Illinois Hoops Recruiting Thread (November-December 2018)

[sacraig]

Of course the A-10 isn't the B1G, but DJW has proven he could have had a role here if the situation was better for him. Nunn's actions were his own, but you can't discount the absolute legal/disciplinary mess John Groce's tenure at Illinois was. My overall point is that it makes zero sense to not even try to repair the Simeon relationship. They often have players we could use.

I'll fault John Groce for a lot of things, but Kendrick Nunn striking his girlfriend is not one of them.

 

[Deleted member 746094]

Well it is just coming to surface on a legal standpoint. We will see if he stays super successful now that the heat is on him. Self is a superior recruiter and an average coach. His hi low is not overly complicated. He just has supreme athletes running it. Only time will tell if it was paychecks or charm that was reeling in the big fish.

I don’t disagree that there aren’t better basketball coaches than Self out there. To say he is average is just not accurate. Yes, he does have the best talent on the court ...most nights. Again, this is why being a great recruiting head coach separates you from the head coach that is great with X’s/O’s but an average recruiter. Bo Ryan didn’t get one and dones, but he always got the 3/4* guys he knew he needed and wanted to execute his system and win. Just throwing 5* players together doesn’t win you 14 or so consecutive conference championships. Being able to coach them once they are there does. See Calipari’s inconsistency at UK as an example.

 

[Dbell1981]

Much of this discussion is akin to the chicken vs the egg. Good stuff. But the issue is the $3,000,000 per year CEO of Illinois basketball is not controlling the narrative. He may in fact be out of his league. SFA is a tiny school that is ignored in Texas. Okie State is OU’s little brother, even when they had good years under Eddie Sutton. And one year isn’t indicative. By contrast Illinois, even in our current situation, cannot be ignored in this state.

Maybe some of the coaches are bitching because they’d like to contribute? maybe just they like to !!!!!. Does Not Matter. The honeymoon is now over. The CEO is being called out. As I said this morning, TWICE THIS WEEK.

Communication is hard. When in control of a large organization you must be mindful of who can help and hurt you. You have to think critically every day about what you know that has to be relayed to every constituency. You have to be aware of appearances.

As Mattcoldagelli intimated, he cant send a few emails that he’ll see them later? That he’s away from recruiting because of a fantastic schedule? Obelisk says he can’t close. Selling is weak too. Now it’s a mess.

Underwood appears to be a good X’s and O’s guy and maybe he can teach, but indications are he is not a good CEO. Whitman seems to understand PR, he needs to get involved here.

This is really good stuff. Armchair coaches saying Brad Underwood is in over his head because Chicago coaches aren't getting attention.

 

[illinipioneer]

So, what exactly should BU be doing as "CEO" of basketball to change the narrative....win? I would argue he is working his butt off on that

 

[PtownIllini8]

Here we go again... You have to recruit THEM, and recruit them successfully, if you are expecting the top recruits from HS and AAU program to just end up at Illinois as a favor, they will just go elsewhere. We need them, they do not need UI, they will have plenty of offers from other places.

We have not been able to recruit some of their top players, and it is not always that Simeon, or any other program, will have top players every single year. Recruiting is about relationships. Self built/repaired an excellent relationship with Simeon even without having top players at the time. You need to build relationships and just take advantage of the opportunity when it arises.

In the past 25 years, we did get some good players from Simeon, Kevin Turner, Bryant Notree, DJ Williams, Kendrick Nunn, even without getting the top stars. Some of them panned out, some did not, whether the coaching staff's fault or their own, but it was not on Robert Smith.

Yeah, Kevin Turner and 3 years of K. Nunn.....that's an amazing pipeline over 25 years! IN that same timeframe, little old Peoria Manual has produced Jerry Hester, Sergio, Griff, Frank Williams and Da'Monte Williams.

Piper just posted an article on Scout basically blasting away at the Sun-Times article showing the specific days that the prospects we are recruiting had games and the conflicts that existed with Illinois' schedule. As I've said many times, the Sun-Times is a bigger rag than it used to be, which is saying something.

 

[Dbell1981]

Maybe the coach feels it's more important to coach up the kids that have already committed to him and are wearing illini jerseys already. There are only 4 players on the team that know any of this scheme. He offered a kid from St. Louis last week I believe so he is recruiting. Maybe Miller is his only priority in the Chicago area right now. Maybe coach Underwood believes he can win without a Chicago heavy roster. Maybe the CEO of all Illini athletics has faith in his coaches plan wether it involves Chicago or not.

 

[Emerson Bigguns]

Yeah, Kevin Turner and 3 years of K. Nunn.....that's an amazing pipeline over 25 years! IN that same timeframe, little old Peoria Manual has produced Jerry Hester, Sergio, Griff, Frank Williams and Da'Monte Williams.

Piper just posted an article on Scout basically blasting away at the Sun-Times article showing the specific days that the prospects we are recruiting had games and the conflicts that existed with Illinois' schedule. As I've said many times, the Sun-Times is a bigger rag than it used to be, which is saying something.

That's the part of this story that I just don't understand. BU has a very young team that has played very little together. Maybe it's a crazy concept, but isn't practice a pretty important element to developing a winner? If he is out watching HS hoops every day that the Illini don't play, who is coaching these guys up? The last couple of games we have observed improvement in defensive rotations, and offensive execution. Is that possible if he runs up to Chicago on every day off? I doubt it. My belief is that he should coach the heck out of the guys he has. I think players will want to play the style he is teaching. Once he shows he can win with it, recruiting will be easier.

The schedule opens up for the Illini the next couple of weeks. He should have more opportunities to get out and see prospects. The priority should still be developing the guys he already has.

 

[TopOtheKey]

But you didn't coach basketball. Maybe you are the one out of his league.

Perhaps. But I very well understand how “constituents” can take you apart from afar. Negative press will not build the program.

 

[RichBradIllini]

Yeah, Kevin Turner and 3 years of K. Nunn.....that's an amazing pipeline over 25 years! IN that same timeframe, little old Peoria Manual has produced Jerry Hester, Sergio, Griff, Frank Williams and Da'Monte Williams.

Piper just posted an article on Scout basically blasting away at the Sun-Times article showing the specific days that the prospects we are recruiting had games and the conflicts that existed with Illinois' schedule. As I've said many times, the Sun-Times is a bigger rag than it used to be, which is saying something.

Too bad he didn't include those tidbits when O'brien interviewed him for the article.

 

[ChiefIllini]

Too bad he didn't include those tidbits when O'brien interviewed him for the article.

It's frustrating for sure, but as others have said, newspapers are less about showing something 100% factual and telling of the whole story, and more about twisting something to get views, clicks, or reads.

I'm glad Piper's getting it out to his followers/readers, because those are the ones who deserve to know the whole story the most. It would be helpful if the Sun-Times could've mentioned this, but that didn't fit their narrative.

 

[oldschool51]

In the year 2018 and going forward we need to make a choice work in the gray area where there is a chance it could explode or keep our hands clean and hope for the best. People !!!!! about coach Cal cheating he did but he does not have to anymore same with coach Self. I love the university of Illinois even though i have been away for over thirty years, and i have no trouble telling anyone i would work in the grayest of areas to bring us back to where we belong and that is at or near the top of the big ten

 

[alaskaillini]

Would you rather have BU out on the recruiting trail or in CU trying to get a bunch of freshman up to speed so they can compete in the B1G? The fact of the matter is that most of the posts on here are unreasonable and petty. Does BU need to do better - yes, and at a lot more than recruiting Chicago. All this article shows me is that BU has his priorities straight. Recruiting the class of 2020 in Chicago is not the major issue he faces - winning basketball games so a recruit might actually want to play for ILL is.

Two things are different now compared to when Bill Self was here: (1) Self inherited a team loaded with young talent and did not have to rebuild, so he had the luxury of time to focus on recruiting for the future, and (2) the world was a lot bigger place and location played a much larger role in choice of school making it easier to recruit the Illinois kids. Is there any great teams built on local kids today - don't really know the answer to this, but I doubt Kentucky has a lot of Kentucky kids or Duke has a lot of NC kids or Kansas a lot of Kansas kids. Just who is predominantly recruiting from their own state to regularly build a quality program? There may be a few, but I am not sure who they are.

Probably should have looked at number of starters, but the overall number of homestate players on the rosters including walkons in the B1G is as follows: IN:6, MI:7, WI:4, MS:10, OSU:5, MN:7, MD:6, NE:4, PD:5, IA:9, NW:4, PS:6, RU:3, IL:7. It looks like Michigan State is the one team that can claim to be homegrown, but 5 of its 8 major contributors are from out of state. For Michigan 6 of top 7 contributors are from out of state, including top 5 scorers. Iowa may actually be closest but 3 of top 6 contributors including top 2 scorers are from out of state. Finally, our most comparable competitor is maybe Indiana, and only 2 starters and 4 of their top 10 contributors are from IN. The fact is that recruiting in state is not typical and not critical to success today. The idea that UI has or needs some special relationship with Chicago to succeed is antiquated, and to direct a disproportionate amount of effort to Chicago would be counterproductive.

 

[skyIdub]

 

[Dbell1981]

Would you rather have BU out on the recruiting trail or in CU trying to get a bunch of freshman up to speed so they can compete in the B1G? The fact of the matter is that most of the posts on here are unreasonable and petty. Does BU need to do better - yes, and at a lot more than recruiting Chicago. All this article shows me is that BU has his priorities straight. Recruiting the class of 2020 in Chicago is not the major issue he faces - winning basketball games so a recruit might actually want to play for ILL is.

Two things are different now compared to when Bill Self was here: (1) Self inherited a team loaded with young talent and did not have to rebuild, so he had the luxury of time to focus on recruiting for the future, and (2) the world was a lot bigger place and location played a much larger role in choice of school making it easier to recruit the Illinois kids. Is there any great teams built on local kids today - don't really know the answer to this, but I doubt Kentucky has a lot of Kentucky kids or Duke has a lot of NC kids or Kansas a lot of Kansas kids. Just who is predominantly recruiting from their own state to regularly build a quality program? There may be a few, but I am not sure who they are.

Probably should have looked at number of starters, but the overall number of homestate players on the rosters including walkons in the B1G is as follows: IN:6, MI:7, WI:4, MS:10, OSU:5, MN:7, MD:6, NE:4, PD:5, IA:9, NW:4, PS:6, RU:3, IL:7. It looks like Michigan State is the one team that can claim to be homegrown, but 5 of its 8 major contributors are from out of state. For Michigan 6 of top 7 contributors are from out of state, including top 5 scorers. Iowa may actually be closest but 3 of top 6 contributors including top 2 scorers are from out of state. Finally, our most comparable competitor is maybe Indiana, and only 2 starters and 4 of their top 10 contributors are from IN. The fact is that recruiting in state is not typical and not critical to success today. The idea that UI has or needs some special relationship with Chicago to succeed is antiquated, and to direct a disproportionate amount of effort to Chicago would be counterproductive.

Thanks for this. Now will people quit beating the dead horse already!

 

[GForce]

Too bad he didn't include those tidbits when O'brien interviewed him for the article.

Maybe he did but O'Brien cut it from his story.

 

[bombayIllini]

Too bad he didn't include those tidbits when O'brien interviewed him for the article.

O'Brien cannot count.

 

[Courier]

The sooner we accept that Illinois needs Chicago, but Chicago doesn't need Illinois, the better it will be for Illinois. The cultural schism between the city and downstate is unfortunate, but it is what it is.

Recruiting Chicago is complicated. People tend to think of Chicago as one front, but it's really not. We've chosen to align ourselves with the Irvins, but that's a dangerous game. The Irvin's have more enemies than friends in the city. By aligning ourselves with the Irvin's, we ostracized Simeon and Young. That's fine as long as MIF and MP produce players, but if you look at the next crop of Chicago high school talent, they aren't playing for MIF, they're playing for Meanstreets. Meanstreets was a program that had a strong relationship with Illinois. I don't think that's the case "under" the new regime.

 

[I Bomb]

In the year 2018 and going forward we need to make a choice work in the gray area where there is a chance it could explode or keep our hands clean and hope for the best. People !!!!! about coach Cal cheating he did but he does not have to anymore same with coach Self. I love the university of Illinois even though i have been away for over thirty years, and i have no trouble telling anyone i would work in the grayest of areas to bring us back to where we belong and that is at or near the top of the big ten

Have you not been following the FBI's reporting on their investigation into these programs? It doesn't diminish their individual coaching abilities and/or personalities, but they absolutely still have to play that game - at an even higher level than before. 2k to Ft Sooy/No Limit is beans in comparison... IMO, but not exactly, with all the dirt coming out of that investigation.

 

[Hoppy2105]

Someone talked about Derek Piper giving a sort of “other side” to the story article on his Twitter.

Here it is:

Link

Underwood should definitely be making some calls, but there are reasons he hasn’t been IN the gyms recently. If this article had come out in a week or 2, it would have been a moot point as BU’s plan has always been to hit up the holiday tournaments.

But the Sun Times wanted clicks and hits and this was the best way and best time to do it.

 

[Calvin]

Have you not been following the FBI's reporting on their investigation into these programs? It doesn't diminish their individual coaching abilities and/or personalities, but they absolutely still have to play that game - at an even higher level than before. 2k to Ft Sooy/No Limit is beans in comparison... IMO, but not exactly, with all the dirt coming out of that investigation.

I have been following it, and I agree they still play the game. I don't see anything really changing, other than the need for plausible deniability in cases where assistant coaches were sloppy. The FBI is interested because they could prove there were government employees, i.e. public university coaches, directly funneling money to other parties, i.e. bribery. There are many other ways to accomplish the same thing, which is why so many programs are still raking in 5* players as though nothing changed --they already were more cautious about their methods.

We should hire some SEC football programs to show us how it's done /s

 

[Deleted member 643761]

I believe the only path to Adam Miller is a good season. Neglecting our current team would be counter productive to getting Miller.

 

[ChampaignFaithful]

Coach Underwood and his coaches should check out the Class of 2020 players at Chicago Heights Bloom. They have a 6'9" center with three dynamic guards/wings. They are rated #2 in the Chicago Area and 4A for the state. They are undefeated this year and are the #1 seed in the Pontiac Holiday Tournament.

 

[ejam21]

Too bad he didn't include those tidbits when O'brien interviewed him for the article.

how do you know he didn't?

You think this was a one question and one answer phone call? LOL

I'd bet Piper told him a lot of stuff and MOB cherry picked the stuff that aligns with the theme of the article.

 

[Deleted member 11196]

Someone talked about Derek Piper giving a sort of “other side” to the story article on his Twitter.

Here it is:

Link

Underwood should definitely be making some calls, but there are reasons he hasn’t been IN the gyms recently. If this article had come out in a week or 2, it would have been a moot point as BU’s plan has always been to hit up the holiday tournaments.

But the Sun Times wanted clicks and hits and this was the best way and best time to do it.

The only way a Illinois coach can please Chicago, is to have 50 clones, who could sit with the local HS coach at every one of their games.... do a bunch of favors for them and basically kiss their rings....

 

[WhiteRhino]

Is it possible that O'Brien and Dan are working together to drive up hits on this site?