What’s that? Another player transferring from one Horizon League team to another?? This time, the Norse — to use my good friend Chris Hart’s word against him now — “POACHING” a player from an in-conference rival. Cade Meyer, the 2021-22 Horizon All-Freshman teammate of Sam Vinson entered the portal about 4 weeks ago. Since then, we have seen the Norse, Ball State and Stetson emerge as key players in the race for Cade’s services next year. After visiting this weekend, Cade decided to commit to the Norse.
So who are the Norse getting? By the numbers, the Norse are bringing in a guy who produce statistically right away. Cade’s FG% is impressive enough, but even more impressive is his 61% 2-pt field goal percentage. “Man he must LIVE inside the paint.” Why, yes he does!
When looking at his shot chart, I was somewhat blown away. I have not seen that much red RIGHT AT the rim in a long, long time. So it got me thinking.. Loudon Love is one of the most dominant bigs I have ever seen in this league. How does Cade’s shooting match up side by side with Loudon Love’s? Let’s take a look:
I honestly could not believe what I was looking at when I saw this. The fact that Cade was more effective inside last year than arguably the most physically dominant center I’ve ever watched since NKU joined this league was kind of mind blowing to me.
Meyer’s tape is great, too. The young man has great footwork inside often times finishing in the most non-traditional of ways. I don’t want to get accused of making unfair comparisons, but his footwork on the block really reminds me a lot of Drew McDonald. And when you look at his numbers, you realize we aren’t getting a direct replacement for what we are losing, rather we are getting a player who possesses a certain skillset that we haven’t seen from an NKU big man for years. I have made the argument for a long time, defending our style of play as a “volume shooting” three point team but that’s just because we have not had a dynamic offensively creative big man. Adding Cade Meyer to the rotation will put the Norse in a position to add an entire layer to their offense that really hasn’t existed under this coaching staff.
HIGHLIGHT VIDEO:
STATUS:
COMMITTED on April 18, 2023.