LOUISVILLE, Ky. (WDRB) – For Scott Davenport’s entire coaching career, whether a head coach or an assistant, the opening-meeting routine has always been the same: Welcome the new players to the team, formally, in front of the group.
This year, it was different. With the transfer portal having changed life dramatically for everybody – particularly mid-major programs – Davenport turned instead to the players he has back.
Bellarmine fans will see plenty of familiar faces when the Knights open exhibition play Tuesday night at 6:30 in Knights Hall against Transylvania. The team lost a couple of players to graduation and a couple to injury, but didn’t lose any to the portal, after losing leading scorer Dylan Penn a year prior.
That’s a whole lot of retention for a small-school program that can’t yet go to the NCAA Tournament as it reclassifies from Division II.
“I thanked, congratulated and told them how proud I was of everybody that came back,” Davenport said. “And it was very sincere, because in these turbulent times in college athletics, they believed in themselves, they believed in this institution, and they believed in their plan going forward.”
Still, it’s a remarkable record for a program that would’ve seemed ripe for the offseason picking. Ben Johnson and Pete Suder were both on the ASUN All-Freshman team and were No. 2 and 3 in scoring for the Knights.
Others surely had opportunities.
I asked the longest-tenured Bellarmine player, sixth-year grad student Garrett Tipton, why Bellarmine isn’t suffering portal attrition, even during reclassification.
“It’s a good place to be,” Tipton said. “It’s your teammates. You know, at a lot of other places, it’s makeshift nowadays, right? With the transfer portal and everything else, you don’t know who’s going to be your teammate next year. But you know here. The reason that you come here is to play with great guys, be in a great program at a great school. And we’re just kind of here to build on that, you know. Obviously, we know what 2021 did for the university. And I think that’s all we’re trying to do, just keep building that up. You know, we’ve got great guys. So that’s a lot to do with it.”
Tipton will be playing alongside Johnson and Suder when the Knights open Tuesday night, as well as with a healthy Bash Wieland and Alec Pfriem. Big men Langdon Hatton and Curt Hopf are also back. Fans will get a first look at newcomers Dez McKinney, a guard from North Dakota State, and former Miami of Ohio guard Billy Smith, with a quartet of new freshmen.
“It’s the most competitive team I’ve ever coached at any level,” Davenport said. “You know what? A state championship year at Ballard we literally started the same lineup 39 straight games. In 2000, Division II national championship started the same lineup every single game. That won’t happen this year. Just because of the depth. We have preached and been very consistent, we will play the best players because that’s fair. And you know what else it is? That’s the real world. We’re preparing them. That’s the real world and they compete. But the one thing I admire most about them, they are as close as they are competitive. That’s hard.”
And on Tuesday night, they’ll get to turn that competitiveness outward to an exhibition opponent,.
Copyright 2023 WDRB Media. All Rights Reserved.