NIKO MEDVED – David Shama's Minnesota Sports Headliners

Stay Tuned on Niko Medved, Gophers Basketball Recruiting

Posted on April 8, 2026April 8, 2026 by David Shama

There’s a buzz, including with potential recruits, around Niko Medved’s University of Minnesota basketball program. Don’t be surprised at the program’s success during the transfer portal period that started yesterday and ends April 21.

It’s believed Medved will have a program high of over $7 million to pay players for next season. This is a combined pot of athletic department revenue share money and dollars from donors for Name, Image and Likeness.

Athletic departments in the Big Ten and elsewhere don’t disclose NIL budgets to pay players for activities such as TV commercials, social media endorsements and personal appearances. However, it’s believed the Gophers NIL budget for the coming year could be at least $3.5 million, with a similar amount coming from the U athletic department. Bottom line is Medved will have more money to work with than his first season and word is his budgets from the two sources put Minnesota in the middle range among the Big Ten’s 18 men’s basketball programs.

Niko Medved, Gophers hoops coach, photo by David Shama — Niko Medved

A lot of fans, particularly older generations, bemoan the recent development of paying players in several different sports including men’s basketball and football. But the truth is this allows the Gophers to generally recruit higher level talent than in the past. The Gophers are financially competitive with Big Ten rivals and superior to mid-major programs ranging from Appalachian State to Wichita State.

Hired in March of 2025, Medved showed coaching and culture building skills that suggest promise of making the Gophers a conference contender. The likeable and principled Minnesota native is a big hit with fans including program donors.

Just as important, the players enjoy the program. Evidence of such are his starters with remaining eligibility who are committed to new compensation deals and playing for the 2026-2027 team.

What Medved is trying to do now is fill out the roster around guard Isaac Asuma, and forwards Bobby Durkin, Grayson Grove and Jaylen Crocker-Johnson. It could be that transfers will include former Orono High guard Nolan Groves (Texas Tech) and guard Kyan Evans, who played for Medved at Colorado State prior to joining North Carolina.

Underline this prediction: in coming seasons the Gopher roster will include European players. Talent from overseas is becoming more prevalent in college basketball and Medved is a savvy recruiter with skills that include identifying under the radar talent.

Illinois’ roster included six European players this past season. The Illini made their way to the Final Four this spring. In an early top 25 teams for next season listing by The Athletic’s C.J. Moore, Illinois is No. 1.

The Gophers’ momentum in recruiting success and help for next season started months ago with a three-man recruiting class that 247Sports ranks No. 9 in the Big Ten. The talent meter will be going up with the 2026 freshmen class of four-star small forward Nolen Anderson (Wayzata) and two three-stars, center Chadrack Mpoyi (Crean Lutheran, Irvine, Calif.) and point guard Cedric Tomes (East Ridge).

Worth Noting

With its money and prestige, the Big Ten will be at the forefront of power teams in college football and basketball. Indiana won the national championship in football earlier this year and Michigan earned the national title in men’s basketball earlier this week.

In Moore’s top 25 for next year, he has Michigan No. 2 with Michigan State, Nebraska and Iowa also highly ranked.

Gophers departing senior Cade Tyson, the team’s leading scorer, will participate in the 72nd-annual Portsmouth Invitational Tournament, April 15-18 in Portsmouth, Virginia. Tyson is one of 64 men’s basketball seniors selected for the event, which is a showcase for pro basketball scouts.

Twins right-hander Taj Bradley is among the hottest pitchers in baseball with a 2-0 record and 1.08 ERA. With 22 strikeouts in 16.2 innings, only six other pitchers have whiffed more batters.

Bradley, in his first full season with the Twins, has won two of the club’s five games and could be part of a high quality big three starting staff next season if Minnesota doesn’t trade Joe Ryan and Pablo Lopez recovers from arm surgery.

In what figures to be a playoff atmosphere tomorrow night in Dallas, the Stars host the Wild in what is likely to be a preview of a post season matchup of Central Division power houses. The Wild has won two of the previous three games this season and home ice in the playoffs is likely on the line.

Left wing Matt Boldy (2-2=4) and right-wing Vladimir Tarasenko (1-3=4) lead the Wild with four points each in the series. Left wing Kirill Kaprizov has three points (1-2=3).

The University of St. Thomas hires quality coaches, and it looks like the Tommies hit the bullseye with Mandy Pearson as the new women’s basketball coach. She won Coach of the Year awards during stretches at Minnesota Duluth and St. Mary’s (Minnesota)—two challenging places to win. She was a first team All-American at Concordia College (Minnesota).

3 comments

Medved Expects ‘Large Number’ of Returnees to Gophers

Posted on March 25, 2026March 25, 2026 by David Shama

Niko Medved has nine players on his roster that appear to have eligibility for the 2026-2027 season. The men’s college basketball transfer portal opens for 15 days beginning on April 7 so the Golden Gophers coach will know a lot more by the end of next month, but he told Sports Headliners he believes a “large number of them (players)” will return.

Starters Isaac Asuma (guard), Bobby Durkin (forward) and Grayson Grove (center) have remaining eligibility. Center Jaylen Crocker-Johnson, who was a starter until a foot injury sidelined him in February and sixth man Kai Shinholster (guard) have future eligibility, too.

Projected starters earlier this season Chansey Willis (guard) and Robert Vaihola (center) are candidates to receive medical redshirts. Others on the roster with apparent future eligibility are Max Lorenson (guard) and Chance Stephens (guard).

Medved added that while in this transfer happy era of college basketball there are no guarantees he “feels good” about the process as the window nears for the 2026 portal. He made that comment after Nehemiah Turner (center) transferred but prior to the more recent transfer out of the program by B.J. Omot (forward).

Medved said none of the players who were sidelined with injuries, including Crocker-Johnson, will participate in the College Basketball Crown tournament in Las Vegas starting April 1. The Gophers are part of an eight-team field with their opening quarterfinal game in the single elimination tourney scheduled against Baylor of the Big 12.

The Gophers haven’t played a game since their Big Ten Tournament loss to Rutgers on March 11. In the days since Minnesota players had about a week off. The rest period was one of the reasons Medved and his players opted for the Crown tournament. The Gophers have been playing with a six-man rotation that Medved said will continue in the tourney.

The players were also attracted to the tournament because of potential NIL money. The two winners in the semifinals (April 4) are guaranteed a pool of $50,000. The winning team in the April 5 championship games divides up $300,000 while the loser receives $100,000.

Medved said it’s “cool” that his players have an opportunity to earn money in the postseason. He also likes that the tournament is all in one location, expenses are covered by the tourney and there is an association with FOX Sports, which is a Big Ten partner.

Now in its second year after being founded by FOX Sports and AEG (Anschutz Entertainment Group), the 2026 field consists of Minnesota and Rutgers from the Big Ten, Baylor, Colorado and West Virginia from the Big 12, Creighton from the Big East, Stanford from the ACC and Oklahoma from the SEC.

The Gophers and Baylor have never played against each other. Their game April 1 will be televised starting at 9:30 p.m. CDT.

Hired about a year ago, Medved and his staff scrambled to put a roster together and then faced a discouraging number of injuries that thinned out the talent even more. There was plenty of adversity, including the experience of a losing season (8-12 in the Big Ten and 15-17 overall). Medved and the players took a positive approach to the adversity, and the season included three upsets at Williams Arena over top 25 teams.

“The players deserve a ton of credit for staying with it,” Medved said. “Every time we got knocked down…they just bounced right back. You know it’s really cool. They set a great standard for…the way we want our culture and our program to look like moving forward.”

Worth Noting

Illinois freshman All-American guard Keaton Wagler was an under the radar talent for awhile when in high school in the Kansas City area. When Medved was head coach at Colorado State he said the Rams were recruiting Wagler hard. Medved thought he had a good chance to get him to Colorado State, but he eventually attracted more attention from colleges including Illinois. “…I thought he would be really good,” Medved said. “I don’t know that anyone, even Illinois included, thought he would be this good, this early. Kudos to him.’’

The women Gophers, under third year coach Dawn Plitzuweit, are setting a foundation for increased box office attendance and fan following. The Gophers are headed to the Sacramento Regional and a Sweet 16 game Friday night against UCLA. They earned their first trip to the Sweet 16 since 2005 with a dramatic home win Sunday on a last second shot by Amaya Battle in the fourth quarter.

The Gophers might not have won the 65 -63 game without the raucous support of the fans. Playing first and second round NCAA Tournament games at Williams Arena, the Gophers had announced attendances of 10,355 and 10,763 (arena capacity 14,625). Those were easily the largest home crowds of the season and brought the average for 18 home games to 4,792.

Last year home attendance averaged 3,819. This season and last the Gophers sold in the range of 2,300 to 2,600 public season tickets so there is a lot of potential for growth. With some key returnees and top 40 recruits, the Gophers figure to be winners again next season. Plitzuweit has won everywhere she has coached, including her four previous head jobs.

Gophers football historians noted the recent passing of Minneapolis native Tom Brown who was the dominant player on Minnesota’s 1960 national championship team. A two-way lineman, he was known as a “rolling boulder” on offense and “rock of Gibraltar” on defense. The All-American finished second in the Heisman Trophy balloting in 1960, something no lineman had ever accomplished.

Comments Welcome

What to Know for Office Pool Bracket & U Run for the Crown

Posted on March 18, 2026March 18, 2026 by David Shama

There is a lot of “noise” out there about predicting the “Big Dance” winner. Why listen to this platform?

Well, I have never been wrong in an office pool. (Full disclosure: Never entered one, either.)

Credibility? I’ve been following college hoops for so long I remember when only the Big Ten champion was allowed to be in the 25-team field.

I recall when the Final Four wasn’t on TV. I listened to static-filled broadcasts from out-of-town radio stations and reception was so bad I often didn’t know the score.

Impressed yet? (Should I mention coaching a ninth-grade basketball team to the Minneapolis city title?)

Now that you’re on board, here we go:

Want a dark horse to emerge at the Final Four? While we learned in Minnesota that not all Pitinos are alike, Rick Pitino’s St. John’s Red Storm just might grind their way to the finals in Indianapolis.

To do that the Storm will have to upset Duke in the East Region. The risk-taking part of my brain says a Final Four of St. John’s, Arizona, Michigan and Florida. The Cinderella Pitinos, with their 73-year-old coach and full court maniacal defensive pressure, could bring the “Big Apple” a national championship before the Knicks can win their first NBA title since 1973.

The cautious side of my cranium says it will be Duke, Arizona, Michigan and Florida in the finals. The boys from the desert, those talented Wildcats from Tucson, win it all!

For support on that assertion, I turn to my friend Jim Dutcher. “They just have been the most consistent team all year,” the former Gopher coach said. “They’ve got great guard play and they’ve got good depth. Very good defensive team. …When they play any of the big teams, they still manage to win.”

What about St. John’s, Dutch? “Yeah, the way they came through and just killed UConn (in the Big East Tournament title game last Saturday). UConn is a good team. They beat them by 20. And, of course, Pitino is a good coach. He’s proven it at every level. …They’ve had a great year and they’re a dangerous team for sure.”

The authoritative Kenpom.com website has Duke, Arizona, Michigan and Florida with the four top net ratings among men’s college teams. The first three are above the gold standard of 35.00, with Florida coming in at 33.79. A team at 35 is expected to outscore an average team by 35 points per 100 possessions.

CBS college basketball guru Clark Kellogg has Purdue in his Final Four. Dutcher doesn’t see the Boilermakers going that far because their “outside shooting” isn’t good enough. He thinks Michigan has the best chance of the Big Ten’s nine tourney teams to make a long run. “It wouldn’t be a great surprise to see Michigan go all the way,” he said.

Wisconsin, a No. 5 seed in the West, has two of the better guards in the nation in Nick Boyd and John Blackwell. Boyd played previously for Dutcher’s son, Brian Dutcher, at San Diego State. The Aztecs made the Final Four in 2023 for the first time ever, but with the impact of NIL money in major college basketball now you can make the odds long of mid-majors causing a big splash in the tournament.

The divide between high majors and mid-majors is that considerable. There are reserves on high major teams earning six-figures, so be wary about picking “have nots” to win much in the tournament. “Money talks,” Jim said.

The Gophers, 15-17 overall and 8-12 in Big Ten regular season games, have accepted an invitation to the College Basketball Crown tournament in Las Vegas starting April 1. Other teams are Colorado, Creighton, Baylor, Oklahoma, Rutgers, Stanford, and West Virginia. The Gophers, No. 77 in Kenpom.com net rating, open against Baylor, No. 49, on April 1, with a 9:30 p.m. Minneapolis tip off time scheduled. The game will be televised by FS1.

In coach Niko Medved’s first season, playing with limited talent and virtually no depth because starters were sidelined with injuries, he far exceeded expectations. The Gophers upset three top 25 teams and in the regular season standings finished ahead of seven other schools in the 18-team Big Ten.

“He did an unbelievable job,” Dutcher said of Medved. “To go into a team (place) like Michigan and take them right down to the final wire. And see some of the other games, they were just unbelievable and had some great upsets.

“But then they lost to some teams like a Rutgers (and) that isn’t that good. So, they just don’t have the depth. But he did an outstanding job. It was good to see upwards of 8,000 people at Williams Arena again.”

What about Minnesota’s fate in the upcoming tournament?

“You can’t win a tournament with a six-player roster,” Dutcher said. “Sometimes five player roster. They just don’t have the depth. They’re capable, as we saw, of beating some really good teams, but you’ve gotta have more depth than they have to make a tournament run.”

Comments Welcome