Jai Lucas’ First Year at Miami: Inside the Massive Roster Makeover

If you fell asleep at the end of the last Miami Hurricanes basketball season and woke up right about now, well there would be not a single player on the roster you’ll have watched play for the team a year ago.

Yes, it would be fair to say the work’s been put in to remake the roster with 11 new players under new coach Jai Lucas.

The additions include a slew of transfer arrivals: G/F Marcus Allen from Missouri, G Tre Donaldson (Michigan), G Jordyn Kee (Georgia), F Malik Reneau (Indiana), C Ernest Udeh Jr. (TCU) and G Tru Washington (New Mexico).

As for freshman talent? A big get was 4-star forward Shelton Henderson, who Lucas flipped from Duke. Plus 4-star guard Dante Allen, a Villanova commit, is now a Hurricane as is 3-star G John Laboy II. Turkish 6-10 center Salih Altuntas will also be a freshman at UM after averaging a double-double for Anadolu Efes and 10.1 points and 9.2 rebounds for the Istanbul Efes U-19 team this past year. Another international addition is Slovakian forward Timotej Malovec, who averaged 6.1 points and 3.1 rebounds for Mega Superbet (hitting 36.5 percent from three-point range).

“It’s been good, it’s been a whirlwind,” Lucas summed up on Jon Rothstein’s podcast with CBS Sports. “All in all it’s been a great (start) here in Coral Gables.”

He says that “I feel great about my roster. One thing I wanted and am most comfortable with as a coach is on the defensive side of the ball. I feel we really, really targeted a lot of people that fit that. I want to be tough, be able to rebound, have size, be able to win the game within the game – the loose balls, extra possessions, getting fouled, things like that. I feel I’ve built a team that will be able to exploit a lot of those. Once I get everyone on campus I’ll have to figure out offensively how we want to play. From the defensive side I feel really good about it. We have a good mix of youth and age and international. We covered a lot of bases with this first class and having some that can grow with the program was important to me as well.”

Of guards Donaldson and Washington, who were on teams that won games in the NCAA Tournament, Donaldson says it’s “very reassuring” having them.

“Tre has played in big games, made big plays in big games,” Lucas said. “And Tru I’ve known forever. I recruited his uncle at Kentucky, coached his uncle. Tru fits that defensive mold, has the opportunity to be one of the best defensive guards in the country next year and create. Those two have done a lot in the game already but can make another step.”

Asked about Udeh, Lucas said, “One thing I told him is he has to be able to get in incredible shape and play hard for multiple segments. One way he’ll have a big impact is rebounding and offensive rebounding. Defensively he’s one of the best defensive bigs in the country. On offense, offensive rebounds, be able to finish, catch lobs, use him in different ways than he has been can put him in a different lens for people.”

Lucas said the addition of Henderson is “huge.”

“I’ve known Shelton I want to say his whole life – he played for my father’s AAU team,” Lucas said. “He is that Swiss army knife that we needed. He can play the one through four. His body, athleticism, offensive game putting him in different situations – he’s the missing piece that really ties the team together for what we needed.”

Lucas says there will be tremendous competition for playing time among everyone on the roster and that in recruiting he’s going to go after the best high school players in the nation while filling in any future roster gaps with the portal.

“We’ll target the best high school freshmen,” he said.

Also of note: The roster has six players from the State of Florida (Dante Allen, Marcus Allen, Donaldson, Kee, Reneau and Udeh).

“A thing I wanted to do – target people from Florida because the program needed an injection of care and want to because of where you’re from,” Lucas said.

This is Lucas’ first head coaching job after serving as an assistant coach at Texas, Kentucky and then most recently Duke over the last nine years.

“The biggest thing was coming down and just a total reset of everything – having to hire people, get a whole new team, starting a program in my vision,” Lucas said. “Coach L (Jim Larranaga) did a great job here the last 14 years. So it’s not like a rebuild, it’s a reset in my own vision.”

Lucas’ father, John Lucas II, is a legendary player and coach and Jai says that helped prepare him “for understanding the urgency and time that goes into the job.”

In addition to his fathers’ example, Lucas has gotten experience playing and working with the likes of John Calipari, Jon Scheyer, Shaka Smart, Rick Barnes and Billy Donovan. And Lucas says he takes “a little bit of everybody” in his approach to coaching.

“It was about learning as much as I can from as man people as possible,” Lucas says. “It was about what would help prepare me for this situation and opportunity, because it’s ultimately what I wanted. Coach Barnes is discipline and relentlessness to the details and making sure (there’s) competition and playing hard. Coach Donovan, his communication style and how he was able to communicate (was a big takeaway). With coach Cal, the ability to be blatantly honest with the players, tell them the truth no matter the feelings. And Shaka, just his understanding and teaching of culture and what it means, establishing that in the program. With Jon, I wanted to be next to someone that was a first-time head coach and seeing his attention to detail with everything. That’s something I’ll take from him. You can’t let anything fall through the cracks, have to make sure everything is in your vision and how you want it to be.”

Lucas says in February he “found out this was a real possibility” and that it was something he chased.

“I put feelers out there and attacked the job,” he said.

Initially he thought he’d stay with Duke through the NCAA Tournament run, but of course there was so much work to be done at Miami that it changed and he left the Blue Devils prior to the postseason.

“A week before the end of the season we talked and figured it was best that it was going to need to go a different way to get the program started here,” Lucas said. “It was hard, emotional, was tough in the moment (leaving Duke before the end of the season).”

As for what it will be like coaching against Duke next year?

“Hopefully we can beat them,” Lucas says with a chuckle. “The ACC is what makes this job intriguing to me. It’s kind of a reset as well – a lot of Hall of Fame coaches have retired. We’re building a new ACC.”

What’s Lucas’ mindset looking to year 1 for getting this Miami brand back to where it was when the team went to the Final Four?

“You’ve got to win,” he says. “You’ve got to win and make sure your team is getting better throughout the year. … You have to compete at a high level.

“It’s my job to make sure we’re continually growing throughout the season, getting better game by game, practice by practice.”

A bottom line takeaway from Lucas with the roster coming together?

“I’ve felt comfortable with everything that’s come so far,” Lucas said. “Build a program here that wants to competes for ACC championships every year – that’s my goal.” He adds that his Year 1 goal is “The continuous growth of the program, making this place a home court environment where people want to come to the games every night. And giving ourselves every opportunity to play in the NCAA Tournament this year.

“This is the foundation of this program for the next however many years I’m here, making sure it starts off on the right foot.”

*Lucas says Miami will at some point announce a big neutral site in-state rivalry that will be renewed over the next two seasons and that the team will “start a home and home with another Power Four team.”