Welcome back into the Illinois Quartet podcast.

It is Jeremy Warner, Derek Piper, didn't plan on doing a Saturday night podcast.

We were hoping to spend a quiet weekend with the family after the season ends for Illinois. But as we know, the transfer portal. It's our favorite time of year, Derek.

All the news that comes in, all the surprises that come in. And, well, it just didn't age well, the Friday morning podcast we recorded because Marez Johnson Jr. enters the transfer portal. Trey White enters the transfer portal. So for about two hours, that was interesting content. We got to go back and talk about it all. But Derek, how's your last 24 hours? I guess 36 hours, Ben, of Alignanai news. Here's the offseason, buddy buddy crazy uh it hits you in the face like oh yeah

this is what this is like and we'll get into it mores does feel maybe a little different than

some other ones that have happened uh especially you know in contrast to most of them i feel like

we can compare it to one or two through the years but certainly certainly a wild development and wild 48 hours,

as I can get into a little bit.

And the conversations I was having on Wednesday night versus what we saw pop on Friday.

So, yeah, I told you before we recorded, I brought a moon man.

So because who doesn't need to drink in the Transion Portal?

So that's kind of where I'm at. But we'll see how many we need to get through the rest of this cycle and how long it takes. Let's talk about it. I mean, we talked about after the season, our offseason previews is like retention, retention. This is the offseason of retention. This was the off season of making sure the two-year plan happens. And

Morez Johnson, Jr., one of the top four or five players we thought could return, gone, right?

A guy that you thought could be a three or four-year player for you, a guy that obviously was

a fan favorite and a guy that you really don't have another piece like him. It's hard to find and they're very expensive.

And that's part of the reason probably where he's entered the portal. Trey White, listen, like there were times this year I didn't know if he was a guy you'd have for two years. He's now going to his fourth school in four years, most likely. And can you find another guy like him in the portal? yeah but i mean he, he's a guy that's talked like you at return and now he's not.

And a guy that you thought could just be a low usage winning player for you as he was late in the season.

So that's kind of my response to all this, Derek.

Obviously, this is really frustrating for fans.

This era of not knowing who's going to be on your roster, not being able to count on a guy who's been committed to you as a high school player for three years.

You buy their jerseys and they're gone.

It's really frustrating for fans, but most importantly, it's like, listen, you can win going into the portal, but I think it makes it harder when you don't have a lot

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