic's final team had 2 bad home losses that people on the boards melted down about at the time before apparently forgetting all about them.
Neither team actually had any "terrible" losses. For comparison, our men's team has five losses this year alone worse than the #78 team.
This year's team really screwed up by finishing the season with back-to-back losses to Missouri and LSU, because before that it was really easy to make the argument "we've only lost to good teams." It does explain why were projected as a 6 or 7 seed 2 weeks ago and now we're barely hanging in there.

Again, this is not a defense of NMP, just a clarification of who we actually have and haven't lost to this year. Obviously Vic's final team was much better than this, and actually beat several teams in that upper range, while this year's team only has 1 good win (Georgia).

[Medic601]

Just saying there was more that was going on behind the scenes than what is being told.

Roll your eyes all you want.

Well if you are going to hint around about having some ?inside information? about what was going on behind the scenes and the program was crumbling before Vic left, don?t be so elusive... share your knowledge.

[Hambone]

You had star players that were not showing up on time for workouts (never happened before under him). Had players talking back and arguing to the point they were asked to leave and collect themselves. Vic even said so on record last year he was having issues with this team (maturity, responsibility) that he had never had to deal with in his coaching career.

Then there is some personal issues (Not Vic) that were going on under his watch, BUT I will not disclose any of that. People in the know, know.

I am not by any means bashing Vic. He is by far the greatest coach we’ve had in any sport, ever. All I am trying to say is there were cracks in the facade.

[KB21]

Some will go to extremes to try and make NMP look better than she really is as a coach.

[Tbonewannabe]

You had star players that were not showing up on time for workouts (never happened before under him). Had players talking back and arguing to the point they were asked to leave and collect themselves. Vic even said so on record last year he was having issues with this team (maturity, responsibility) that he had never had to deal with in his coaching career.

Then there is some personal issues (Not Vic) that were going on under his watch, BUT I will not disclose any of that. People in the know, know.

I am not by any means bashing Vic. He is by far the greatest coach we’ve had in any sport, ever. All I am trying to say is there were cracks in the facade.

So in your opinion, are these things what led him to jump ship so quickly at a weird time during Covid? It isn't like he went from a high pressure situation to a low one. Also, it has been said that we matched the money UT was offering, not sure if that is true but he was a top 3-5 paid in the country.

[Coach34]

So in your opinion, are these things what led him to jump ship so quickly at a weird time during Covid? It isn't like he went from a high pressure situation to a low one. Also, it has been said that we matched the money UT was offering, not sure if that is true but he was a top 3-5 paid in the country.

Kids transitioning to adults always bring problems. Going to very liberal Austin, Tx is not about some players not showing up on time for shoot-arounds. Gonna always have more discipline problems at a place like UT as opposed to Starkville, Ms. What State tolerates in their weed policy vs UT is very different

[R2Dawg]

Please don't misinterpret this as me saying that Vic isn't a much, much better coach than NMP, as obviously he is. But these are our losses over the last 2 years:

2019-2020 - RPI
1 South Carolina (away)
1 South Carolina (neutral)
6 Stanford (neutral)
25 Kentucky (away)
71 Alabama (home)
78 West Virginia (home)

2020-2021 - NET
4 South Carolina (home)
12 Texas A&M (away)
19 Kentucky (home)
20 Arkansas (away)
29 South Florida (away)
34 Alabama (home)
34 Alabama (away)
38 Missouri (home)
61 LSU (neutral)

Note: I'm not trying to pull a fast one, switching from RPI to NET. The NCAA adopted NET this year, so that's what they put out there. Also it should be pointed out that the NET rankings as as of today and may drift a little before the field is selected.

All I'm saying is that:

Vic's final team had 2 bad home losses that people on the boards melted down about at the time before apparently forgetting all about them.
Neither team actually had any "terrible" losses. For comparison, our men's team has five losses this year alone worse than the #78 team.
This year's team really screwed up by finishing the season with back-to-back losses to Missouri and LSU, because before that it was really easy to make the argument "we've only lost to good teams." It does explain why were projected as a 6 or 7 seed 2 weeks ago and now we're barely hanging in there.

Again, this is not a defense of NMP, just a clarification of who we actually have and haven't lost to this year. Obviously Vic's final team was much better than this, and actually beat several teams in that upper range, while this year's team only has 1 good win (Georgia).

People melting down on a board doesn't mean we had a bad loss. Expectations then were to win 30+ games a year so yeah losing 5-6 games was unacceptable for Vic teams.

But there were no losses on that list anywhere close to the losses this year. We got skull drug all year by terrible teams. This years team has more bad losses than Vic had his whole time here. Losing by 1 or OT is not a bad loss other than it hurts. Vic never got skull drug. We could have beat USC at Columbia that year and was in every game. We were never in most of the games we lost this year.

[tcdog70]

people trying to justify Mccray's sorry coaching by criticizing Vic---is just -well--stupid.

[RougeDawg]

I love how Nikki is taking all the heat....

How about the coach that left in the middle of the night and had underlying issues.....

The program was crumbling before Nikki took the job

Do you wear 2 or 3 masks? Asking for a study on the absurdity of an otherwise rational human brain.

[R2Dawg]

people trying to justify Mccray's sorry coaching by criticizing Vic---is just -well--stupid.

Yep, that is just proof of how bad things are when someone does that. Vic if he were here would not stand there and watch this team perform like it did. He would play walkons before some of these players ever stepped foot on the floor. I guarantee you several players would have left with Vic still here last offseason. That or they would have got it in gear.

[R2Dawg]

I love how Nikki is taking all the heat....

How about the coach that left in the middle of the night and had underlying issues.....

The program was crumbling before Nikki took the job

Program wasn't crumbling when Vic left. Also what does when he left have anything to do with anything? Coaches always leave quickly, that is the way it is done. They don't stick around for a farewell tour around campus unless they are retiring.