Illinois Hoops Recruiting Thread

[Oldskoolkoach]

I can't with some that think this team right now as it stands is blahhh.

I think we are already better than last years team and im not really sure its close.

Vaaks can flat out stroke it...we didnt have that this year. Yes, Keaton was very good, but not the pure shot Vaaks is from anywhere on the court.

Coleman will be better than Bam by end of the year.

AS/Z/T/Mirk all one more year in the program, typically players improve number 15-20% each year and have chemistry

Throw in Jake Davis bangin baseline 3s to spread the floor.

Morillo is pure gravy and he looks really really skilled for a true freshman.

I watched a lot of video of Wagler last year and thought he could be a 10 ppg type freshman. Coleman and Morillo both look better on film than wagler did, IMO. Chew on that a bit.

Can only feed so many mouths and we have enough to be excited about! Enjoy it!

 

[goillini30]

Wait…aren’t we bringing back 5 of our top 8 players from last year?

We will not be relying on any freshman to “carry the team.” We have 4 seniors and one of the best returning sophomores in the country to do that. The freshmen just need to do their jobs.

We are going to count on one freshman to be a starter and at least one more to be a rotation piece off the bench. That's definitely riskier than just needing one or two to be bench guys. I think this staff has earned our trust at this point, but I still would've preferred getting Blackwell to build a super team. I fully admit to being greedy

 

[LadyLoyalty]

Wouldn’t be loyalty without all the “expert” takes. Here’s my personal favorite when Wagler was signed. Receipts are forever.

 

[fatboyslim]

We are going to count on one freshman to be a starter and at least one more to be a rotation piece off the bench. That's definitely riskier than just needing one or two to be bench guys. I think this staff has earned our trust at this point, but I still would've preferred getting Blackwell to build a super team. I fully admit to being greedy

Why is that riskier? Freshman are on a team for a reason, to come in and compete for playing time. There's nothing riskier about that. If they are good enough to play they will. Look at the Final Four teams, all had at least 1 freshman key contributor. In the case of Arizona they had 3 starting and UConn had 1 starting and another key reserve.

Also we aren't done yet. We're probably going to add depth piece.

 

[CoachHooleyHoo]

6’4” combo guard ranked in the top 30 nationally with both excellent shooting and athleticism and was the teams 5th leading scorer?

Hmmmmmmmm

Conveniently left of McDAA part but whatever. Regardless of the rankings, he was a known commodity that could have gone wherever he wanted. I have connections to the family and trust me, he was viewed much higher than top 30. I may be biased but apples/oranges here.

 

[Dee_4_Three_83]

Let's take a look at the top 5 pre-season (AP) and National Champions that year for the last 4 seasons:

TL;DR- The National Champion has not been a top 5 team preseason the past 4 seasons. Just a little perspective for those that are feeling like not adding Blackwell dooms our chances.

2022-2023
1. North Carolina (didn't make tournament)
2. Gonzaga
3. Houston
4. Kentucky
5. Baylor/Kansas

National Champion: UConn (unranked)

2023-2024
1. Kansas
2. Duke
3. Purdue
4. Michigan State
5. Marquette

National Champion: UConn (#6)

2024-2025
1. Kansas
2. Alabama
3. UConn
4. Houston
5. Iowa State

National Champion: Florida (#21)


2025-2026
1. Purdue
2. Houston
3. Florida
4. UConn
5. St. John's

National Champion: Michigan (#7)

 

[Combo]

They are literally getting preseason number one shouts on social media by national writers.

A lot of people in here are overestimating what the talent landscape in college basketball looks like next year. Look at other rosters and the lack of tons of high level players left.

True, but other teams will add big pieces, while we appear to be finished. That will change these really early preseason rankings.

Which I don't care about -- whether we're ranked #2 or #7, we should be a very good team.

 

[CoachHooleyHoo]

They are literally getting preseason number one shouts on social media by national writers.

A lot of people in here are overestimating what the talent landscape in college basketball looks like next year. Look at other rosters and the lack of tons of high level players left.

And I would say that’s a bit overhyped. Top 10 for sure which is amazing. I truly don’t see this as a top 3 team.

 

[TheodoreRex]

They are literally getting preseason number one shouts on social media by national writers.

A lot of people in here are overestimating what the talent landscape in college basketball looks like next year. Look at other rosters and the lack of tons of high level players left.

It's probably just because we saw how unbelievably talented Michigan was this year- arguably the most talented team I can recall in college ball for a while. It's for me not to think about us needing to be better than them.. Even if that's not realistically how good we need to be.

 

[fatboyslim]

True, but other teams will add big pieces, while we appear to be finished. That will change these really early preseason rankings.

Which I don't care about -- whether we're ranked #2 or #7, we should be a very good team.

Are they? Well they better hurry up there aren't many big pieces left and it's gonna take more than one big piece for many of these teams.

 

[Rap47]

Will one of the stats posting people come up with the percentage of times that KB and KW drove to the basket that turned into assists, compared to missed shots. They both could get there but it seems there were not many assists.

 

[Illiniguy13]

I’m just looking forward to more posters insisting this is overly optimistic mental gymnastics post Blackwell-whif

 

[Illiniforlife]

They are literally getting preseason number one shouts on social media by national writers.

A lot of people in here are overestimating what the talent landscape in college basketball looks like next year. Look at other rosters and the lack of tons of high level players left.

I think what people are really trying to say is this: last year, Tomi looked like a shell of himself. He did improve as the season went on, but he was still stuck in a shooting slump. Big Z was flat‑out bad over the second half of the year. Andrej also struggled for most of the season—he didn’t really show up until the tournament, and even then, he still doesn’t shoot it well.
If you look at Mirk’s numbers against top‑level competition, he hasn’t been very good at all. That means he’s going to have to make a significant jump for this team to reach its potential. On top of that, we lost our best player—Keaton—who essentially won us two or three games by himself. We also lost another secondary ball handler.
To think that Coleman is going to step in and immediately replace Keaton is unrealistic. Expecting him to be Keaton—or even Boswell—is a stretch, especially considering Boswell wasn’t consistently that good himself. Vaaks is a very good offensive player, but he’s a major liability defensively.
Because of all of that, I don’t think it’s crazy to say there are a lot of question marks with this team. It’s far from a foregone conclusion that we’re going to be great next year.

 

[BWA]

I think that this freshman class is VERY special. The are the foundation for a great team in years to come if they stick together. Add a big or two next year and they may be world beaters.

But they're FRESHMEN. Counting on them to carry the team like Keaton did is asking a lot. Acquiring Blackwell as the second guard would mean that we wouldn't have to count on any freshmen. We'd have 7 players who are proven performers at every position with 5 freshmen being initiated into Illini basketball by years end. talent? yes! experience? no....

Love this team....but we're short one scorer at guard.

I. E. we're not quite done...

P.S. In my 70 years of watching Illini basketball, we've NEVER had a freshman before like Keaton Wagler. Should we count on that two years in a row??

To be fair, we’ve had freshman as key contributors most years with underwood.

Ayo
Kofi
Miller/Curbelo
Epps/Clark/Ty/Harris
KJ/Riley/Morez
Wagler/Mirk

 

[EwGroce]

Let's take a look at the top 5 pre-season (AP) and National Champions that year for the last 4 seasons:

TL;DR- The National Champion has not been a top 5 team preseason the past 4 seasons. Just a little perspective for those that are feeling like not adding Blackwell dooms our chances.

2022-2023
1. North Carolina (didn't make tournament)
2. Gonzaga
3. Houston
4. Kentucky
5. Baylor/Kansas

National Champion: UConn (unranked)

2023-2024
1. Kansas
2. Duke
3. Purdue
4. Michigan State
5. Marquette

National Champion: UConn (#6)

2024-2025
1. Kansas
2. Alabama
3. UConn
4. Houston
5. Iowa State

National Champion: Florida (#21)


2025-2026
1. Purdue
2. Houston
3. Florida
4. UConn
5. St. John's

National Champion: Michigan (#7)

I hear you on this, but we’re not wanting to land Blackwell because it’ll make us preseason #1 per se. We want Blackwell so we can become borderline unstoppable, overwhelm teams with depth and talent, and intimidate everyone in our path lol. To kind of reach that Michigan tier from this last season. I don’t think we should avoid Blackwell to make sure we avoid preseason #1 lol.

 

[Det_Illini_fan]

Wouldn’t be loyalty without all the “expert” takes. Here’s my personal favorite when Wagler was signed. Receipts are forever.

To be fair, they got the “be on the roster one year” part correct lmao

 

[Fly Illini Fly!]

Cooould even argue Sophomore Vaaks > Frosh Wagler in overall productivity. (Wagler will have a much better pro career but just in terms of their college impact for one season)

 

[BBlock24]

And I would say that’s a bit overhyped. Top 10 for sure which is amazing. I truly don’t see this as a top 3 team.

With all due respect, I'll side with the opinions of people who cover the entire sport rather than a fan of one team lol.

 

[hoopsfan47]

It's wild that we are consistently beating Wisconsin out for their states top recruits.

Podz, Domask, and now Zens we're all Mr Basketball in Wisconsin.

I am a bit hesitant to make anything of that fact. All it takes is for the basketball gods to decide coach XYZ needs to spend a few years in Madison. And said Coach just happens to be a great recruiter, can persuade generous donors to pony up big $, and poof...........they are beating us for top recruits after BU leaves. Things never stay the same. But you are correct, it is pretty wild.

 

[mhuml32]

I don't think he will be as good as Keaton was next year, but I think he is a top three player in terms of high school talent Underwood has signed since he's been here.

I promise you he will not be as good as Keaton. We either live in a simulation or this staff got a copy of Gray's Sports Almanac if this situation happened twice to the same program, let alone in back-to-back years.

 

[RichardKeene’sHair]

I’ll believe it when I see it.

Until then - absolutely no way, especially thinking that going into the season.

I realize Keaton Wagler is the best basketball player that ever lived and you could only replace him with a mutant cyborg, but maybe, just maybe a player that’s older, an inch taller, 30 pounds heavier that scored 16ppg as a Freshman on a bad team will make a pretty big impact.

 

[Emerson Bigguns]

We are going to count on one freshman to be a starter and at least one more to be a rotation piece off the bench. That's definitely riskier than just needing one or two to be bench guys. I think this staff has earned our trust at this point, but I still would've preferred getting Blackwell to build a super team. I fully admit to being greedy

Where did you get the impression they backed off Blackwell? He is choosing a different path. He was definitely Plan A, but as far as Plan B’s go, it’s pretty dang spectacular.

What team has a decidedly better roster right now? We’ve relied on freshmen just about every year, as do most teams.

Coleman and Morillo are the kind of prospects we used to pray for. They don’t have to be Keaton. If they can play like freshman Ayo, Adam Miller, Curbelo, Jacucionis, Riley, that kid who went to Michigan…I forget his name… they can fit in just fine.

 

[fatboyslim]

I mean it's possible. I keep saying this but no one saw what Wagler did coming. It's not some farfetched take that he comes in and really takes off. Look I love Keaton and what he did last year but we got stop acting like no one will ever eclipse his productivity from last year. Is it likely to happen? I would say no but I don't know that for sure and neither do you. No one does. Did you think anyone at this time last year would eclipse Riley or KJ? No you didn't.

 

[jmm]

Kid shot 65%fg/50%3/90%FT last season, won the state championship & was Mr.Basketball in MO, and people are like, are we sure he’s good?

Keaton’s senior year he won the state championship and was 59% 45% and 83% in The same categories and Mr Basketball. . We all saw what happened his freshman year

 

[illini0440]

Just curious: can we not even get Blackwell on a visit to shoot your shot? Sell winning, legacy, vision, etc.

I mean… if UCLA can get him on campus then why can’t we?

He’s been out in LA working out. Easy visit to UCLA.