Doggydaddy's Den: DoggyDaddy's Dailies 5/17/16

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Looks like the waiving of Swin Cash by the New York Liberty is a salary cap solution. They wave her and sign her again for less money. Swin has always been selfless and she is showing it again.

Swin will be back!!

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Interesting article "Next recruiting class crucial for Lady Vols"

It's a true statement. I can't remember a high level team coming away with zero top 100 recruits like Tennessee did with their 2016 class. That is coming off a small 2015 class with No. 12 T'ia Cooper and No. 49 Jamesha Jackson.

They did add unranked Kamera Harris, a 6'3" center that will help back up Mercedes Russell. But she is rated an 89 and the 48th best player at her position for 2016. Not exactly a top program type player.

They also added Schaquilla Nunn, a 6'3" post player and is Tennessee's first graduate transfer. The former Winthrop player will have one season of eligibility remaining. Nunn averaged 11.2 points and 10.3 rebounds per game in three seasons at Winthrop. She was an All-Big South preseason selection last fall before missing the season with a broken foot.

So, for 2016, they have added two post players to replace Graves and in some ways Jones. But they are really unknown commodities.

Freshman posts always take time to adjust to college basketball but an unranked post? Its hard to believe that she can give Tennessee much this upcoming season.

Graduate transfers are also a big unknown. There just haven't been that many. But a great example is Sarah Imovbioh. She played 3 years at Virginia before heading to South Carolina for her final season in 2015-16. She was terrific at Virginia, but she really struggled finding her game consistently for South Carolina. At Virginia she averaged 12.8 ppg and 10.6 rpg. I'm sure that South Carolina was expecting similar type play. But she only averaged 14.4 minutes, 4.2 ppg and 5.0 rpg.

Dunn is coming from a really weak team in a really weak conference. We will have to see how she does on the big stage against better players.

So, after a small 2015 class and a weak 2016 class, Tennessee is desperate for talented players in 2017. There is even a decent chance that Deshields and/or Russell decide to leave after the 2016-17 season making the 2017 class even more important.

Here is the sentence that should really frost the Tennessee fans. "The Lady Vols pursued top 10 prospects Lauren Cox, Joyner Holmes and Tori McCoy into last fall and missed on all three. In retrospect, Warlick said, "maybe we should've had more of a backup list."

Ya think? Coming up empty makes that statement about 2016 pretty obvious. Are they now spreading themselves too thin? "Tennessee is believed to be recruiting at least 17 players in next year's class."

If they come up with another weak class in 2017 and both Deshields and Russell leave along with seniors Reynolds and Carter, Tennessee is in a heap of trouble.

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