Trailblazers pick up two more big signings in Bodingh and Tshibola

VINCENNES, Ind. – The 2023 Vincennes University men’s basketball recruiting class added two more big names over this past week, first with the signing of six-foot-nine Vilhelm Bodingh from Sweden and six-foot-three point guard Thierry Tshibola from Quebec City in Canada.

Swedish big man Vilhelm Bodingh signed with Vincennes University over the long weekend, adding more size to the VU frontcourt, standing six-foot-nine and 215 pounds.

Bodingh is originally from Akersberga, Sweden, where he played last year for the Swedish U18 National Team that won the 2022 FIBA U18 European Championship, Division B title.

Bodingh is currently getting set to represent his country again as he is the youngest member of the Swedish U20 National Team that will begin competing in the FIBA U20 European Championships Friday, July 7 in Skopje, Macedonia.

“Vilhelm was a young man that I had gotten some information on back in the spring,” VU Hall of Fame Head Coach Todd Franklin said. “I liked what I saw, but by the time I had seen it, Mineral Area had already got him. He was a guy that I kind of knew something about, but really got serious about it when Coach Strege had left and all of those guys at Mineral had gotten released.”

“I knew Coach Strege was very high on him as a player and as a person,” Franklin added. “So as that became a possibility again, I was on it pretty hard. We dug into everything that we could and everything came back very positive.”

“He’s a six-eight, six-nine power forward/center,” Franklin said. “Offensively, I think he’s going to be able to do whatever we ask at those two spots. Defensively, it’s more of who will he be able to guard at that four-position. He’s got the size and he’s young. He’s the youngest member of the U20 National Team in Sweden. He’s a top-five guy coming out of Sweden and a top-two post and that has been proven by him being the youngest member of the Swedish U20 team.”

“He’s a good student,” Franklin added. “His English is very good and speaks very fluently, so he’s an easy transition type of guy in those areas. He’s pretty athletic and runs the floor really well. He has good bounce. Offensively, most things in the European system are based off of the screen and roll, but they probably post more than we do. He’s very proficient in those areas. He’s pretty good on the roll. He’s got the agility to catch it and score. He can score over both shoulders and it appears like in this last year he has really improved his ability on the pick and pop, even out to the three-point line and I think he will certainly be efficient from 17 to 18 feet. In those areas, I think he will be able to adapt very quickly to what we do.”

“I think he will get bigger and stronger in the weight room,” Franklin said. “I think once he gets into our program and gets after it, he is going to put on some weight and strength. He’s got a good frame and good size and we think he will be a good player and could probably be a good player right away.”

Thierry Tshibola comes to Vincennes University as an experienced and highly rated point guard out of Quebec.

The six-foot-three, 185-pound point guard is the third Trailblazer signee from Quebec this offseason, joining Mathieu Nader-Kalombo (Longueuil, Quebec) and Alphonse Muteba (Montreal, Quebec).

This trio looks to continue VU’s line of successful players from Canada during the Coach Franklin era, which includes former Golden State Warrior Mychal Mulder, 2019 NJCAA National Tournament MVP Kevin Osawe, 2023 NJCAA All-American Caleb Johnson and more.

“Thierry is a kid that I have looked at on-again-off-again since the spring,” Franklin said. “Thierry is a little bit older, he had one year of COVID in Canada where they didn’t really play and then he reclassified after he was supposed to come out last year. He was generally regarded in last year’s recruiting class as a Top 30 player in Canada. I think over the past couple of years he’s probably one of the best, if not the best, point guard prospect in Canada.”

“As has been the case with all three of the guys we’ve signed (Alphonse, Mathieu and Thierry), they are from one of the more underrecruited areas of Canada,” Franklin added. “Canada is pretty unique that you only really get scouted and seen in the Toronto area and a few pockets out west. But the Montreal and up regions, you’ll be known, but it’s not as frequent.”

“in the case of Nader-Kalombo, he was off the radar and then came to the States to play and he is a good player,” Franklin said. “Then we also think Muteba, who we’ve signed from that area is like that. Thierry, who was rated pretty well anyway, I think that if he was from Toronto, he could have been the best point guard prospect last year and he’s improved, getting bigger, stronger and better since then. So, I think he could be a good player.”

“He’s very efficient and doesn’t force things,” Franklin added. “He’s a smooth type of player. He shoots the ball well and he’s got good size. He’s not the biggest or thickest player, but he’s gotten bigger and stronger and more athletic. He’s playing above the rim more now in the last year or so. But he’s very efficient with the ball and knows how to play the position. He has good vision and doesn’t get in a big hurry.”

“We’re excited about him,” Franklin said. “We closed the summer with these guys last week and you kind of assess where you are, especially when you’ve been able to see your guys and I think we’ve got good players across the board. I thought we needed to add another ball-handling guard that could really shoot, that was maybe a little older and we needed to get another guy that could play at the power forward or center position. We were able to hit it pretty hard and I like both Vilhelm and Thierry a lot. If they come in and play like I think they could and adjust, they fill the gaps that we felt like we still had.”

Bodingh and Tshibola are joining a Trailblazer squad coming off of a 30-6 season last year, which saw the Blazers reach the NJCAA National Tournament for the 10th time in 11 years and reach the National Quarterfinals.

“We’ve got a good balance to our roster right now,” Franklin said. “With the six guys returning that played last year, we’ve got six freshmen coming in and we have a redshirt freshman in Lebron Thomas (Bishopville, S.C.) who was here but didn’t play last year. If you look at the positions, we are pretty balanced in what we have in both of those classes. I not only feel good about where we are at for this year’s team, which I think has a chance to be really good, but in getting everything back to how they were pre-COVID. I feel like we are back and the classes are level and I like where we are right now a lot. We are in a pretty good spot and we’ve got to just keep plugging forward. But these two guys were exactly what we were looking for in theory and were both guys that were highly recruited and we were able to find a way to get them both.”

“I don’t think we have a glaring hole right now on our team,” Franklin said. “I think we are pretty good across the board. I think we’ve got depth across the board. If people play the way we think they are going to, we’ve got some older guys across as well. So, the rest of recruiting isn’t going out and looking for something specific, I think we’ve kind of done that. So now it’s just looking at what’s still out there as a best available that is going to make our team better and not going to make our team worse.”

“We’ll be really picky about how we use these last two spots,” Franklin added. “Could bring in somebody that could have an immediate impact or it could be somebody that we think will be good in a year or two and redshirt them, or it could be that we just go into next season with 13 guys. If we don’t think somebody is going to come in here and be a positive, we won’t do anything. I like my team as it is right now. But anytime we can upgrade it we certainly will. Or if we see somebody that will eventually upgrade it, needing some time and redshirting a guy like we’ve done in the past.”

“But we don’t feel a pressing need right now,” Franklin said. “It’s a good position to be in, in the moment. When you have a good group coming back, it makes things much easier because you have that core group and then you can be picky to begin with. We’ve tried to be throughout this process and I like the team we have. We’ll see how Vilhelm, Thierry and Alphonse look when they get here, the other 10 guys were here during the summer and they were good guys that wanted to learn and wanted to work. The returners are all about it. Lebron is back healthy. The 10 guys we’ve seen we are pleased with. The three that were not here that are now part of our squad, we are very excited about the potential of those guys. We are in pretty good shape in that we had 10 guys in here over the summer and seven of those guys were here last year and we really think that those seven guys are the right kind of guys that really fit who we are.”

“We’ll keep pounding the pavement on recruiting,” Franklin added. “We’ve still got visits lined up and we will see what happens. But we are not in a pressurized situation right now.”

The Vincennes University Athletic Department is excited to welcome Vilhelm Bodingh and Thierry Tshibola to the 2023 recruiting class.