2023-24 Illini
1. No 5 stars
2. Lock for NCAA championship
Illinois Hoops Recruiting Thread
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Sorry if I misunderstood others, but some people who were bringing up Curry, Morant, Lillard, or Hayward seemed to be implying that this is what we could expect...why I brought up Tom Brady, which was meant as outlandish.
I also like the idea of transfer portal strategy.
I've read on this board that we are ahead of the game compared to other schools in NIL (assets at our disposal). Is our NIL good enough to get the next Chicago superstar to come to IL? Has been sad to see the D. Rose, J. Parker, J. Okafor, A. Davis types always go elsewhere. Maybe I've been burnt so much from that that I want the 5 star to actually pick us next time.
Well with many of those underrecruited guys, people are overlooking, or not acknowledging, the obvious. Most of these guys didn't play AAU or were on small AAU circuits. Some grew significantly. There are A LOT of kids out there, and coaches only have so much time to view kids. Because of that, they go to these major AAU events because you can get more bang for your buck. The scouting analysts do the same thing, hence the top 100 is heavily predicated on AAU performance.
Then when the high school season rolls around, people are watching these prep schools, because again lots of talent in one place. The regional scouting analysts seem to be decrease, so no one is going to watch a St. Ignatius game, thus Phoenix Gill, who didn't play AAU, is lowly (and inaccurately) rated. So yes, there will always be kids that are just undiscovered because they didn't go to where the coaches were. That's why many of these kids end up at a pretty local school, because they're only known locally. My Purdue alum buddy has been raving about Roosevelt Colvin's son, who will be a Fr. this year. I never heard of him because he didn't play AAU, was lowly rated, and was really only recruited by Indiana schools. So he'll be another good example potentially.
There's also another group that goes underrecruited. The small guys. Guys like Markquis Nowell. He played at a major basketball school, but he was tiny. People knew he could play, but they didn't think his size would allow him to perform at the college level. They were wrong. You tend to see a lot of small guards at small schools leading the nation in scoring. Everyone knows they've got skills, but the big schools are afraid their size will hurt them against high major competition. I think this wide open transfer portal will start to give some of those guys to prove whether the small guys can excel in a major conference. Nowell certainly did.
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Pretty interesting... in CFB the blue chip ratio is like the end all be all in being able to win a championship. Is scouting in basketball that much worse or is one transcendent player just that much more impactful because there are only 5 on the court
No, it's because in football you have to stay 3 years. Meaning that 5 star player can get bigger, stronger, and more experienced. In basketball, the top guys leave after one year, so you never really get their best.
Also to your final point, in basketball 1 or 2 guys can really make your team. In football it takes far more to have a strong team.
All things being equal a 5 star is better than a 4 which is better than a 3. But all things are never equal.
This is where the art of recruiting comes in. Finding the right players is far more important than the stars they have. Character is a big factor, and players are not awarded stars for it. Give me a 3 star that is dedicated to working hard, improving his game and being a team player, over a selfish egotistical 5 star that is a locker room problem. In this day of NIL, you need players that have their head on straight. The top players have to know how to relate to the other players that aren't getting a big paycheck, and the players not getting a big paycheck can't let jealousy drive a wedge between them and their teammate.
Fit and personality is another factor. I think about RJ. As a freshman he was here with 4 other guys that were Puerto Rican connected (I'll include Kofi as Jamaica not too far away). He was comfortable and he fit in, and he excelled in the time he got. A year later all 4 of those guys are gone. It was a huge change for RJ. He was now the odd one out. Though I have no personal knowledge, I will always believe that, if Curbelo hadn't gone off the deep end and stayed, RJ would have been a completely different player.
Putting a team together has to be five dimensional chess. It is an imperfect art.
This is where the art of recruiting comes in. Finding the right players is far more important than the stars they have. Character is a big factor, and players are not awarded stars for it. Give me a 3 star that is dedicated to working hard, improving his game and being a team player, over a selfish egotistical 5 star that is a locker room problem. In this day of NIL, you need players that have their head on straight. The top players have to know how to relate to the other players that aren't getting a big paycheck, and the players not getting a big paycheck can't let jealousy drive a wedge between them and their teammate.
Fit and personality is another factor. I think about RJ. As a freshman he was here with 4 other guys that were Puerto Rican connected (I'll include Kofi as Jamaica not too far away). He was comfortable and he fit in, and he excelled in the time he got. A year later all 4 of those guys are gone. It was a huge change for RJ. He was now the odd one out. Though I have no personal knowledge, I will always believe that, if Curbelo hadn't gone off the deep end and stayed, RJ would have been a completely different player.
Putting a team together has to be five dimensional chess. It is an imperfect art.
sacraig
- The desert
It's really not that hard. I have always found some fans tend to act like sports is astrophysics that only a select few can understand. It is not, some coaches are certainly better than others, but that is for a variety of reasons. An extraordinary brain is not typically that reason.
Again, it's not hard to identify great players, it's hard to land them. So you've got 2 choices, the blue blood approach of just grab the best players and let them go, or recruit to your system. I guess there is a 3rd choice miss on the best players and then not recruit players for your system (the Weber approach), but i don't recommend that one.
But there's another reason 3 star/lower rated players outperform ranking expectations, they get opportunity. Podz is a great example. He had 0 chance of being a 1st round draft pick last year if he stayed at Illinois. He wouldn't have got the minutes and he certainly wouldn't have gotten the shots. Whether he earned those minutes and shots in practice or not is irrelevant, because my point is you can't perform if you're not on the court. As others have pointed out there is not a wide gap between the #40 and #80 players, really not even that big of a gap between #40 and #140. But if that #140 player is starting and getting 25+ mpg and that #40 player is getting 10 mpg off the bench, well clearly there is much more opportunity for the lower rated guy to perform. Then factor in that the better guys ranked #140 (likely too low) are the ones that would get those minutes, then voila they were way off with this guy, rankings are worthless. Again we can look at Podz. Ranked #107 barely played at Illinois, well that seems right he was properly ranked. Goes to Santa Clara gets 36 mpg and 14 shots per game, becomes a 1st rounder and all the sudden he's massively underranked. The player didn't change, the opportunity changed.
This one is on the kids. I thought it made no sense that Goode, Melendez, and Podz all committed in the same class. There's only 1 ball and only 2 wing positions. Clearly someone from that group was not going to play, and that is exactly what happened. When we've had wide open minutes for a guy like Kylan Boswell, but he chooses to go to a school that already has high performing PG it makes you shake your head a bit. Opportunity is what gets you noticed kids.
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foby
- Bonnaroo Land
Oops.
When Boswell committed curbelo was just starting his sophomore year.
So I guess that does that then?
? Are you saying because Jeremiah received a Kansas offer that he is definitely not considering coming to Illinois? That is not the feeling that I am getting from others.
That’s actually my personal kink…
IlliniwekKDR
- Colorado Springs, CO
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