Speaker 1: Welcome back. This of marches right around the corner and
the Cougars are.
Speaker 2: Written the metal of it.
Speaker 3: It's time to talk some college basketball on Cougar Sports
with Ben Crittles.
Speaker 4: Welcome back Cougar Sports one O three nine ninety eight
point three ESPN the Fan. I've been critical broadcasting from
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Speaker 1: Let's get out to the hotline.
Speaker 4: Welcome and former b YU Great, the Brazilian bomber uh
three point specialist international superstar. We got Jonathan Tabnari on
the line JT for three. What's up, buddy?
Speaker 2: We ought to add we ought to add x twitter. Uh.
Speaker 3: I don't know, tro, but we got to add something
there with how you know my spicy takes, you know,
sparks everybody's day.
Speaker 4: Definitely, they add a whole lot of enrichment. JT takes
on Twitter are.
Speaker 1: Some of the best in the business.
Speaker 4: Know if answer butts about it, JT uh biggest news
probably of the day for BYU basketball. I hate to
start off on a bad note, but Myron Medcalf earlier
today pen to piece entitled by US, Cannard Davis Junior
cited for duy clarification here marijuana possession. Cited for marijuana
position and driving under the influence following a car crash
in subsequent of resid in Provo, Utah, according to a
redacted police report obtained by ESPN on Tuesday through an
open records request. Now, we don't know if this is
medicinal marijuana, if it was prescribed, I don't know if
they would actually like list that on the report. Anyway,
BYU has made an official statement, you know, after the
the case we have looking into the situation from the
b YU sid side of things, and then Kevin Young
in his postgame essentially said that Cannard Davis Junior had
had broken team rules and he is out for an
undetermined amount of time.
Speaker 1: We don't know.
Speaker 4: So a standard field sobriety test was performed due to
the assumption or the you know, the the the w
one of the officers thought that he could be impaired,
and he was later arrested for possession of marijuana. So
your reaction to this news, what you think about it?
The impact of the BOU basketball team, how long he
could be out for this season.
Speaker 3: Well, listen, I you know, it doesn't matter how big
of a view I u fen is. I think we
would all agree that, you know, driving under the influence,
driving while impaired. You know, it's an irresponsible team to do,
first and foremost, Ben, I don't care.
Speaker 2: How big of a fan you are.
Speaker 3: I highly doubt someone would disagree with me. So that's
number one, right, not a smart thing to do. Number
two in terms of uh the statement in YU put
out as you as you know more and better than
I do. VUYU is extremely conservative and delicated when it
comes to these issues. There are a lot of things
in play here, right, it's a private institution, you know,
there's also you know, the standards of the church.
Speaker 2: But then there's also hip ho laws.
Speaker 3: Now in no way, shape or form, I am trying
to condone Canard's actions, you know, there is also the
The thing is could this have been a medically prescribed situation?
Speaker 2: I had a situation with.
Speaker 3: My teammate of mine if you remember Tran placed it
at the time. You know, now ex wife actually had
a situation where she actually was had a d w
Y because she was under medication and she didn't know
that the medication was going to impaired to her the
way you did it, and and you just you know,
you kind of figured that out. And again not not
saying that this is right, but I seen it, I
went through it. I I was there in the locker
room as all these things happening, and it became public information.
While I have an extremely hard time believing that a
BUYU doctor would prescribe marijuana as a source of medication
for a situation, you know, the church has put out
a few different statements on it. And so with all
of that being said, you obviously have to wait for everything
that that's going to come out. And you know a
BUYU is going to play safe and play it, you know,
playing things close to the chest how they all have done,
you know. But again a few things, you know, stating
the obvious here, right, and you know a d U
Y and d W Y are never okay, there's not
a single justification for that.
Speaker 2: That's number one. Number two, the honor.
Speaker 3: Code is extremely clear and open, and you know in
terms of you know where you're signing up for when
you get here, and then you know less but not least,
did you know could this possibly be you know, for
this is there a world where this would be you know,
medically prescribed. I know the chances are small, slim to none,
you know, so let's just wait to find out more.
And so not gonna donate the situation, just kind of
presenting the facts that they are. Nonetheless, you know, turning
the wheels a little bit more to basketball. Bind extremely disappointing,
right because Canard was a starter, you know, he was
looking to be a big addition this year for the team,
especially with the amount of time that he had left
in his career, and so, you know, definitely a big blow,
you know to just the way things are, you know,
to unrevering, unraveling.
Speaker 2: Excuse me.
Speaker 3: One thing that I will say is my freshman year,
I actually got to the rotation because of a situation
like this, if you remember with Rashaan Brotus and so
you know, there are unfortunate events, for sure, you know, thankfully,
uh you know, the university worked with Rashawn and he
was able to get his degree and graduate. You know,
in this day and age of nil and transferring and
so on, and how early it is in in.
Speaker 2: Canard's career, I don't know how that's going to unravel.
But you know, a lot, a lot to take in.
Speaker 3: I know I shared a lot then, but you know,
just trying to be as clear as I can, as
objective as I can, but also you know, trying to
to say, hey, let's let's seem two we have all
the facts, so so none as the thearity, we can
make a judgment, but we can see, you know, so
we can have you know, hindsight is twenty twenty and
then when you have all the information, you know.
Speaker 2: But but that's how I feel about it, Ben.
Speaker 4: Yeah, I'll give additional context here as it pertains to
b YU the NC double A their stance on cannabis
and t UTC and marijuana use, as well as the
LDS UH standard UH and and their UH their insight
on on the use of medical or just and even
recreational marijuanas. So obviously this is a a serious issue,
right UH in a number of ways, as you've mentioned,
and uh, you know, the n C double A has
taken a certain stance on cannabis and this is recent.
Speaker 1: Okay, Uh.
Speaker 4: College athletes must comply with their own schools policies on
drug use and testing in addition to the NC double as. Historically,
the n C Double a's and even like professional athletes,
we've seen kind of a you know, it used to
be where you'd get suspended for legal use or improper
use of THC, cannabis, marijuana, et cetera.
Speaker 1: But now they've been a little bit more lax in.
Speaker 4: The n C Double A also recently has been a
bit more lax on this. During the twenty fourteen NCAA Tournament,
University of Michigan star Ford Mitch McGarry learned he would
be suspended for the upcoming twenty fourteen fifteen season as
a result of a positive marijuana test. Rather than to
sit out the season, Vigary declared for the NBA Draft
and joined the Oklahoma City Thunder. In twenty nineteen, the
NCAA increased the amount of THC that athletes could test
positive for, but players were still suspended for multiple games
and important championships due to cannabis usage. The decision taken
last June by the NCAA this is back in twenty
twenty five, applied retroactively, so college athletes suspended due to
marijuana usage were allowed to rejoin their teams. So there's
growth in permissible cannabis consumption. Once again, like you cannot
get behind the wheel after you consume THHD based cannabis Merijuana.
Speaker 1: You can't do that.
Speaker 4: This is it's illegal and you're putting other people in
harmon way, there needs to be accountability there.
Speaker 1: But we have seen a going trend even within the.
Speaker 4: Church of Jesus Christ the Lattery Saints, where in nineteen
fifteen they the Church explicitly banned cannabis, but the Church
acknowledge is a distinction for medical youth, supporting legal framework
that allow for medical cannabis when prescribed by a doctor.
The Church has opposed the broad legalization of recreational marijuana youths,
and we are obviously here in support of that as well,
because I don't think the I think the impact is
really severe on the youth, in the young minds and
bodies that end up consuming it due to the legalization.
So there's got to be accountability here JT. And as
much as I want Cannar Davis Junior to have a great, lovely,
awesome experience at BYU, this is the first, in my opinion,
true adversity of a pro style programs like this Venture
into pro style program like this is the first true adversity.
I think this b what you basketball team is experiencing
as it relates to the LDS b YU institutional policies
that for many years have been the impediment of going
out and recruiting the highest level talent that wants to
indulge in Uh what seemingly is culturally acceptable but not
acceptable here in Utah, not in at b YU.
Speaker 3: So I and and you know, I love you like
a brother, and we're extremely close.
Speaker 2: We've known each other longer than we've known our wives.
Speaker 3: And so let me put it this way, I would
adjust a little bit to what you're saying as to
this is the first Kevin Young challenge that he's facings.
Speaker 4: That like honor code right, like where you're losing eligibility
of players you recruited, right like Dave Rose, Yes it right, Uh,
Steve Cleveland, I mean, come on.
Speaker 1: Everybody's got it, man.
Speaker 4: We but Bronco experienced it like it's it's inevitable no
matter how you recruit, where you recruit. It seems like
it's inevitable even from an LDS standpoint. I mean we
can go into Spencer Hadley, Uh, in his situation in
Vegas getting caught, you know, partying in Vegas and then
the University of Utah giving it over to the honoricle. Anyway,
there's a lot there to to unpack.
Speaker 3: But well, and and what I would say to disband
is the reason why I say I would personally adjust
the way you presented that because under Kevin Young, who
are the two biggest names that he has.
Speaker 4: Recruited, Yegor Gelemen, Yegor Geoman and a j De Bonsa.
Speaker 2: And Uh, I think we all run.
Speaker 3: I think we all ritweet it InCred you know reposted
including you from your personal account and also from you know. Uh.
The ESPN's accout look at Yegor stated about buy uh
if you want to go, if you want to work
out and you want to just have a good time,
and you want to go bowling and you want to
go just hang out and go get some food and
just work when your game is the place to be.
And here is someone having an incredible rookie season in
the NBA as a top ten lottery pick and the
best prospect that has ever touched floor on on the
Marriott Center court.
Speaker 2: Hey, j.
Speaker 3: Can we talk about this Young man and just like
shower him with praise, my guy. I mean just uh,
the amount of of of situations that this kid puts
himself in to do good, to do the right thing,
to you know, to just grow his brand is very
Lebron asked. Lebron has never had you know, drama in
situations and you know intention and issues and you know
that have exposed him, exposed them. And so to be
able to say that AJA is on that trajectory and
the biggest supporter of the mau about BYU, I agree
with you, Ben, it is the biggest challenge that the
Kevin Young era of basketball is facing. None oftheless Kevin
Young can go and say, look, guys, you know, is
it a different place?
Speaker 2: Absolutely, it's a different place.
Speaker 3: Is it a different type of situation where you know,
talk about you know having to be you know more
like clean and you can you know, you can have
sexual relations with women and you have to maintain you
can drink alcohol, you can you know, partake on recreational
drugs that are allowed elsewhere.
Speaker 2: Absolutely you can do that.
Speaker 3: Nonetheless, let's look at AJ and Yegork and so I
got to tell you I work in sales. I have
to spin up all different sorts of situations to say,
you know, our competitor does this, but you know, how
can you compare that to X, Y and D. And
let me tell you, Ben that if I had to
pitch those two guys versus the honor code and the
issues that we are just talking about, I have a
hard time believing that top prospects that their goal is
to go to the NBA and their families are going
to have a hard time saying no to b YU.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 4: Like so, I've had this discussion with Riker Matthews, former
BYU offensive tackle play in the NFL, played in the CFL,
and something he brought up was very intriguing to me.
He said, look, look, when you get drafted by the
New York Yankees, you become a part of their family
and you gain access to the Yankees organizations. It's resources
all that comes with it, the access to the fans,
Like you're going to be able to make maybe a
lot of money off the baseball diamond and on the
baseball diamond, right and we've seen legacy players just I
mean just do tremendous things off the baseball diamond, and
so you gain access with that comes their honor code.
You know, facial hair, right, I know they've listened to
that a little bit. You have to dress and act
a certain way. There's essentially things that if you want
to be a part of our program, you want to
be a part of our business, you want to be
a part of.
Speaker 1: Our brand, you got to buide.
Speaker 4: And I think in this transition from so called amateurism
to professionalism BYU has to take a pretty ardent stance
about what you're signing up for and like, yeah, the
nil offering is going to be competitive, it's going to
be great, but you must abide, like you're a part
of our brand now, and you get access to that brand,
you get access to that network, you get access to
that corporate monster, one of the best economies, if not
the best economy in the United States of America here
in the state of Utah.
Speaker 1: You get access to all of that.
Speaker 4: But with that, you have to engage in impulse control
in a non traditional sense, right, You have to engage
in an impulse control within you know, this framework that
other people in the United States of America and other
universities are not engaged in. And that's just a part
of it. Once again, let me clarify. Do you why
taking any sort of substance and getting behind the wheel
like there is no like.
Speaker 1: He's got to be held accountable like you. But I
think we.
Speaker 4: Got to do a better job of gatekeeping here with
h and kids are gonna be kids, but we gotta
be if we're gonna do this, I feel like we
need to have more babysitters.
Speaker 1: We gotta have more mentors. We got to have more people.
Speaker 4: Engaged in leading, guiding, walking beside these kids that make
bad decisions. I made bad decisions. I needed mentorship. Yeah,
I need my handheld. And I was. I grew up
in a two parent household and in Arizona active church members. Okay,
Like I had great friends around me, socioeconomically stable, all
those things, and a great war to attend all these
institute and early morning seminary teachers over that, and I
made bad decisions. So like you know what I mean,
Like like, if you want to stay out of the
negative public limelight, then then we probably need to invest
in more infrastructure, more framework to protect people from making
bad decisions.
Speaker 3: I will say this, and again what I'm gonna say
can be interpreted as a dig at u y U
basketball and Kevin Young, but it is not what I
want to highlight is Colony does an amazing job at
this Colony does an amazing job with having former players
who excelled at U y U and that were and
excelled not only on the field, on and off the field.
Colony does a great job on bringing those guys back. Okay,
And this is something that you know, even dating back
to to Mark Pope, it wasn't you know, on the
basketball program. It wasn't extremely you know, it's not something
that is done now. I will be the first to
say I'm down at BUYU a lot because of the
work that I do with Uyu TV. In the list
of things that I would want to do is be
a basketball coach, a collegiate basketball coach.
Speaker 2: Definitely one of the last things that I would want
to do.
Speaker 3: Ben And so I'm not saying that Kevin Young needs
to put more basketball players on his staff. I'm not
saying that at all, you know, But you know, I'm
gonna to your point about mentors. You know, Charles Abuo
is there, Nate Austin is there, and I think that's
a great start to the situation.
Speaker 2: Justin Hamilton, for as great of a player.
Speaker 3: As he was, as successful of a professional a professional
basketball player that he was, wasn't a BUYU guy. Now,
what Justin brings to the team is phenomenal, right, What
Chris Burgess brings to buy U is phenomenal right. You know,
but living that honor code life and knowing how to
move and how to navigate things. And I'm not just saying, oh,
so you just got to teach them how to avoid
and not get caught. It's absolutely the contrary. And you
are teaching them how to live with the honor code,
how to understand the honor code. Now we're not talking
about we're going to teach them even furthermore.
Speaker 4: Like it's like culturally, like where can Oar Davis Junior
comes from or any of my Like I remember talking
about this with my teams, where they came from. It
was perfectly fine culturally morally to engage in marijuana use,
like in multiple like a very young age, like, they
don't connect, they don't connect that to immorality. And so
you have to have very frank and forthright conversations about what.
Speaker 1: Needs to change.
Speaker 4: And these are difficult conversations because they infringe culturally and
even morally from where they come from.
Speaker 1: That's it, right, I mean it's throw a JT just
to throw this.
Speaker 5: You guys know, like from Chicago, primarily black community with
an all black boys' school, you think that that I
had convert.
Speaker 2: Convert.
Speaker 5: I'm a convert reminder, right, like my mom and my
dad who wasn't around, but when he was, they pushed like, hey,
like this is socially acceptable. Like I remember after school,
like people doing that at sixteen seventeen, it was a
normal thing.
Speaker 1: I remember.
Speaker 5: I hate to even say this is my Hopefully this
doesn't go too far coaches, like I remember off days
like practice on a Saturday, like it was socially acceptable.
So it just add to that. That doesn't make it right.
I'm not saying that, but this is something like you
just said, been can infringe culturally. Like I remember, this
is a normal thing. So when people bring up, oh, marijuana,
I just second atre I keep going because it was
a normal thing. It wasn't like oh but in the
terms of BYU, yes, it does affect that brand.
Speaker 4: Yeah, I guarantee you this is not the first time
that that Cannard Davis Junior and maybe I'm I'm stepping
out of pocket here, but I highly doubt this is
the first time that he's taken any sort of TC
cannabis marijuana and driven the vehicle. Like there's no way
that this is the first time. So like it's I
will be wake up call for him too.
Speaker 3: Oh so, And I will say this, Ben, like that
is total Like that's a total assumption, right, I mean,
I want to make it clear. Nobody here is saying
that you know Cannard Davis has done this before, or
you know this is not his first time. You know,
this is a massive assumption, and I want to make
sure that we're careful navigating that. The one thing that
I will say is, I'm going to give you a
perfect example, a perfect example. When I was at BUYU
for all my first year, I will be in the
dorms after that. I lived with Lamont Morgan, with Archie
Archie Rose, and with Michael Lloyd Jr. Right, Mike, Mike
Lloyd is one of my absolute best friends. I was
just in Vega this Vegas this week, and every time
I even drive by Vegas, I see Mike, I give
him a hug, I get to see his family. We
got to spend time together. Mike's one of my all
time best friends. We live together, like we you know,
like we know things about each other that like probably
the only other people that know are Heavenly Father and
our lives and so like, Mike and I are extremely close.
And you know, I was there for Mike on a
lot of situations where he needed a mentorship, he needed guidance, yep.
And you know, like, and so what I'm saying is
I know exactly what that's happening.
Speaker 2: Am I volunteering to become a mentor? I don't know.
I never had that conversation.
Speaker 3: But you know, this is something that Kloney does, so well,
what a man, Kloney. And you know, again, you don't
have to put someone down to put someone else up.
Speaker 2: But Colone's an amazing man.
Speaker 3: And I think Coloney Navi gave these part better than most,
you know, and I think there's a lot to.
Speaker 2: Learn overall about these situations. And so but yeah, an
unfortunate thing. No one is condoning and saying that.
Speaker 3: A d U Y d w Y is okay, the
w YU athletes cat special treatment. You know, we're here
to say that you know what he did wasn't right.
And let's wait until all of the facts come out
before we understand where Buyu is going to be coming
from when their decision is made about his future.
Speaker 4: Jonathan, let's talk about on the on the hardwood, right,
So Nate Pickens Junior, sorry, Nate Pickens is out for
the season due to injury. You have Canar Davis Junior.
He may be out for the foreseeable future. With what's
occurred this past week, how does that impact this team
in their quest to not only get back to a
Sweet sixteam, but advance past that and get to an
Elite eight Final four compete for a national championship. Aj
Debonsa said, if they don't win a Nattie, it's a
failed season. No one remembers the runner up. That's the
standard he set. He's essentially, along with Richie and Rob,
the face of the program. What say you, how does
this impact b Yu's quest to UH to once again
make a deep run in the NCAA tournament.
Speaker 3: In full transparency, I would say that this is like
the Chicago Bulls going from John Paxton to Steve Kerr
and which is you know, not that big of a difference,
and the reason Why I say that is because can
was Canard going to be a massive, huge, importantly piece
for this team.
Speaker 2: I would say that he would have been a.
Speaker 3: Secondary, a secondary or in my honest opinion, I think
you know the role of Canard Davis was going to
be a tertiary you know of of you know of
a third or fourth tier in terms of important Sorry
my you know, my English third language got got stuck
over there. And here's why I would put it as
a third or fourth you know in your level of importance.
Number one is, you know, will aj Aj, Ritchie and
Rob stay healthy and you know, staying able to score
sixty plus seventy plus percent I'll view I use points.
Speaker 2: That's number one by a mile.
Speaker 3: Number two is are we going to be able to
get Keba to stay healthy?
Speaker 2: And then along with Keba, are we going.
Speaker 3: To be able to get cadem and or Xavion to
help Keba on that situation? Number three, are we going
to be able to.
Speaker 2: Get Mahi Loo Mahi Loo and Tyler and.
Speaker 3: Baker and potentially Brody coach Lawsky when he starts playing
to become high level shooters and be able to come
to between the three the four, the three four of
them to average forty from three and then I would
say that the question becomes, is Canard and Dominique going.
Speaker 2: To be able to be that defensive three and D specialist?
Speaker 3: And so as I look at the at the at
the primary concerns for this basketball team, you know, on
the packing order of me as an outsider.
Speaker 2: Now you know, do I know a lot of things
going on in the program?
Speaker 3: I do, right, But as an expect an ex spectators,
as an analyst, as you know the work that I
do for ESPN and b y U TV and so on,
what do I think about this?
Speaker 2: This is the way that I break.
Speaker 3: Down the priority I don't think that Carnard's performance was
going to.
Speaker 2: Move the needle more been all.
Speaker 3: Of these other three four things that I mentioned to you.
And again that's my personal opinion. You know, the coaches
may not agree with it, the rest of the world
may not agree in it, but you are having me
come on the show, so I get to share my opinion,
and so that to me, Ben becomes the packing order
off priorities for BUYU basketball. And that's how I feel about,
you know, Kurnard not being available.
Speaker 2: That's how you pack the rest of the team.
Speaker 1: Love your perspective. JT.
Speaker 4: Always appreciate our time, and unfortunately we got to talk about,
you know, off court, things that impact on court, things
that we truly like to break down. But appreciate your
perspective today, Jonathan Tavornari. Make sure you're following you on
x for all of his hot takes and commentaries. We
appreciate you, JT. Thanks wropping off for a college basketball segment.
Speaker 2: I appreciate it always and forever.
Speaker 1: Goku's Let's go all right.
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Speaker 1: Here on one of three nine ninety eight point three