Going into the 2022-23 season, the Ashland University men’s basketball roster may look a bit different than it has the past few years.

After losing to Cedarville in the 2022 Great Midwest Conference, the team fell just short of a NCAA tournament bid. With an injury to senior forward Derek Koch, the Eagles could not reach full strength and ended up falling short of pre-season hopes.

In the upcoming 2022-23 season, the Eagles are going to be without four of the five regular starters from this past season. Forward Aaron Thompson, guard Bo Furcron, and Koch no longer have eligibility, while sophomore guard Tre Baumgardner has chosen to enter the transfer portal. In addition, four other seniors are graduating this year, leaving the bench depth empty.

“We’re losing a lot,” head coach John Ellenwood said. “But we had some guys that didn’t play that much that I think are going to help us out a ton.”

To replace the size that Koch brings to the team, Ellenwood has his eyes on redshirt forward Maceo Williams and sophomore forward Victor Searls. Ellenwood also likes freshman forward Stefan Stanek, who never found his footing this past season due to COVID-19 and injuries. Junior guard Ethan Conley should also see more playing time, as he has played great off the bench. Finally, the Eagles will be retaining the talents of junior guard Brandon Haraway for another year.

Along with Baungardner, sophomore guard Hunter Shedenhelm will enter the transfer portal as well.

“Everybody has different reasons [for entering the transfer portal],” Ellenwood said. “Usually it’s just not the right fit for some guys. Most of the time it has to do with playing time.”

While Ellenwood may be losing a few players to the transfer portal, he also sees the opportunity that the transfer portal can bring. In particular, Ellenwood is looking at players in the Division I transfer portal who fail to be picked up by a Division I school.

“It’s an interesting dynamic in college sports right now,” Ellenwood said. “There’s a lot of players right now who are on bloated rosters. Because of that, there’s a lot more disgruntled players.”

With a crowded transfer portal, efforts are better spent recruiting players within the portal rather than recruiting players out of high school. This is because a transfer player already has a few years of college experience and is unlikely to transfer twice.

Ellenwood is eyeing the transfer portal for this reason, but he believes that the roster he has currently is capable of making some noise.

“I still have high expectations for this team because we have some very good veterans,” Ellenwood said. “We’re going to have some new players though that are going to have to adapt quickly to a college game.”

Ellenwood knows there will be growing pains as the team enters a new era of Eagle basketball, but he also knows that it is nothing to be concerned about in the long run.

“As the season goes on, if we grow, my expectations will change. I expect us to have some learning mistakes early on that will get fixed and hopefully by Christmas we will be a more veteran team.”