bob-sabin_2_07-08-2026_132704 0:11

Welcome to Tracking the Cats. I'm Bob Saban, along with our co-host, Steve White

bob-sabin_1_07-08-2026_115500 0:16

We're a week late on our schedule this summer, but we're doing okay with that. And we've got more guests coming up over the course of the summer. But as we continue with Tracking the Cats, we are going to be as usual brought to you by Stanberry Insurance with offices in Silva, Waynesville, Highlands, and Clyde, and they can handle all your insurance needs. I'm in a different location today, obviously. I'm in the Florida Keys with one of my kids expecting our eighth grandchild, hopefully any day now. That's why you see a unsolicited advertisement behind us. One, one of my boys used to work for that company. Actually, both my boys used to work for that company. And so I'm in a unusual situation, but still we got the Catamount banner behind us, and that's gonna be good. Steve, wanna w- have you go ahead and welcome Coach Craft and open it up with the first questions. We are so glad to have you back, Coach.

squadcaster-cgcf_1_07-08-2026_115457 1:21

That, that's great just having him back here. But yeah, it's Coach a pretty, a good big week for Catamount basketball this week for a lot of reasons. But me and close to 100 other alleged golfers had a great time Monday over at Waynesville Country Club, our second annual WCU Summer Shootout the basketball shootout, a fun day for everyone involved. My foursome didn't contend for the championship, the trophy, but we really enjoyed the camaraderie, seeing a lot of Catamount fans, seeing the next year's basketball team, and just having a great time and helping Catamount basketball. And maybe just your thoughts on the event, and I say I, I think we did a great decision on maybe postponing it from the first time when we had some threatening weather, but the weather was really great Monday over in Waynesville

squadcaster-1500_1_07-08-2026_115458 2:15

Yeah, it was a great day, Steve, and I appreciate you being there and playing in the tournament. It was a great day. And guys, thanks for having me on your podcast. I always enjoy coming on and talking with you guys. But it was a good day on Monday. The weather was fantastic. I was just r- so impressed about how-- the, our turnout with us having to postpone it, 'cause it was supposed to be on June 22nd. We had some threatening weather, so we pushed it to the rain-out date, which was this Monday, July 6th. But had a great turnout. Seemed like people had a lot of fun. Nice kinda overcast day, so it wasn't so super hot. Probably couldn't have been better from a weather standpoint and just a great day to, to hang out with people that love Western and, just really thankful for the support of people the sponsors that we had for the event those that sponsored teams those golfers that, that signed up to play. A-and then, our staff that did a great job organizing the event. Particularly on our staff, Jackson Simmons is really the guy that did a lot of the legwork, working with our Catamount Club, and Brittany Ki-Kichlighter they did a phenomenal job putting it on. Making that decision to move it when we had some rain threatening there on, on the 22nd. But it went great, and we enjoyed the day, and I hope everybody else did as well.

squadcaster-cgcf_1_07-08-2026_115457 3:34

I get,

bob-sabin_1_07-08-2026_115500 3:35

Was,

squadcaster-cgcf_1_07-08-2026_115457 3:35

was a lot of fun.

bob-sabin_1_07-08-2026_115500 3:36

am I confused? But was that the Mutt on the same another golf tournament? Was that the same day?

squadcaster-cgcf_1_07-08-2026_115457 3:42

the week before

bob-sabin_1_07-08-2026_115500 3:42

Was that early? That was earlier. Okay. 'Cause I'm starting to see some promotion on how that went. So it sounds like that went pretty well too

squadcaster-cgcf_1_07-08-2026_115457 3:51

had a great turnout down in Charlotte. Actually in Concord at Cabarrus Country Club. We had played that in Western North Carolina for years, the Mutt, but they moved it close to Pam DeGraffenried. The family all lives in the Charlotte area now, so it worked out a lot better. But great turnout down there, great turnout Monday. So we've got two more left. Got one, I think the 21st of August the Marion Lake Club, the old shootout down there, and then the Bob Waters Memorial on October the 2nd on a Friday before our, I think our game with Tennessee Tech. So two more tournaments coming up for the Catamount Club.

bob-sabin_1_07-08-2026_115500 4:28

So Coach how did this actually benefit you guys as far as total in income and how that's going to support the team?

squadcaster-1500_1_07-08-2026_115458 4:37

Yeah, I don't know the final numbers on it, Bob, but we were estimating bringing in around 20,000 for our program, to go into our development account which we can use for a variety of things. Certainly now everybody you gotta raise money for to put your roster together. And a good amount of that will go towards that, but it just, the overall operation of our program. It was a good day for us to certainly elevate some funding that we have there

squadcaster-cgcf_1_07-08-2026_115457 5:03

Well, Coach, it

bob-sabin_1_07-08-2026_115500 5:04

So

squadcaster-cgcf_1_07-08-2026_115457 5:04

a lot of your players actually at the tournament, and is that your entire team that we saw there? How many players are on campus this summer, and any of next year's players not in Calloway for your summer program? You might want to talk about their summer workouts, how that evolves. I know that's a new thing that's evolved over the last few years. Used to be, you couldn't even gather your team together until October. I know, and that's were talking about that earlier. That takes up a lot of time in the summertime.

squadcaster-1500_1_07-08-2026_115458 5:34

Yeah, it does. It does. Most of our team was there at the event. We brought them out there to ha- we practiced in the morning, and then they had weights and things like that, so they weren't playing or anything. But we brought them out there to have lunch with the participants and hopefully get to know and meet some people. There was a few guys that weren't there, that weren't out there. But in terms of everybody that's on campus here t- right now we have one player who's not here right now. He was here to start, and then he had to go, To Guyana, that's Malachi Brown, who's a transfer point guard from Georgia State. Was a two-year starter at Georgia State. He averaged about 12 points a game for Georgia State. He was here for the first couple practices and then he got an opportunity to try out for the Guyana national team, which his mom is from that country, small little island in the Caribbean. And so Malachi's down there right now in the Caribbean playing basketball and training camp and then they have a t- a tournament here that starts later this week. But he'll be back with us starting on Monday, so be good to get him back. We have all of our scholarship players here right now and most of our walk-ons as well. They came in on June 24th, got them moved in, had c- a couple good practices Friday and Saturday of that week. And then we're now currently in the second full week of having those guys on campus. We've got, We'll go all the way through the month of July, so for a total of about five and a half weeks with them here. It's a really important time for the team. We got 10 new players, and establishing the way that we operate, the pillars of our culture the things that, that we wanna represent as a basketball program there's a lot of time put in during the summer establishing those things and talking about those things. And we're doing a lot of meeting and discussion on tho- that. We get some time with them on the court. We're allowed to practice or do athletic, mandatory athletic activities with the team for eight hours per week. per week you have eight hours when you're not in season. Some of that is spent, about half of that's spent in the weight room and then the other half on the court. So it's again, it's just a, it's a really important time for us to lay the groundwork and we talk about building a unbreakable foundation in the summer. That's really the goal for us. We want a foundation of relationships, foundation of trust, foundation of the way that we want to do everything that we do and how we wanna represent Western Carolina. On and off the court. And then a foundation for the way that we like to play, both offensively and defensively. That's kinda our goal for the five and a half weeks to to build a strong foundation that when the guys get back in the fall, they'll have about two weeks off between summer training camp and fall classes. So when f- we have about two weeks in between those, when the, so when the guys get back in the fall, then you got about a month to six weeks to get going before you start your preseason practices. So we wanna be in a great place when we come back in August in every facet of our program

bob-sabin_1_07-08-2026_115500 8:48

I know that some of the foundations that you're talking about is off-court team building and you guys do some fun things and fun activities. Can you share some of that kind of thing that, that, that helps build camaraderie amongst the players?

squadcaster-1500_1_07-08-2026_115458 9:02

Yeah, sure, Bob. Just trying to create shared experiences. Again, we got a lot of guys in that locker room that don't know each other real well. It's amazing how quickly they blend and bond and, start to have fun together. But the... We're doing things a little differently this summer. We have John Williams, our strength coach, has organized this. But w- we've all, put our our two cents in and to put it together. But we have-- W- we're calling this the Cullowhee Olympics. So we have every... The way we're organizing our summer, every week we have two teams. We have a purple team and a gold team. So we divide the t- the players up into two teams. They're new teams each week. But we give them the teams on Sunday night, and then there's a series of ways that they can earn points. Part of the ways they earn points is just, being on time, wearing the right gear cleaning up after themselves doing what you're supposed to do. Sh- we have mandatory breakfast in the summer. Yeah, that's one way that they earn points. We call them trustworthy points. Trustworthy is a pillar of our Catamount DNA, our culture. And so we have a, they can earn these trustworthy points. Then we have competitions through the week. So we have at least one drill in every practice that's purple versus gold for a chance to get a point for the Olympics. So you got one of those every day. We have a weight room competition at the end of the week that's just a gritty deal a- on Fridays. Then we have an off-court competition every week. Last week we played softball on the Catamount softball field, purple versus gold. The players can draft staff members to their teams on, for the off-court

bob-sabin_1_07-08-2026_115500 10:42

Great

squadcaster-1500_1_07-08-2026_115458 10:42

So we had purple. Our purple team won last week. And now as we, we roll into week two, we got gold is up a little bit right now as of today. But it's been... It's a fun way to create some more competition. Also some accountability in some areas that... And some shared accountability in some areas. And so we've done similar things like this throughout our years in our program. But this is a little bit different. And Coach John Williams, our strength coach, came up with the idea, and I'm really enjoying it so far. I think the players are too.

squadcaster-cgcf_1_07-08-2026_115457 11:16

Yeah

bob-sabin_1_07-08-2026_115500 11:16

And I can imagine that you see some who's gonna be in some leadership roles coming just from those types of things as well, right?

squadcaster-1500_1_07-08-2026_115458 11:24

you got some guys that kind of step forward to, to make sure everybody's where they're supposed to be and doing the right things and yeah, stepping forward as leaders and, that'll be important thing as we, continue throughout the summer is having some guys step into those roles.

squadcaster-cgcf_1_07-08-2026_115457 11:38

How is this team maybe different from last season? Maybe what has impressed you? I know it's early and you really haven't, any competition type thing, but how what's impressed you about this bunch and how maybe is it going to be different from what we saw last season? know twen- New players.

squadcaster-1500_1_07-08-2026_115458 11:56

yeah. Yeah. It is early. It is early, so we do have, we do ha- We don't have as much continuity as we did last year. Where last year I believe we had maybe seven scholarship players back six or seven whereas we don't, we don't have... We only have two scholarship players back. We got four overall returners. So our continuity's not as good which you love having, returners. But that just didn't shake out that way for us this year. I would say the, some of the ways that we're different we have a more overall a more athletic team. Our athleticism to run and jump and move is at a higher level than it was with last year's roster. I think that will translate into us being a a good defensive team. You typically when you have good length and athleticism, that can translate to being a good defen- defending and rebounding team. Now a lot more goes into it than just that, but think we, we would hope to be a better defensive team last, than we were last year. And I would hope we'd be able to maybe to play a little faster than we did. So th- those are some things that I think maybe some changes that you, w- we, you might be able to see going into this year. Again, it is early. But we do like our ability to be athletic out there on the floor pretty versatile defensively. We got pretty good size on the perimeter. Our point guard position, we have some smaller players, but other than that, we have pretty good size which is great. We're looking forward to continuing to build all the things you gotta build to having a great season.

bob-sabin_1_07-08-2026_115500 13:31

I'm looking at your returners and they look like we had some impact from several of those from last year, which is great. Your freshmen are impressive. You've got the Chinese guy, Xu who seems pretty solid. And your transfers got some nice pedigree from the places that they came from. Looking at the roster, I'm thinking you've gotta be fairly pleased with what you've got

squadcaster-1500_1_07-08-2026_115458 14:01

Yeah I thought the staff did a great job in the spring building this roster and recruiting. I wish we, could've done a... maybe retained one or two of the guys from last year, but we weren't able to do it. But I think two things. W- we did, we worked really hard in fundraising and just creative ways to, create different streams of revenue for our revenue sharing and our NIL program. We, we did a really, I think, good job there getting to a certain number where we have the opportunity to bring in some transfers that have proven themselves. And you got Malachi Brown, who was a double figure scorer, in the Sun Belt Conference. He's going into year four, so he's got experience. He started over 60 games in Division 1. You got Isaiah Manning, who started his career at TCU, was a 150, top 150 player, coming out of high school. And had a really good season before he before he, he got... Suffered an injury about middle of the year at Sam Houston State. Conference USA, he averaged double figures, around 10, 11 points a game some production there. He's going into year four. We, we got Traveal Bryson who played last year at Howard. They went to the NCAA tournament. And he averaged about nine points a game for a conference championship team. Jayden Roberts is another transfer who we think is got a bright future. Was just a freshman last year at Hofstra, but another team that went to the NCAA tournament. played behind one of the best players in their league. So he came off the bench, but in his minutes that he played was very efficient and scored the ball really well, can shoot the basketball can score, create his own shot. I'm looking up here at my roster up here on the board. Donovan Raymond is a post player that, that has also been in college for three years and so he's got some experience coming from Old Dominion and playing quite a bit for those guys. And he'll be a good post player for us. Then and then Jackson Prunty started 10 games last year at College of Charleston, and he's in year three. So got some experience there from a transfer standpoint. Certainly our returners with Samuel Dada, I would think he'd be preseason All-Conference player. He's looked terrific here this summer going into year two with us here. And then Tayshaun Smith, who had a good season for us as a freshman, provides some versatility, can play some different positions. Physical rebounder, defender. and then you mentioned our four freshmen who I think are really talented guys and we signed Antonio McCoy early out of Eastern North Carolina. He's really looked good here early on. Jacob Zhu is from Atlanta. But you mentioned that his dad is from China, so he plays with the Chinese national team. Then we've got Jose Martins who's really done a nice job so far. He's a big point guard, can play some two. He's about 6'4". And then and then we've got Fola Fola Sandipo, who is about 6'8" big forward. Got great future, great upside. So we like the roster. The guys are, have been working really hard. I think we've got pretty high level of talent and there's a lot of work to put all the pieces together, a lot of work to do, but I think these guys are up for the work from what I've seen so far. It's gonna be exciting to just see them grow here this summer over the next few weeks.

squadcaster-cgcf_1_07-08-2026_115457 17:28

Well, Coach moving along to something that be like I say the big picture, so as to speak. There's a lot of contrary, a lot of questions about on the expansion of the NCAA tournament for next March, moving from 68 to 76 teams. A lot of discussion on whether it will help the mid-major conferences with more at large teams or just create more spots for the Power Five leagues. Y- maybe just a little editorial comments from you about th- this decision

squadcaster-1500_1_07-08-2026_115458 17:59

Yeah, Steve I'll just be honest with you, man. I'm really the wrong guy to comment on it. I just... I should I should be more dialed. I know that the NCAA tournament has expanded. I'm well aware of it. I'm just too focused on getting Western to the NCAA tournament,

squadcaster-cgcf_1_07-08-2026_115457 18:14

right

squadcaster-1500_1_07-08-2026_115458 18:15

I don't... I'm just, Is it better for mid-majors? Is it worse? I don't... I really can't... I don't know. I think i- it's gonna... It's certainly gonna create more of the first four scenarios, where those are expanded, so you have more teams playing in that that what used to be the first four round. Which could be, more... There's gonna be more mid-majors playing in that round. Whereas, instead of maybe being a 15 seed you're gonna be playing on Tuesday or Monday or Tuesday early which I think is fine. I think that's... Wherever you're playing in the NCAA tournament, it's really exciting, whether it's in that first what used to be called the first four, I don't know what they're calling it now or not. So I, I don't... I just... I really don't spend a lot of time thinking about it things that I can't control, that are beyond my control. We just... we've had our head down trying to raise money, build our roster. And now that we got the guys in here, now pour into them and do everything we can to make sure that when November rolls around, we got a product here that's gonna make Western fans proud

bob-sabin_1_07-08-2026_115500 19:20

I can't figure out whether this next question is going to be more of a side note over the course of the season or if it's gonna be an impact. But when we talk about Tennessee Tech joining the Southern Conference, it is going to impact, have impact on the schedule in once we get started. How do you see that rolling out? And of course, that part of the schedule we won't know for a couple of months, but w- any initial conversations on that? And what do you think about Tech as far as the basketball program?

squadcaster-1500_1_07-08-2026_115458 19:52

Yeah I think I think they're gonna be a great member to the league. My little brother actually played quarterback at Tennessee Tech, so I'm pretty familiar with Cookeville. I used to go up there and watch him play a lot. That was a long... that was years ago. So I haven't been there in a while, but I know they're really investing heavily into both football and men's basketball. I know that for a fact. So they're gonna be a formidable opponent, I know in those two sports. I don't really know how they've been in other sports. But I think it's great to expand into Tennessee a little bit there, our footprint in the league. It is gonna change our schedule. We're playing 20 league games now versus 18, so we're gonna continue to play everybody twice. we're actually playing three conference games in December. So

bob-sabin_1_07-08-2026_115500 20:37

Wow

squadcaster-1500_1_07-08-2026_115458 20:38

something that's very different. And the schedule hasn't... Or we haven't released our schedule yet, but we're pretty close, I think, to doing that. We play Citadel on December 5th. And then we play Furman, and that's at home, and then we play at Waf- at Furman at Wofford at the end, very end of December. Just kinda moves... the schedule moves up a little bit into the year 'cause you gotta play more games. The conference tournament has... The bracket is gonna be a little different. it's a little different than what it was the last year for sure, last few years. Which the bracket is... i'm not honestly crazy about it. It's not a huge difference, but there are some some things that are a little different there. I believe five teams get to buy versus six, and it's just, it's structured a little bit differently. So yeah, there's been an impact just bringing another team in and how that affects scheduling, how that affects the bracket. And I think they're gonna be very competitive

squadcaster-cgcf_1_07-08-2026_115457 21:38

Yeah, Te- Tennessee Tech, talking about Tennessee Tech back in the early '70s even into the '80s they were a regular on our football schedule, and we also played them several times in basketball. And like I say, I'm very impressed with that campus and with what they're doing and so forth. And one of these days when we have a lot of time, I'll tell you the story how about I got kicked off a press row at Tennessee Tech for,

squadcaster-1500_1_07-08-2026_115458 22:03

Oh

squadcaster-cgcf_1_07-08-2026_115457 22:03

S- that's another story for another day.

squadcaster-1500_1_07-08-2026_115458 22:06

Okay.

squadcaster-cgcf_1_07-08-2026_115457 22:07

a good one.

squadcaster-1500_1_07-08-2026_115458 22:08

I bet it is

bob-sabin_1_07-08-2026_115500 22:09

We'll nail that one. We'll put that one in the next time we're up. Ta- and talking about next year's schedule, we've got, Is there gonna be a time or have we renewed the ASUN SoCon Challenge? And I know now we've got three ACC teams on our out-of-conference schedule

squadcaster-1500_1_07-08-2026_115458 22:31

Yeah. Yeah. To a- answer the question about the ASUN alliance with the SoCon, we did have that in place to play two ASUN teams, just like we have the last two years. Unfortunately, that kind of fell through late. A little bit of a sore subject with a lot of the coaches in the Southern Conference and ADs because, we felt we had- we'd really just been holding two dates for those games since October. for whatever reason it didn't really materialize the way we thought it was going to. So you really have a lot of, a lot of the teams in our league scrambling for a couple more games. We were fortunate to be able to get Lipscomb to come here. So we're get- we got Lipscomb coming here on November 14th. So thankfully we were able to get that done. But yeah, we do we have, we, we got a really challenging schedule. We've got as you said, three ACC opponents. We got Carolina, Wake Forest, and Virginia. We're gonna make a trip to Indianapolis to play Butler. And

bob-sabin_1_07-08-2026_115500 23:33

That's right

squadcaster-1500_1_07-08-2026_115458 23:33

we're also gonna take the team to Charlotte to play UNC Charlotte who will, be really good. Their roster is super talented. Wes Miller, they did a great job building that thing. So we'll get the opportunity to go to Charlotte. We're at Asheville this year. So those are some of the, key games on the schedule.

bob-sabin_1_07-08-2026_115500 23:51

That sounds exciting. Steve, you got anything else that you need to ask?

squadcaster-cgcf_1_07-08-2026_115457 23:56

think Coach has done a great job of covering everything here. I wanted him maybe g- be a little more opinionated about the NCAA decision, but

squadcaster-1500_1_07-08-2026_115458 24:05

Yeah. Sorry.

squadcaster-cgcf_1_07-08-2026_115457 24:06

I understand that.

squadcaster-1500_1_07-08-2026_115458 24:08

Yeah,

squadcaster-cgcf_1_07-08-2026_115457 24:08

but

squadcaster-1500_1_07-08-2026_115458 24:09

that

squadcaster-cgcf_1_07-08-2026_115457 24:09

thing I do know, Coach, it says it's gonna create more money for everyone in NCAA basketball. So I don't know how that's going to trickle down, but they say it'll create a lot more money, so we'll see how that goes. So that's a positive. I guess so. Yeah, that's right.

squadcaster-1500_1_07-08-2026_115458 24:24

Hopefully we see some of it, right?

bob-sabin_1_07-08-2026_115500 24:27

Exactly. Exactly. All right, guys. Our time is about up, and it's been another good one. We appreciate having you back again, Coach. We'll look forward to it in another couple of months as things get s- ready to roll on the basketball court. In the meantime, "Tracking the Cats" is brought to you by Stanberry Insurance, with offices in Waynesville, Silva, Highlands, and Clyde, and they cover all your insurance needs. We will be back in about two weeks. I know it's been three weeks since our last one. We're working to get a couple of good interesting visitors to come on the next couple of podcasts, and we'll give you a heads up when that happens. But until next time, this is Bob Saban, Steve White, and Coach Tim Craft saying so long for "Tracking the Cats."