Illinois Hoops Recruiting Thread

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#26      
Mr. Roberts
LvilleILL1 said:
We are on announcement watch the next 36 hours.
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#27      
Kendall Gill’s Uncle
soupy17 said:
Decent update to the Portal Tracker from over the weekend. Some commitments, some new CB's.

The unofficial Crystal Ball is now up to a solid 89% hit rate - only misses being the late shifts from the Sellers and Dix recruitments.

We're still holding the Andrej CB, but given the information above you can choose to take that as you wish.

Grid is as current as I can go based on the actual information. Mirk unsigned, an estimate of 2 eligibility years for Petrovic, and projecting that Ben and Jason return.
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Thank you for doing this!!
 
#28      
Joel Goodson
altgeld88 said:
On the Stanford-poaching-mad-portal-talent topic: I was at a Virginia Tech basketball game last December in Blacksburg. Snagged last-minute tickets on SeatGeek in a section for donors. Got chatting with one of them adjacent to us about NIL and how VT funneled its bag to football, leaving men's basketball a bit hungry.

They guy said he had gone out to the VT-Stanford game in Palo Alto that fall. He was talking to a Stanford donor at the game who was bragging that given the high net worth of Stanford alums and the new NIL landscape, Stanford would be able to purchase nattys in revenue sports and that few if any programs would be able to compete with them.

I found that vaguely plausible but I've not seen not any evidence that it's afoot. They need money and coaching talent. The former is a necessary but insufficient condition for success. We'll see.
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seems like a bad case of hopeium
 
#29      
WxIllini
Hoping today is the day we get the announcement. No need to drag it out any longer. Said his peace with Cal yesterday and the kid knows exactly where he’s going. Good things come to those who wait…
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#30      
DCIllini
BashCtIllini said:
If the internet is to be believed, Stoyakovic lives about 2 hours from Palo Alto and just under from Berkely.

It is pretty clear that Andrej is interested in education and staying somewhat close to home, given he started at Stanford and then transferred to Cal. Stanford was not good under Haase, but he was able to grab a 5 star here and there. The results at Stanford leading into Andrej's commitment were 14-13, 16-16, 14-19. In 8 seasons at Stanford, Haase won 20 games once and had 0 NCAA Tournament appearances. So while a 5 star recruit had many options, he chose Stanford.

Then when he transferred, again he had many options and chose Cal. The coach of Cal is a Stanford guy Mark Madsen. And Madsen's first year he went 13-19. Prior to that Cal was 14-18, 9-20, 12-20, 3-29. How is 3-29 even possible for a major college team?

So Andrej twice chose California schools, with strong academics, and poor recent history of success. Stanford has a new coach now and he won 21 games in his first season. All of this means I'm more concerned about Stanford than UNC.
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Thoughtful response. Looking back at AS’ selections, it appears that he clearly made academics a top priority in his early college career. However, given last year’s jump in basketball performance at Cal vs his year at Stanford, AS has now elevated his game to the next level. Logic would suggest that with a future that now likely includes professional basketball, AS would select a program that could develop his abilities further and improve his draft stock. Because of that, I don’t think Stanford is the first choice.

I think UNC/Davis must have impressed AS during past recruiting efforts which is why they were named a finalist. However , given that AS did not visit UNC’s campus, I think this is more of an optics play and including UNC as a finalist is being done to appease previously-developed relationships. Also, UNC of today / tomorrow isn’t the UNC of the past and they are no longer an automatic NCAA tournament team.

While I’m biased, for the reasons above, I was really encouraged that the school finalist pool reveals UI as AS’ ultimate selection. UI has proven it can develop players for the next level and his visit speaks volumes; actions speak louder than words. I hope I’m right; he’d be a great addition.
 
#35      
Chukwuwumba
altgeld88 said:
On the Stanford-poaching-mad-portal-talent topic: I was at a Virginia Tech basketball game last December in Blacksburg. Snagged last-minute tickets on SeatGeek in a section for donors. Got chatting with one of them adjacent to us about NIL and how VT funneled its bag to football, leaving men's basketball a bit hungry.

They guy said he had gone out to the VT-Stanford game in Palo Alto that fall. He was talking to a Stanford donor at the game who was bragging that given the high net worth of Stanford alums and the new NIL landscape, Stanford would be able to purchase nattys in revenue sports and that few if any programs would be able to compete with them.

I found that vaguely plausible but I've not seen not any evidence that it's afoot. They need money and coaching talent. The former is a necessary but insufficient condition for success. We'll see.
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Hopefully VT gets some money for Chester.
 
#37      
ChiefGritty
BashCtIllini said:
It is pretty clear that Andrej is interested in education and staying somewhat close to home, given he started at Stanford and then transferred to Cal.
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Transferring after both college seasons, which is of course extremely disruptive to a student's academic career, pretty clearly belies that.

What Andrej has dedicated his young life to and had as his focus from a young age is being an NBA star like his dad was.

And let's be frank here. All three of Stanford-Cal-Illinois, Stanford-Cal-UNC, or Stanford-Cal-Stanford are pretty strange pathways that don't have a ton of internal logic to them.

Bbuck21 said:
I get the point that Stanford probably has an Alumni base with deep pockets. And the hypothetical is plausible. But, I don't think they have the kind of base that care about their athletics enough. They'd probably put their money into women's volleyball or archery. But, what do I know?
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1. Much smaller school so a much smaller alumni base in sheer numbers. 2. Sports doesn't have the huge presence in campus life there that it does at most other major schools 3. The wealthy alums are disproportionately in fields that tend to care less about sports. 4. The (remember, small) alumni base is heavily dispersed nationally and globally more than other schools, there's not a large community of Stanford alums really anywhere.

There are any number of Stanford alums (or just Palo Alto residents) who are rich enough to single-handedly make them a power player, but until that day, it's not really the shape of a situation well suited to NIL dominance unlike a Miami (larger alumni base concentrated in and around the levers of power of one very rich city that loves the teams), or a Michigan (gigantic and still very rich alumni base more centered around gladhand-y professions whose fondly remembered college experience was wall to wall Go Blue propaganda)
 
#38      
IndyIllini2
The fact that Stanford is back on this list tells me that academics really do play a large part in his decision. UNC has got to be about the dollars, despite being a highly ranked school, their history with the basketball program and academics is dicey at best. Still like our chances here.
 
#40      
nyc_illini
IndyIllini2 said:
The fact that Stanford is back on this list tells me that academics really do play a large part in his decision. UNC has got to be about the dollars, despite being a highly ranked school, their history with the basketball program and academics is dicey at best. Still like our chances here.
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Only fans care about the scandals at UNC. At the end of the day, if a player chooses to care about education, he will be able to get it at UNC
 
#46      
Bigtex
FI_8905 said:
Familiarity with Stanford and personal connections is the main draw there. Major factor.
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I am assuming a new coach and last years winning season gives Stanford a 2nd look.
 
#49      
strobes77
I would be surprised if academics are a huge deal in the picture here. Money too. You are looking at familiarity with Palo Alto and California beauty v. Champaign, cow farms and winning and being at a basketball grinder for the next level.
 
#50      
ChiefGritty
FI_8905 said:
Familiarity with Stanford and personal connections is the main draw there. Major factor.
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And yet with a new coach who can say "all the things you didn't like are different now, with all the things you liked still being here".

BU had better be at his MacGuyvering best right now. Can't let this be a RayJ "too late to pivot" situation.

They thought they had more control over this than they did, which colored our earlier pursuits and isn't great, but all that matters is the end result.
 
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