Illinois Hoops Recruiting Thread
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Are we on a commitment watch with Darius Wabbington this weekend since he suddenly moved his visit up before his other visits? Or am I way off?
It was a surprise preponement for sure. We weren’t even in his Top 6 till the summer when he swapped us in place of Louisville.
And we already have 3 other composite 5-stars visiting this weekend:
- Dylan Betts (7-3, C, Class of 2028)
- Bentley Lusakueno (6-10, PF, Class of 2028)
- Moussa Kamissoko (6-8, SF, Class of 2027)
Wabbington fashions himself a stretch 4 and would love to play in a two BIG-BIG lineup. As such, don’t think he’s worried about the 2028 guys.
I think it’s more a concern if he wants to play the 4 and Mirk returns. But I could see him taking Tomi’s spot at the 5. We played smaller in the gap betweek Kofi and Tomi with CoHawk at the 5. Wabbington would hold his own at that spot better than CoHawk but what happens when we run into the Clingan, Mara, Condon, and Krivas’s of the world.
Feels like a 7’ bruiser at the 5 is an absolute must to build a dominant contender.
I mean id love to see us get a commitment from Betts and Wabbington but im think8ng it will probably one or the other.i mean wabbington was just listed as 6"11 and 255 in a recent article from he shall not be named on this site if thats correct hes definitely big enough to play the 5 in the big or any other conference in the country
Betts is in 2028. Wabnington is in 2027.
Orangetool
Give me back my Afta, heh heh
Let's Effn Go
Recruit, recruit and then recruit some more
Recruit, recruit and then recruit some more
Not for long!
Betts is said to be moving up a class and he will be imminently announcing that as soon as he commits to whichever school he ultimately ends up choosing.
Also, I'll share that I was told earlier tonight that an NIL deal has been verbally agreed to by one of the aforementioned mentioned players above (you can guess who)...
Was told everything will be finalized once the terminology of the contract is looked over in person when he arrives for his visit.
If everything stays in line with the preliminary discussions, he's going to officially agree to it.
This player is already 100% bought-in to the program (just needs to see the financials ofc), and he is said to be embracing the idea and role as the Captain of this recruiting class!
And lastly I'm told he is even hopeful that we will see a certain wing player who he is close friends with, commit with him as well, following what could be one of the most memorable recruiting weekends in Illinois basketball history!
So who is all going to be here this weekend? What a loaded weekend.
He is the priority for sure.
Nice. I had to look that one up.
pruman91
- interviewing new NL's daily....I really really am
The staff loves him. And it's easy to see why.
Do we have too many big-time recruits for a non-basketball weekend? Would some of them feel like we aren't rolling out the red carpet just for them? Are we looking for a Fab Five-type situation?
No. No. Yes.
Arguably could roll out even more of a "red carpet" because the coaches could dedicate more time to recruitment than preparing for a basketball game.
Very few schools are able to pull the Fab 5 these days not named Duke and Arkansas. I doubt we are in a position to pull one out of the blue. Duke seems capable as they can afford it and kids have FOMO over that experience (JBB literally said that) and to be part of the Sisterhood. Cal can do it because he starts them all and massages the OAD experience, which he's been doing for 30 years. Hurley seems to be selective around it, grabbing one 5 star/year and not over-promising.
I don't think Brad is a Fab 5 kinda guy, his recipe at this point not playing a fleet of 18 year olds and more mature euros. Don't fix what ain't broken.
Yeah last time he relied one multiple freshmen to be major major contributors was his worst year.
That being said, BUs shown that he can build a highly competitive team in multiple ways. I’d imagine if he thinks signing 4 5*s was a good use of NIL, we’d be putting together a pretty awesome and competent team.
What year are we talking about?
Brad's worst year was year 2 when we went 12-21. And it's true we relied a lot on freshmen that year. But it was not the last time we relied on multiple freshmen.
If multiple means more than one, then that would be last season, when we made the Final Four starting 2 freshmen in Wagler and Mirk.
My guess is you were referring to either the Matthew Mayer season (where we had freshmen contributions from the likes of Epps, Rogers, Sencire, and, for a time, Skyy) season or the KJ/Will Riley season. It's hard to really draw any conclusions based on those. I mean these guys visiting this weekend are all top-20 recruits and each one of them has a higher 247 composite ranking than Will Riley, the highest ranked recruit we've pulled in during the time in which 247 has been doing the composite. We've just never had a class like that. Even pulling two of those guys would be uncharted territory.
It's also would not a true Fab Five situation unless there is some re-classing being discussed because half these guys are from the '27 class and half are '28.
In today's world, I find the 5* OAD model to have a clear ceiling. Always exciting as F because it usually entails a lot of lottery picks, stars of tomorrow, but ineffective because you're usually getting them well before they kit their potential.
20 year old Euro freshman that played pro ball not the same as US freshmen. Last year's team had plenty of age on it.
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