Illinois Hoops Recruiting Thread
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I have seen serious posts made in this forum stating emphatically that:
1. AS is unplayable.
2. BU won't play a freshman
It is mind-boggling. Might as well say that the floor should be changed to butter or that the Assembly Hall is made of pure sugar. Where does anyone come up with these ideas? There is no shread of fact behind them. And yet they continue. Makes me wonder how such people live long enough to learn how to type or even turn on a computer. I mean we all know that the earth is flat....right?
So, maybe a simple “asked and answered” response would work? Certainly seems more productive than shouting down people who don’t seem to tow the company line. Isn’t a fan forum supposed to be an exchange of opinions?
sacraig
- The desert
That depends on (a) your definition of top recruit, and (b) what retention looks like.
Vaaks is a top recruit in the sense that he is a very good newcomer. He just came from the transfer portal. By that measure, we have Coleman, Morillo, and Vaaks (remember, Morillo is top 50, so is no slouch). Plus, you never really know who is going to blow up. Wagler wasn't considered a top recruit last year, and now he's a lottery pick.
Plus, we retained so much from last year that we have less need for high-impact freshmen or transfers. That doesn't mean zero need, but we don't need to reload the team with fresh recruits that have to carry the load.
sacraig
- The desert
I'm glad you're not their AD. Keep that man in Lexington forever.
USAFILLINI
- Florida
I’m guessing the chant itself, but she sounded like she had been on the sauce since breakfast so who knows.
Louisville already has their backcourt solidified with Knox and Shelstad.
going to Duke…
I don't think it could necessarily work the way the modern game is reffed and with how many guys can shoot now but I would love to see a team try to bring back the Nolan Richardson 40 minutes of hell style and that would be interesting to see on a team that did hockey style line changes to keep guys fresh.
I think you would also probably have to adjust and limit the trapping or choose specific situations to trap in but Ive always thought watching the teams that play extremely differently like that was fun.
The biggest problem might be finding 10 kids that want to press for 40 minutes and the length/athleticism needed to do that.
Sure, there are a bunch of 4-star recruits and some of them end up being good. What you want to know is how likely is it that X player(s) can fill the role(s) you collectively need them to fill
That's what I aimed to look at here, showing that last year's #24-30 guys weren't that impressive (McKenney was #18, so not in that range). That sample size is obviously small (I don't have time to do that for multiple seasons and/or to generate a smoothed probability across the entire range of rankings), so it doesn't say anything with much certainty, but it may be a good reality check. There's still the very important question of whether a particular team's talent evaluation is better/worse than the online recruiting ranking sites, and I'd like to think we've done a very good job finding talent outside the top 20. And maybe Morillo ends up being "the guy" over Coleman this year- it's good we have multiple chances at hitting on someone, though a top portal player or top 10 recruit might on paper have an even better chance.
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Illini2010-11
- Sugar Grove
That's too bad.
Glad we have a winning operation in Brad and Co. They know how to get a roster created in this era of college basketball.
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No it was the winning bidder!!!
Quite the luxury to secure not one, but BOTH Ivisic brothers:
I'm not agreeing with his opinion because it lacks context. I haven't gone back to confirm this, but it felt like the consensus was that we could retain AND bring in Blackwell. I see people saying it was an either/or situation, which is fine if that was the case. The questions stem from not understanding how the staff went from wanting a big fish, to being good with the current roster.
This does not mean people are not happy with the team. Or that this team can't compete. Just that if we felt like we could really use Blackwell, why not put those efforts into finding another quality guard. Now that it's apparent it was an either or situation, it makes more sense. If this either/or situation was common belief, no one would be questioning what happened. As most fans would agree that bringing our guys back should have been the priority.
foby
- Bonnaroo Land
ME TODAY: Yay! Superteam!
Lot's of straw man arguments being made on this thread. The people that were dissappointed that blackwell didn't come here were hoping we had a chance to be preseason #1, which hasn't happened in a long time, if ever. I don't think any of those people are saying the team isn't good. It's just going to be preseason #5 or so, not #1.
The response has been "some people think that right now illinois is the best team". Which is not the same thing as being preseason #1. I'd be willing to bet anyone that wants to that illinois will not be preseason #1. Doesn't make it a bad offseason, but also doesn't make it what people were getting excited about a couple weeks ago. It can both be true that it was a good offseason and not the "best" offseason possible. Blackwell is gonna go to Duke now (it seems, which isn't surprising) where he is going to have a similar non-A#1 role he would have had here. This is a similar story to last year with Sarr, a couple years ago with Storr, etc. That doesn't mean it is a bad offseason, but a fan has a right to be not happy about a recruit picking some other team.
I personally don't even think Blackwell is that great, so I'm not worried about it. But i also doubt very much that illinois will be the favorite to win the national championship at any point next year. Which doesn't mean we can't win the championship, but it has shown again that we are not a top tier program in the truest sense of the word (in the tier with Duke, UConn, Kansas, and despite their current issues UNC and Kentucky).
Yeah, I suppose it's easier for teams like Duke to "overbook" many top freshman than it is to bring in a top transfer to potentially have to compete for time/usage. Please nobody take this as a gripe or doomerism, but it sure would be nice to bring in one/many top-10 freshman too. That's also mostly how Arizona reloaded/upgraded.
And (as ChiefGritty pointed out), there are plenty of super-teams on paper that fail spectacularly, so this isn't Fantasy sports- roster fit and coaching are huge.
But Michigan convinced Yaxel to join after also convincing two returning starters (admittedly not as good as ours), a #18 freshman, and four solid transfers (not super highly ranked, but the 247 ratings would've put three in the top 20 and the fourth top 40 this year). I know Michigan wasn't a preseason favorite last year (#5 in preseason odds), so there's absolutely hindsight bias risk that this is a good/reliable way to build a roster, but it's certainly an example where a lot of guys probably could have felt entitled to the same minutes. Do we think they over-promised, paid huge $, or just found a unique group willing to make sacrifices? Much has been said about Yaxel sacrificing usage, but the seven others also committed to some sharing/competition even before he joined, and they didn't seem to have issues sacrificing further after he joined, at least not that affected the results.
I don't have time to look at prior years. I was hoping someone would chime in with an opinion if any of those are relevant.
Is Duke a done deal? I’m curious what happens if Scheyer leaves for the Bulls
The news of Haugh coming back to Florida should be more reason for Mara and Morez to stay in the draft. All three players were/are projected first round and now one of them (Haugh) is off the board and returning back to his school, Mara's and Morez's stock should climb up the board in the first round even more. Just my take.
That argument doesnt really work with Florida, but nice try. Fland can't do anything but get better. Haugh's shooting numbers regressed last year and he was still 2nd team AA. They brought in so much guard talent last year who saw limited minutes that they'll be a year older and that much deeper. I actually think losing Xavier Lee is an addition because him and Fland never gelled in the backcourt.
ChiefGritty
- Chicago, IL
It was pretty easy to clock early on that Glynn Blackwell wanted his son to play for his alma mater and John Blackwell wanted to be a Dookie.
I am not the Dookie type, personally, but they don't lose many battles for kids that have that spark of interest in their whole schtick.
We are playing the (extremely strong) hand we've been dealt as well as we possibly can.
That has been a MAJOR strength of this staff. They have been very good at reading the situation as it develops and reacting accordingly.
I concur. That’s why I said Morez was moving closer to the lottery.
If he was capable, then he would’ve seen the court. The 9th man usually sees the court.
2025 — Jake Davis; 9th man, appeared in 32 games, averaged 3 points per game in 9.5 minutes.
2024 — DGL; 9th man, appeared in 28 games, averaged 2.4 points in 7.1 minutes.
2023 — Luke Goode was the 9th man; 10 games, 13.8min, 4 points per game (his first game was in February since he was hurt in the offseason). When Skyy Clark was playing, we didn’t have Goode… and when Goode was playing we didn’t have Skyy… but we played 9 deep in each of those timeframes.
2022 — we literally played 11 deep. The 8th-11th guys were Goode / Bosmans / Payne / Melendez. All of them played over 7mpg and appeared in most games.
TLDR; if you’re the 9th man at Illinois, you’ll usually see the court. Won’t be gaudy numbers, but you’ll see the court. This past season was the outlier because the staff didn’t feel comfortable with either Lee or Petrovic.
As it currently stands, Ethan Brown is the guy in that spot, so hopefully he’s more reliable than Lee / Petrovic.
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