It didn't take long for new Western Michigan University men's head basketball coach Kahil Fennell to give out his first high-five to a player during the Broncos' first practice of the 2026-2027 season.

And it didn't take long for him to stop a drill and show a player how he could get into a better defensive stance.

As expected...that's the way the first practice for a team with 14 new players, no returners and a staff of eight new personnel got things going on Tuesday in University Arena.

"Monday night was the first night we have all been together and it was long overdue for me," Fennell said. "This is the fun part of the season where we have guys from all over the world, building cohesion, learning together and fighting together.

"I'm thrilled to be back in the gym."

WMU has an array of players who have seen a lot of different basketball. Augustinas Kiudulas is from Lithuania, Janis Jünemann is from Latvia and Isaac Finlinson is from St. George, Utah, and played for Hawaii.

Fennell and his staff also hit the state of Michigan hard, getting Ben Johnson from Portage, Jordan Sigmon from Detroit, Ramere Draper from Grand Rapids and Rob Lee Jr. from Flint.

"But I'm tired of talking about these guys…I just want to coach these guys," Fennell said.

And coach them he did, being in the middle of virtually every drill with his coaching staff, giving a high-five here and a stern lecture there.

"Overall, today was really ugly," he said. "So much of every facet of basketball needs to be cleaned up.

"It's the learning and downloading of information which needs to get better. We have to find solutions and I have to do a better job of getting them up to speed faster, to hit the ground running faster.

"That's something I will continue to work on tonight and for the rest of the time."

It showed at times that getting 14 new players onto the same page will take time.

"A little bit of it was paralysis by analysis," the head coach said. "Taking the clutter out of their minds makes it easier to just play, to let it rip as opposed to thinking."

After about a 30-minute film session on the offensive and defensive principles Fennell wants to see, the Broncos spent the next 25 minutes on defensive drills…and there were a lot of bodies battling for rebounds and diving for loose balls.

"The hustle was great and the enthusiasm was awesome, but that's a baseline thing," Fennell said. "For us, we have to do the thinking-part better, process things quicker and we will.

"We have a lot of offensive-skilled players, people who have hit over 40 percent from 3 and won a lot of games due to their offense. This group needs to value the defensive side of the floor. We need to get tougher here and nastier there and we will moving forward."

At the end of the team portion of practice, was maybe a sign of good things to come. As the team watched, Sigmon toed the free throw line.

And made it.

"Many of these guys came out of the transfer portal, so they haven't been practicing at a level which Division 1 requires," Fennell said. "They aren't used to the physicality, but we don't want to risk injuries."

On to the next practice.