Nevada basketball coach Steve Alford is faced with replacing many key components from last season’s 17-16 team.
Nevada Appeal file
Sports Fodder:
The Fresno State Bulldogs are quickly becoming the greatest benefactor the Nevada Wolf Pack can count on each and every men's basketball offseason.
The Wolf Pack plucked another key piece off the Bulldogs' roster last week by securing 6-foot-8 defensive force Elijah Price. Price, who will help alleviate the loss of Nick Davidson (also 6-8) to the Clemson Tigers last week, gives the Pack one of the best returning rebounders in the Mountain West.
Price last season as a freshman was third in the Mountain West in rebounding at 8.2 a game and second in total offensive rebounds at 103. The athletic Price was also fifth in the conference in blocks (40) and averaged 1.3 steals a game.
This is the second consecutive off season that Pack head coach Steve Alford has looked westward to Fresno State to fill a huge Pack need. A year ago, Alford grabbed Fresno State shooting guard Xavier DuSell and all DuSell did this past season was set the Mountain West career record for most successful 3-pointers at 328. He was 67-of-167 beyond the arc (.401) and averaged 7.7 points in a career-low 23.4 minutes a game.
Make no mistake, Price doesn't fill all the concerns created by Davidson's move to Clemson. He, for example, is not the shooter Davidson was for the Pack. Price was just 4-of-38 on 3-pointers last season while Davidson was 46-of-124 (.371) at Nevada. Price also shot just .656 from the line for Fresno while Davidson was at .699. Price also averaged 10.5 points a game last year to Davidson's 15.8.
But keep in mind Price was in his first season of college basketball and he was on a dysfunctional roster (three Bulldogs ended up being investigated for gambling) that went 6-26 overall and 2-18 in league play. Davidson was just 26-of-89 (.292) on threes as a sophomore and averaged just 6.9 points a game as a freshman.
So, the drop in scoring from Davidson to Price might not be as drastic as last year's numbers might indicate. Price improved as the season progressed last year, scoring in double figures in 11 of his final 14 games. He was also 26-of-38 from the line over his final three games.
In three head-to-head games (all Pack victories) last year, Davidson averaged 18.7 points and nine rebounds while Price was at 11 points and nine boards. Price was particularly impressive in the Pack's 86-71 victory over the Bulldogs in the Mountain West tournament with a season-high 17 points (11-of-16 from the line) and 11 rebounds.
The addition of Price, of course, is only the start of Alford's rebuilding project this offseason. The Pack lost veterans Davidson, Kobe Sanders (15.8 points, 3.9 rebounds, 4.5 assists), DuSell, Tre Coleman (7.6 points, 3.6 assists), Brandon Love (4.8 points, 2.7 rebounds), K.J. Hymes (3.4 points, 2.4 rebounds) and Daniel Foster (3.3 points, 3.6 rebounds), while Justin McBride (7.8 points, 4.2 rebounds) is currently in the transfer portal looking for a new home.
Now that Price has added a clear defensive presence to the roster with Price, Alford's top priority this spring and summer is to add some offense. The Wolf Pack, 17-16 this past season, averaged just 72.3 points a game in 2024-25, ranking 222nd in the nation. Sanders, Davidson, McBride and DuSell were their top four scorers.
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The task that Steve Alford is facing this offseason is a huge one. On the surface it appears almost impossible, a bit daunting and maybe outside the realm of the Nevada Wolf Pack’s paper-thin NIL reality.
Yes, the Pack has already done as well as can be expected trying to replace Davidson. Price is not a complete replacement but he's close. Davidson, after all, was the Pack's leading scorer this year and if Price leads the team in scoring in 2025-26, well, a few things likely didn't go as well as planned.
Price is a solid start to a rebuild but it's just a start.
Kobe Sanders did a little of everything for the Pack. On some nights he also did a lot of some things. The loss of Tre Coleman late in the season to injury was the straw that broke the Pack's back this past year. He was the ultimate team player, able to do whatever was needed on any given night. Yes, most of the things he did for the Pack were only noticed by his coaches and teammates. But that's only because coaches and players are the only ones that know what it takes to build a real team.
DuSell could shoot. Yes, he was inconsistent and tended to disappear on the court at times. But his ability to shoot will be missed. McBride was a blossoming star. It would be nice if he had second thoughts and returned to the Pack this spring. Foster and Hymes were leaders. Foster was the glue that held the team together on the floor. His injury late in the year also hurt more than his stats would suggest.
The biggest task Alford has this offseason is trying to find some new leadership. There are plenty of points, rebounds, assists, steals and 3-pointers available in the portal. But it's almost impossible to find true leadership, especially for a team that could very well have five new starters in the fall.
Transfer portal players rarely care enough about their old or new team to provide leadership. Leadership, after all, requires sacrifice at times. If portal players always came with leadership qualities, they likely wouldn't have jumped into the portal in the first place.
It's a rare player these days who provides any type of leadership when he's not getting a ton of minutes or shots. The Pack last year was blessed with a more than its share of those rare players who didn't require big minutes and unlimited shots. Foster, Hymes, and Coleman headed that list but even Sanders, Davidson and DuSell didn't spend all their time hogging the ball and the shots. Even when Coleman and Foster were on the bench with injuries late in the year players like Sanders, Davidson and DuSell still didn't hog all the shots.
Alford's ability to find some leadership on the open market this spring and summer will determine the success of his team in the fall and winter.
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The Las Vegas Raiders, for some reason, are in a win-now mode.
They added 73-year-old head coach Pete Carroll this offseason and then went out and signed 34-year-old quarterback Geno Smith. Is this the right way to proceed with an organization that just went 4-13 overall and 0-6 in the AFC West?
Nobody will argue that Carroll, who has gone 170-120-1 in 18 NFL seasons, including a Super Bowl title with the Seattle Seahawks after the 2013 season, isn't an upgrade over fired head coach Antonio Pierce. And nobody in their right might would suggest that Smith isn't a step or two up from last year's quarterback room that included Gardner Minshew, Aidan O'Connell and Desmond Ridder.
But is merely hoping to go from bad to mediocre really a plan? The Raiders, it seems, are shooting for an 8-9 or 9-8 record the next two years before they have to add a new head coach and quarterback once again. Don't rule them out signing Aaron Rodgers in 2027.
The Seahawks, by the way, went 9-8 in both 2022 and 2023 with Carroll as their head coach and Smith as their starting quarterback.
The Raiders used to be an organization that coined the phrase, "Just win, baby." Apparently, that has been modified to "Just win half the games, baby."
The move to Las Vegas, while great for the Clark County economy, hasn't been so great for the product on the field. The Raiders have gone 36-48 since moving to Las Vegas for the 2020 season, with just one playoff game. Jon Gruden, Rich Bisaccia, Josh McDaniels and Antonio Pierce have been the head coaches while Derek Carr, Jarrett Stidham, Aidan O'Connell, Jimmy Garappolo, Brian Hoyer, Gardner Minshew and Desmond Ridder have been the starting quarterbacks.
It's an organization that has lost its mystique, aura and identity since leaving Oakland — in addition to a whole lot of football games. But the losing didn't start in Las Vegas. The Raiders have had just two winning seasons and haven't won a playoff game since going to the Super Bowl after the 2002 season.
The playoffs and the Super Bowl, though, are so far off in the distance that the Raiders now think Geno Smith and Pete Carroll constitute an upgrade.
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Many NFL mock drafts are predicting the Raiders will select Boise State running back Ashton Jeanty with the sixth pick in the draft on April 24.
They could do a lot worse.
Jeanty, a Heisman Trophy finalist back in December, seems like a proper fit with Geno Smith and Pete Carroll. Smith is a solid, accurate and dependable NFL quarterback when you don't ask him to do too much. Smith has relied heavily on the run game since he became a full-time starter ni 2022, handing off to Kenneth Walker, Zach Charbonnet and Rashaad Penny. And Carroll was at his best as an NFL head coach when he had Marshawn Lynch.
The Raiders right now have just 31-year-old Ameer Abdullah and 32-year-old Raheem Mostert as legitimate options in the backfield after losing Josh Jacobs (to Green Bay) and Alexander Mattison (to Miami) the last two off-seasons. Jeanty, a Boise State product like Mattison, would be a solid pick.
Jeanty rushed for 2,601 yards and 29 touchdowns last fall, including a 209-yard, three-touchdown effort in a 28-21 win over Nevada on Nov. 9. He might be the next Derrick Henry or Saquon Barkley, or he might just be a safe, productive back like former Raider No. 1 picks Darren McFadden or Napoleon Kaufman.
If Jeanty is the pick in two weeks, Raider fans will at least have something to get excited about and we should at least admire them for shooting for the stars after an offseason of settling for a quarterback and head coach on their last go-around in the league. If nothing else, with Jeanty on the roster, the new head coach who replaces Carroll in two years likely won't have to worry about finding a new running back.
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The San Francisco 49ers, who hold the No. 11 pick in the first round, are a huge mystery right now.
They've lost a ton of talent and experience off the roster with the departure this offseason of Dre Greenlaw, Charvarius Ward, Kyle Jusczyk and Deebo Samuel, leaving the future a bit in doubt.
But after the dust settled, the 49ers still had the likes of Nick Bosa, Brandon Aiyuk, Christian McCaffrey, Trent Williams, George Kittle, Fred Warner and Brock Purdy, so it's not all doom and gloom in Santa Clara. Not yet. But a volatile offseason still has 49er faithful a bit uneasy.
Much of that uneasiness centers around the future of the quarterback position, an area where 49er faithful have enjoyed quite an easy ride since Joe Montana arrived in 1979. But Purdy is signed just though the coming season and, well, he hasn't signed an extension yet.
Purdy, the brother of Wolf Pack starting quarterback Chubba Purdy, will command a yearly salary of over $50 million a season. The days of giving Montana roughly $3.5 million year are long gone. The most Steve Young made with the 49ers was about $8.2 million a year. Giving a quarterback a contract extension is not a slam dunk anymore. It's a decision that requires courage. Dak Prescott, after all, is getting $60 million a year from the Dallas Cowboys and can't even make the playoffs.
The 49ers, to be sure, got extremely lucky with Purdy when they selected him with the final pick in the 2022 draft out of Iowa State. He's gone 23-13 as an NFL starter, throwing for 9,518 yards and 64 touchdowns in just 40 overall games. He's also gone 4-2 in the playoffs, getting to one Super Bowl. If the 49ers don't give him $50 million plus a year this offseason, you can bet someone else will next year at this time.
Yes, quarterbacks like Prescott, Trevor Lawrence ($55 million a year), Jordan Love ($55 million a year), Tua Tagovailova ($53 million a year) and even Kyler Murray ($46 million a year) are vastly overpaid. They likely won't ever sniff a Super Bowl. And don't forget, 49ers' coach Kyle Shanahan seems able to squeeze touchdowns and wins out of any quarterback with one healthy arm and two healthy legs. Hey, he did it with Purdy, didn't he?
But letting Purdy walk out of town like he is Trey Lance, Jimmy Garoppolo or Sam Darnold is not an option. The 49ers don't let productive quarterbacks simply leave town unless, of course they are a 37-year-old injury-prone Joe Montana and you have a 32-year-old, healthy, rested and motivated Steve Young still on the roster.
The 49ers need to give Purdy basically what he wants. Something along the lines of at least $250 million over five years (2026-30) should do it.