K-State Q&A: Nijel Pack’s transfer, Jerome Tang’s new challenge and spring football
Jerome Tang likes to say he didn’t come to Kansas State to rebuild the Wildcats on the basketball court. Instead, he came here to elevate the program.
That statement fired up a crowd of K-State fans at his introductory news conference last week in Manhattan. But I’m not sure it’s accurate anymore. Tang has no choice but to rebuild the K-State men’s roster now that Carlton Linguard, Luke Kasubke, Selton Miguel and (most importantly) Nijel Pack have decided to transfer.
K-State wasn’t good enough last season to earn Bruce Weber a contract extension, but the Wildcats had some nice pieces. They were on the NCAA Tournament bubble until late February and probably would have been a part of March Madness with a decent big man to help take some pressure off their talented guards.
The hope was that Tang could convince Markquis Nowell and Pack to stay, surround them with some promising transfers and then make a run at the postseason in Year 1.
Well, things just got much more difficult.
Pack was a first-team All-Big 12 guard last season, averaging 17.4 points per game and shooting 43.7% from three-point range. He was arguably the best pure shooter in the conference. He will be sorely missed in Manhattan, and difficult for Tang to replace.
Take away Mark Smith, Mike McGuirl, Miguel and Pack from the equation, and the Wildcats don’t have many returning players worth getting excited about. Ismael Massoud has shown promise and Nowell is one of the best point guards in the Big 12. But ... It’s not a great sign that I ended that sentence after mentioning only two players.
That isn’t to say all hope is lost for next season. Teams can rebuild faster than ever thanks to the transfer portal. T.J. Otzelberger transformed Iowa State into a Sweet 16 team this season after he convinced the right mixture of transfers to play for the Cyclones.
Can Tang find his own version of Izaiah Brockington? And a talented big man? And at least one quality wing?
Maybe. A quick rebuild is certainly possible for Tang and his coaching staff. But the Wildcats are definitely looking at a rebuild, as opposed to an elevation.
And with that, it’s time for another K-State Q&A. Let’s dive into your questions. Thank you for providing them.
Nijel Pack can still withdraw his name from both the NBA Draft and the NCAA transfer portal if he ultimately decides to return to Kansas State and play for Jerome Tang next season.
But I don’t see it happening.
Yes, Pack mentioned in his farewell announcement that he will consider returning to K-State throughout the transfer process. But no one takes the plunge into the transfer portal hoping to stay at their current school.
It has happened before. It will happen again. There is nothing stopping Pack from changing his mind and staying in Manhattan, assuming Tang would welcome him back to the roster (some coaches aren’t so accepting).
But it seems like a long shot. It’s clear he would rather make a run at the NBA or play at a college closer to his home in Indianapolis. College basketball reporter Jon Rothstein tweeted that Pack has already heard from Gonzaga, Arizona, Purdue, Xavier, Tennessee, Miami, Ohio State, North Carolina State and Marquette.
Do you really think he’s going to turn that kind of attention down to stay in Manhattan?
Keep an eye on Purdue throughout the process. Bruce Weber and Matt Painter are close friends. Maybe that connection leads him to the Boilermakers.
The door isn’t closed on Pack returning to K-State. But it’s not wide open, either. I’m certainly not expecting it.
I doubt that has much to do with Nijel Pack’s decision to transfer.
He had NIL deals with a local car dealership and a local restaurant in Manhattan. He also sold a lot of Pushing Pack gear to K-State fans. If he wants to maximize his NIL opportunities, staying put seemed like the smarter move.
This seems more like a situation where Pack really liked Bruce Weber and he decided to leave after K-State went through a coaching change.
I will certainly eat my words if he ends up with a $1 million sponsorship deal somewhere else, but I don’t think that was his main motivation.
I am keeping my eye on Cleveland State as a possibility for both Bruce Weber and Chris Lowery.
Scott Garrett worked at K-State for many years before the Vikings hired him as their athletic director. It won’t surprise me at all if he hires one of them to replace Dennis Gates as the team’s basketball coach.
That would be a good landing spot for Weber. It would get him back to his Midwest roots at a school that can compete for a conference championship.
Of course, there is also a possibility that Weber chooses to retire. I think he wants to continue coaching, but if no one is willing to hire him then it might be time for him to start spending more days with his grand children.
Lowery makes sense as a head coach for several schools at the low-and-mid-major levels. He would be a candidate for an assistant just about anywhere.
Keep an eye on Jermaine Henderson landing a job somewhere in the MAC.
Shane Southwell is young enough that I bet he can network at the Final Four and find a good landing spot. I’m just not sure where.
I actually asked Jerome Tang’s wife about the extremely unique names they chose for their children.
As a father of four myself, that stuff interests me.
I named my children Carson, Oliver, Lincoln and Baker. My first son was born so long ago that people wondered if I really liked covering Carson Coffman when he played quarterback for the Cats. My youngest two sons were born recently enough that people have wondered if I’m a closet Oklahoma fan.
No on all accounts. I was simply aiming for names that were common enough for everyone to know how to spell but unique enough to not be Kevin or Jeff.
I didn’t want my children to suffer through the indignity of spelling out their names when they order food at Chick-fil-A and still having the cashier butcher it. That has happened to me far too many times.
Back to the original topic ...
Sadly, the Tangs are not huge Seinfeld fans. At least, that isn’t why they named their son Seven. Jerome Tang’s middle name is Seven, so they decided to pass that on to their son. They also wanted a family name for their daughter, so they named her Aylyn. Tang was born on the Caribbean island of Trinidad. So it seemed like a fun idea to pronounce her name Island.
Dylan Edwards and Avery Johnson aren’t quite at the level of Arthur Brown, Bryce Brown and Chris Harper, but they are close.
Edwards is the top in-state running back in his recruiting class. Johnson is the top in-state quarterback in his recruiting class. They both have more than 20 scholarship offers and have been in contact with schools like Notre Dame and Oklahoma.
Landing either one of them would be a major recruiting victory for Chris Klieman, not only because they are excellent players but because he has struggled to convince local talent to stay home since he arrived in Manhattan. This would change the narrative that he can’t recruit locally.
I would say K-State is trending in the right direction for both of them. They were each in Manhattan earlier this week for a football practice and would probably rank the Wildcats in their top three at the moment.
Arkansas seems like the biggest threat for Johnson.
Oklahoma seems like the biggest competitor for Edwards.
They might stand to make more money from NIL deals by staying close to home, where their names mean something to fans. We’ll see.
I can’t tell you where they will eventually commit, but K-State is very much involved. That is all you can ask for at this stage.
You shouldn’t be worried at all.
Yes, the Wildcats are way down at defensive tackle during spring practice. So many players are recovering from injuries at that position that K-State coaches have asked an offensive lineman (Trevor Stange) and a long snapper (Nelson Pipes) to fill in on the defensive line.
But it’s not as if the players they are replacing are out indefinitely. Eli Huggins, Jaylen Pickle and others just all coincidentally required surgeries to repair injuries at the end of the 2021 season. And they haven’t been cleared to practice yet.
Much like Adrian Martinez at quarterback, they will be ready to go for summer workouts and preseason camp. Missing 15 practices during the spring won’t hurt anything in the long term.
Fun fact about me: I have never attended a Final Four as a journalist.
Well, that isn’t such a fun fact. It’s more like a sad fact. But it is a fact.
I came close a few times. K-State was on the doorstep of the Final Four in 2010 and 2018 but Butler and Loyola-Chicago got in the way. I was also set to help our coverage team with Kansas and Wichita State a few times, but they got defeated before they could get there.
As fate would have it, when Wichita State and KU have made the Final Four I’ve been back in Manhattan focused on other things. The stars have always aligned against me!
It would be cool to follow Tang to the Final Four with K-State some day.
I still think I am qualified to rate Final Four sites, though. I have been to the Final Four in Atlanta, New Orleans and San Antonio as a fan. I have also been to all of the places you listed for football. So let’s do it.
My rankings:
1. San Antonio - It’s fun to hang out at the Riverwalk until the games start and you just walk across the street to the Alamodome.
2. Phoenix - I never say no to warm weather, golf and basketball.
3. Houston - This is a fun town. I can’t wait to add Houston to the Big 12 travel rotation. But the area surrounding NRG Stadium leaves much to be desired. It would much cooler if the stadium was downtown.
4. Indianapolis - There’s nothing wrong with Indiana. It’s a great place to host the games. I just don’t think of it as a big travel destination.
The odds overwhelming favor the K-State women winning more games than the K-State men next season.
Jerome Tang is going to have to bring in a STRONG assortment of transfers to get the Wildcats to a point where they are fighting for one of the top 16 seeds in the NCAA Tournament. Without Nijel Pack on the roster, I’m not sure that can happen.
But that will be a preseason expectation for Jeff Mittie’s team. The women return Ayoka Lee, Serena Sundell and the vast majority of their rotation from a team that won 20 games and advanced to the second round of the NCAA Tournament this season.
The women are in a much better place than their male counterparts at the moment.
This story was originally published April 1, 2022 at 10:17 AM with the headline "K-State Q&A: Nijel Pack’s transfer, Jerome Tang’s new challenge and spring football."