Illinois Hoops Recruiting Thread

#179      
nichi
nichi said:
No. Gill was kind of a late bloomer.

Derek Harper was our first McDonald's AA in 1980. Followed by Bruce Douglas and Efrem Winters in 1982. Then Lowell Hamilton in 1985, Nick Anderson in 1986, Marcus Liberty in 1987, and Deon Thomas in 1989. Richard Keene was Lou's last one, I would have to look up the year.

Other McDAAs: Marcus Griffin, Frank Williams, and Brian Williams were Lon Kruger recruits in the late 1990s. Dee Brown was recruited by Self in 2002.

Some other highly ranked, top 50 recruits Eddie Johnson in 1977, Larry Smith 1986, kiwane Harris. Also, transfers Ken Norman and Kenny Battle in their high school classes. Of course, Deron Williams was top 50.

Going way back to the misty past before the McDonald's All American team; some candidates for a best ever recruits list would include Skip Thoren, Rich Jones, Nick Weatherspoon, Billy Morris, and a number of others.

The 247 best ever list appears to start with with the 2003 class?
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Argh, Brian Cook, not Williams. Garris, not Harris.
 
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#181      
lstewart53x3
Fly Illini Fly! said:
https://twitter.com/x/status/2052042875177750609
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The interesting thing is, Duke’s as good as they’ve ever been. Kentucky had one of the most expensive rosters in the sport last year. It was just completely mismanaged + of course had a lot of injuries which certainly didn’t help. And now it looks like all the money in the world can’t attract them a good squad this year. Agents know too, go on a visit to Kentucky, that’ll increase your value, then choose a program that wins.
 
#182      
Homecoming 2019
lstewart53x3 said:
The interesting thing is, Duke’s as good as they’ve ever been. Kentucky had one of the most expensive rosters in the sport last year. It was just completely mismanaged + of course had a lot of injuries which certainly didn’t help. And now it looks like all the money in the world can’t attract them a good squad this year. Agents know too, go on a visit to Kentucky, that’ll increase your value, then choose a program that wins.
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Pope was a bad hire, they fumbled that search from the jump.
 
#183      
illiniwil
Curbelo Fanboy said:
As an aside, Rich McBride was rated #1 in his class in like 8th grade or freshman year. He was fully grown by basically freshman year of high school so had a physical advantage. As he got older he started having some injury troubles that took away some of his pop by the time he got to Illinois. Still a good player but not a top prospect.
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has was also not the best player on his HS (Lanphier) team.
 
#185      
Mobi
lstewart53x3 said:
The interesting thing is, Duke’s as good as they’ve ever been. Kentucky had one of the most expensive rosters in the sport last year. It was just completely mismanaged + of course had a lot of injuries which certainly didn’t help. And now it looks like all the money in the world can’t attract them a good squad this year. Agents know too, go on a visit to Kentucky, that’ll increase your value, then choose a program that wins.
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In NIL era, you absolutely need a good coach unless you are Duke. 🤣🤣🤣
 
#187      
jrichisamazing
lstewart53x3 said:
The interesting thing is, Duke’s as good as they’ve ever been. Kentucky had one of the most expensive rosters in the sport last year. It was just completely mismanaged + of course had a lot of injuries which certainly didn’t help. And now it looks like all the money in the world can’t attract them a good squad this year. Agents know too, go on a visit to Kentucky, that’ll increase your value, then choose a program that wins.
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College basketball and the transfer portal is very comparable to European soccer IMO. And anyone who follows that knows many clubs spend an insane amount of money, and it does not guarantee wins.
 
#188      
Calvin
Guy says NIL and the portal have brought equality?? I suppose if you're Kentucky you think that. Pay for play only works to equalize things though if you've got money, or exceptional talent evaluation and development. It's more like Animal Farm equality, where everyone is equal, just some are more equal than others.
 
#189      
Noblesville Illini
illiniguy24 said:
I might be in the minority here, but I personally don’t count transfers who didn’t commit here out of high school when talking about signing McD’s AA’s or “highest ranked recruits” such as Andrej or Boswell

Especially if they transferred as Juniors
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There in lies the rub. The old model (pre portal) was to bring in talent as freshman, highly skilled, and assume that they stay until they either go pro or graduate. So, that’s why we rated recruits as a gauge of our talent on the floor. Well, that’s only a part of the equation now. Transfers instantly can boost your talent in a year. IMHO, if you bring in TSJ and he elevates the teams skill, do you or don’t you consider him a recruit? I lean towards yes.
 
#191      
wc_illini
Noblesville Illini said:
There in lies the rub. The old model (pre portal) was to bring in talent as freshman, highly skilled, and assume that they stay until they either go pro or graduate. So, that’s why we rated recruits as a gauge of our talent on the floor. Well, that’s only a part of the equation now. Transfers instantly can boost your talent in a year. IMHO, if you bring in TSJ and he elevates the teams skill, do you or don’t you consider him a recruit? I lean towards yes.
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But their H.S. ranking is less relevant than their transfer ranking. To do otherwise would be like evaluating a H.S. recruit by their old rankings as an underclassman.
 
#194      
Emerson Bigguns
Noblesville Illini said:
There in lies the rub. The old model (pre portal) was to bring in talent as freshman, highly skilled, and assume that they stay until they either go pro or graduate. So, that’s why we rated recruits as a gauge of our talent on the floor. Well, that’s only a part of the equation now. Transfers instantly can boost your talent in a year. IMHO, if you bring in TSJ and he elevates the teams skill, do you or don’t you consider him a recruit? I lean towards yes.
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The whole paradigm has shifted. You have to "recruit" your entire roster every year. Recruiting is synonymous with roster construction, since everything must be renegotiated annually.
Discounting the time/effort/NIL allocation/procurement coaches have to invest in retaining good players is selling the job they do short.
 
#195      
ChiefGritty
WhereDoWeStandWithStorr? said:
Crazy to me that nobody will have USC preseason top 10.
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Explain why I should think that.

To me that situation reeks of a Kentucky-Indiana NIL roster with lots of notable names but without the coaching and clear coherent structure to believe it's actually going to be a good basketball team.

Eric Musselman always has players and he's 28-48 in conference the last four years.
 
#197      
3nDGuy
Emerson Bigguns said:
He did, however, choose to play for a different coach. Wade's offer must not have been "strong...: enough.
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Not a great look for Will Wade with LSU’s roster being bare as can be. I’m sure there are at least a couple from last years NC state team he could use in Baton Rouge
 
#198      
NarrowJ
ChiefGritty said:
Explain why I should think that.

To me that situation reeks of a Kentucky-Indiana NIL roster with lots of notable names but without the coaching and clear coherent structure to believe it's actually going to be a good basketball team.

Eric Musselman always has players and he's 28-48 in conference the last four years.
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CBS & ESPN both have them at #14 in the way-too-early rankings... not top 10, but they're not being ignored by any means.

And I am joining you on the opposite side of the fence with them. They have a couple decent transfer guards to play alongside Rice, but the frontcourt is Cofie, Reibe and 3 talented but young freshmen. Also, Rice has only played more than 8 games in a season once and he's been around since 2022. Then you have the coaching of Eric Musselman that hasn't lived up to the hype and I can easily see them as a bubble team this year.
 
#199      
WhereDoWeStandWithStorr?
PleaseMakeABowlGame said:
Michigan state is better than UConn, imo.

Tennessee - I think they should be 3. You know they’re gonna rebound and play defense. Pretty much guarantees when it comes to their coach. They are a bit smaller, but athleticism wise there’s no drop off.

Then you add in as much offensive firepower as they’ve added, it’s hard to think they aren’t title contenders. Not great retention, but that’s pretty much meaningless if you can get the newcomers to buy in (see: Michigan).
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I think Tennessee is definitely top 10, maybe even top 5

Top 3 is too high.
 
#200      
illiniguy24
Noblesville Illini said:
There in lies the rub. The old model (pre portal) was to bring in talent as freshman, highly skilled, and assume that they stay until they either go pro or graduate. So, that’s why we rated recruits as a gauge of our talent on the floor. Well, that’s only a part of the equation now. Transfers instantly can boost your talent in a year. IMHO, if you bring in TSJ and he elevates the teams skill, do you or don’t you consider him a recruit? I lean towards yes.
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Yes they are “recruits” again for sure. But their high school ranking becomes mostly irrelevant. They are transferring either because of one of two of these reasons…

One, they aren’t happy or want more money. Two, they outperformed their high school ranking. Three, they underperformed their high school ranking.
 
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