Pardon me for celebrating the state of the Marshall basketball program.
I'm not talking about the recent surge from its three-season abyss. The overall mark of 17-16 was but a steppingstone to where the Thundering Herd wants to be, and the program's record could even take a step back next winter.
I'm coming from a different angle here. Consider coach Dan D'Antoni's just-completed (maybe) signing class.
There are three coming to Huntington. The latest catch was Ky're Allison of Portsmouth, Ohio; Phillip Bledsoe of Wheeling and Jannson Williams of Newnan, Georgia, signed in November.
Allison finished his scholastic career in March at Portsmouth High School, Bledsoe at Wheeling Park High and Williams at Newnan High.
Are you seeing the pattern?
All three are local products, when you consider Williams has family and friends in the Huntington area. But that's not my point here.
They're coming from high school. And consider this craziness: They played at the same school all four years. (Bledsoe transferred to Perry High in Massillon, Ohio, in 2014 but moved back by the start of the '14-15 season.)
Even better, all three apparently have qualified to play as freshmen.
Dang. What a concept.
There are no junior-college transfers. There are no transfers from other schools. There are no prep-school products.
Bravo, I say!
Jucos have their place, in moderation. Two such football players will be among the better Herd defenders this fall, linebacker Devontre'a Tyler and safety C.J. Reavis. But you don't what to do what a desperate Mark Snyder did late last decade and bring in a wave.
The whole prep school movement annoys me to no end.
In football, I won't recite all the players who went to Fork Union or Hargrave Military and still sat out a year as "props." I'll offer one of the worst cases, that of MU great Vinny Curry attending Harmony Community School in Cincinnati and still not qualifying as a freshman.
Curry is the smartest "prop" I have covered at MU. I even asked him, "Why in the hell are you a prop?"
I recall that Chase Litton was planning to go to Atlanta Sports Academy until his mother gave the place a once-over. Litton suffered through a school-less, football-less fall, but that probably was the best choice.
Basketball is far worse. I have written about far too many of those schools that are jokes academically and don't really improve their students' athletic abilities. There are a few schools and coaches I'd trust a young man to, such as A.W. Hamilton at Hargrave, but I'd be wary otherwise.
Of D'Antoni's few recruits so far, one came through prep school and he's already gone (Aleksandar Dozic). While he benefited from former coach Tom Herrion bringing Miami transfer James Kelly to Huntington, I'm not sure D'Antoni will ever go that route.
Kelly was Herrion's best personnel move in a four-year stint littered with bad ones. And it's not coincidence most Herrion recruits came from prep schools and jucos.
Justin Coleman was a Huntington Prep product who had about two moments of brilliance before being dismissed. Kareem Canty went to two prep schools and still was a "prop" whose career was pretty much wasted. Jamir Hanner went to two prep schools and shot like a sportswriter.
Among the jucos, Dennis Tinnon was a warrior you would love to have every year. Justin Edmonds was a victim of injury luck. But D.D. Scarver was a shooter who couldn't shoot, Aundra Williams was among the flakiest athletes I've seen and Elijah Pittman ... oh, never mind.
Yous Mbao was a 7-foot transfer from Marquette who threw balls at the basket and hoped for the best.
Herrion's "traditional" high school recruits who weren't "props" were Tamron Manning, DeVince Boykins and Dante Holmes.
If you said "who?" to the last one, you're not alone. If you want me to never, ever bring up the Tom Herrion era again, I don't blame you.
But it's a point of reference you need to remember as D'Antoni brings in ambitious high school players who likely will earn degrees in 4 to 5 years. And if you missed it, players pushed a 3.00 grade-point average in the fall 2015 semester.
If you like seeing a program run the right way, you should root for this team, even if you're not a Marshall fan.
nnn
Marshall's decision to continue to allow pass-outs at football games was a no-brainer, really.
When discussing it Saturday, athletic director Mike Hamrick gave a nod to the long tradition of allowing fans to leave and return as they please. Some would like to send that tradition the way of the "thunderclap," and there are decent reasons.
At certain games, a lot of fans head into the parking lots at halftime and don't come back, and the stands look emptier because of it. But is it a problem?
No. If you don't have pass-outs in that stadium, you do have a problem. It comes down to the skinny corridors and bathrooms that need additions and renovations.
The corridors under the side stands are about 30 feet wide - the distance needed to gain a first down. Seat rentals and concession stands eat into that distance, so portable toilets outside the gates routinely relieve what would be some nasty congestion.
The south-end stands, added in the haphazard expansion of 2001, have next to no corridor. Or concession stands or bathrooms, for that matter.
The corridors must be widened, perhaps tripled or more, to end pass-outs. And the south end must be improved.
I'd hold off on beer sales for the same reason. That decision, Hamrick said, is still to be made.
"The process is still continuing to determine if that's something we're going to do," he said Saturday.