Building A Family

Author: Matt Raftery

It certainly didn’t take long for T.J. Otzelberger to make a splash in Vegas and get the rumors swirling. This weekend, 3-star South Dakota State recruit Caleb Grill decided to reopen his recruitment and decommit from South Dakota State, in the wake of Otzelberger recently taking the head coaching job at UNLV. In an interview done with the Las Vegas Sun, Grill said, “That would be really cool to follow T.J. to Vegas. It’s going through my mind.” Grill fits Otzelberger’s system well, being a sharp shooting 6 foot 2 inch point guard from Kansas. During Grill’s year varsity basketball career, he averaged nearly 15 points per game, 2.7 assists per game, 3.4 rebounds per game, and over 2 steals per game. Grill also racked up a 38% 3-point shooting percentage along with shooting 76% from the free throw line. Certainly numbers that could contribute to a Rebel’s roster that is currently in limbo with a lot of current UNLV players in the NCAA transfer portal.

Grill is not the only recruit to make noise this past weekend in connection with the Runnin’ Rebels. Jonah Antonio has narrowed down his college choice to three schools: UNLV, SMU, and Seton Hall. Antonio is a junior college player who is originally from Perth, Australia. The sophomore guard has put some impressive numbers in the stat book as well through 34 games at South Plains College. Antonio has averaged 11.6 points per game while having a field goal percentage of 43.6 including over 40% from the three-point line. What is one common theme that popped up in both of these player’s stat lines? They both can light it up from beyond the arch. The noticeably high 3-point percentage fits perfectly within Coach Otzelberger’s offensive system.

The fun didn’t stop there for the Runnin’ Rebels over the weekend. Joel Ntambwe took the weekend to visit UCONN and Jonathan Tchamwa Tchatchoua visited Baylor. This doesn’t necessarily mean that they are definitely transferring but what it does tell us is that they weren’t quite sold on the initial meetings with Coach Otzelberger. We should have more definite information on their collegiate future in the next week or two.

On a more positive note, it sounds like Amauri Hardy is planning on staying with the Runnin’ Rebels next season. This is a huge win for UNLV since Amauri Hardy and Bryce Hamilton fit coach Otz’s coaching style well.