Tommy Lloyd

And he's young and he's done nothing but get better.

And you love to see it for Pella Larson, a guy that, you know, I think that Tommy Lloyd and the Arizona staff probably had high expectations for him in the professional ranks.

But when he first transferred to Arizona, I'm not sure anyone viewed him necessarily as an NBA guy.

And now he's going to be a starting member of a team that also deploys Giannis Antetokounmpo and Bam Adebayo.

I mean, that's pretty remarkable, man.

It's a great story.

And I've said it before, but I think it's maybe Tommy Lloyd's greatest success story ever.

as a coach when you look at the full context.

The Ivasich brothers are back.

And then our friends Tommy Lloyd over at Arizona comes in at number four after making the final four last year.

for the first time since 2001 in Arizona's history.

They get back Ivan Karchenkov and Mo Krivos, bring in two really talented freshmen, Caleb Holt and Cameron Holmes.

And I don't think it'll be undeserved necessarily.

I just think that they're not going to give it to Samson or Lloyd or one of those coaches.

So why not give it to Ross Hodge?

You know, what's funny is that if I remember cricket, when I was looking back at this, I think the last three have been Tommy Lloyd and Calvin Sampson.

Yes, and so hilariously in that regard.

I went with Grant McCaslin at Texas Tech.

And so Max was going to write that up, and You know, I would have thought maybe Steve Smith maybe, but it was Mateen Cleaves that went all the way back to 2000 before Michigan was the last time a Big Ten team incredibly had won the national championship.

And then Arizona, Tommy Lloyd has done such a great job.

He too, he came with this because – he is always recruited overseas and he's not afraid to take chances on whether or not the NCAA, how many years a kid will get.

They take kids that usually come in with freshman eligibility and they learn in the program and they're big and talented.

It's an Arizona story.

Tommy Lloyd and the Arizona Wildcats are headed to the Final Four.

The inside scoop on the Arizona Wildcats.

Inside the 10.

Um, so yeah, I, I would say, uh, no, no real qualms as, as you said, the eligibility question certainly loom large for both Arizona and Gonzaga.

Um, you know, without Godfrey, Arizona doesn't have the, quite the like snap you in half physicality, uh, that, that has really defined the Lloyd era.

Um, they really could use him, and then certainly Gonzaga, their guard play, um, very up in the air because not only do you have, um, you know, the, the, the Lee question mark and the Jovan Bennett question mark still working through a European clearance in, uh, Nathan DeSouza, uh, who played in France, who's like a sta-stabilizer at point guard after they lost Mario St. Supery to, uh, to s- to return to Spain.

So, um, yeah, no qualms here really.

Yeah, certainly compared to some of these other teams, Arizona will be relying more on some of the transfers that they have coming in, right? They have, you know, five notable guys and Kaleb Holt who's a newcomer.

Um, I, I do really think even though, uh, you know, Krivas could arguably be the best defensive player in the country, just having him back and, and Karchenkov coming back both, um, I think is just really, really massive, um, and certainly is, is a big factor in why they're, they're ranked so high.

And Tommy Lloyd has been excellent, uh, in recent years in really getting his teams to perform better than the, the sum of their parts.

Um, okay, let's go ahead and move to the next tier here.