Just this year, we landed Carlson (stanford and ucla offers, top 100) and tillman (cal offer). Our cupboard is hardly bare. We will likely need to fill a couple more spots and i think we will have a great run next year.Originally Posted by justaute
Just this year, we landed Carlson (stanford and ucla offers, top 100) and tillman (cal offer). Our cupboard is hardly bare. We will likely need to fill a couple more spots and i think we will have a great run next year.
Disappointing day for sure. Carlson and Tillman are definitely nice gets. Any more info on the other guys we are after? Epperson or Smith....?
It will be interesting to see what happens with the existing players. If anyone other than Jokl or Zamorra transfer, I will begin to wonder whether LK is simply too old school to coach todays college kids.
We've never signed a five star, so big deal. Still, I don't get how anyone could find solace for our drop-off since Majerus in a perceived "drop-off" between Lute and Miller.
One thing I have learned in a long life: that all our science, measured against reality, is primitive and childlike -- and yet it is the most precious thing we have.
--Albert Einstein
The fact that life evolved out of nearly nothing, some 10 billion years after the universe evolved out of literally nothing, is a fact so staggering that I would be mad to attempt words to do it justice.
--Richard Dawkins
Be kind to all, for everyone you meet is fighting a great battle.
--Philo
Who is finding solace in our drop off? I'm finding hope in the rebound from Giac and Boylen. Are we where I hope to be? No. I would really love to go to another Final Four. That was hands down the best sporting weekend I have ever attended.
I believe LK has shown that he can coach guys up to a certain level. IMO, this team, on the whole, out performed its talent level. Sure, there were games when they didn't and segments of the game where they didn't. That is a credit to the players and the coaches.
My only question about LK is whether he has the temperament to coach today's college kid. I think the jury is out on that and some of that will be answered by what transpires this off-season.
We had a drop off during Majerus, not just after. He never again recruited to the level of Miller, Doleac, or Van Horn (except for Bogut, who never played for him and was re-recruited). He missed on Ridnour and the player who chose UCLA and then played 10 years in the NBA (partly because he was flirting with ASU, Texas, etc.). He never recruited a player the caliber of Delon or Poeltl. Nick Jacobsen was a great college player, as was the point guard from Olympus whose name escapes me at the moment. Run DMC were good college players. Altoff was ok to good, but fundamentally stiff and limited, like lots of bigs we have had since then. Remember the stiff he recruited from Wyoming? Majerus hit the jackpot once (complemented by Alex, Hanno, and Britton) and never repeated it.
Last edited by concerned; 03-10-2017 at 08:38 AM.
Jackson the point guard? as for the kid from Wyoming...........Schmidty!!!! Being a wyoming native, I was thrilled to see a guy from there, especially thermopolis!
For the last 6 years, I have spent a significant amount of time every year at the University of Arizona Medical Center. I am going there again next month. Tucson is passionate for UA hoops. They are fairly passionate for all things U of A, because honestly the university is the only thing going there. If you don't think Arizona fans are unhappy with Miller, you're crazy, high or both. Olson's four final 4's spoiled that fan base. If you are getting the recruits AZ is getting, it better pay off at some point. As crazy as it sounds Miller's 3 elite 8's in 8 years isn't cutting it.
Thank you for covering for my Alzheimers.
This is all bringing back a lot of memories. It underscores how lucky ANY team has to be to make it to the championship game. Even if you are stacked with great recruits and players things like injuries or players just not panning out happen more frequently than not.
Britton Johnsen struggled with injuries throughout his career. Tim Frost, Mark Jackson and others as well. Chris Burgess. Majerus during this time was kind of in and out with his mom's health issues. We had a year of Dick Hunsaker. Majerus courted every job offer that came his way, no matter how ridiculous. Despite all of that, things weren't as disastrous as perhaps they should have been.
Everything you said is correct but I always can't help but wonder in a perfect world where Majerus was at his best and not running players off or having health issues, or whatever. What if Majerus had been able to truly develop Run DMC, Justin Hawkins, Marc Jackson, Andrew Bogut and they all remained healthy? I tend to believe that team would have been pretty special.
Ha! No problem!
311ute pointed out the other day that there was a huge dropoff associated with Donny Daniels leaving. Hard to argue that.
And the UCLA guy was Jason Kapono.
“To me there is no dishonor in being wrong and learning. There is dishonor in willful ignorance and there is dishonor in disrespect.” James Hatch, former Navy Seal and current Yale student.
Per Goon's tweet, Epperson going to Creighton. Lost another talented recruit.
That seems to be the way he'd been leaning for some time. Still disappointing.
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Yah. Right now I am quite down our ability to recruit. Maybe I'm being unrealistic, but I just don't think that much of our recent recruits. Thus far, I believe Poeltl and DWright were exceptions. I know people are pretty high on Daniels, Barefield, and Collette -- i think they are "ok" for a P12 program. Having watched a lot of D1 basketball, I just don't think what we have are much different from the average. Rawson/Zamora/Jokl -- especially Jokl -- are pretty bad.
I feel the same. We don't seem to be able to close and are scrambling every spring. Nobody on the staff has much of a rep as a recruiter.
Just one question- Were we his second choice? If so, please shoot me now.
I think, at the very least, Larry needs to switch a coach around and bring in a much better recruiter.
No question we've been losing high profile recruits too often. It justifies some serious introspection, IMO, to see if there's something freezing recruits late, but the 3 "almost" recruits from Gonzaga and AZ in SLC weren't bagging on Utah, and didn't dodge the question.
Collette's biggest problem is a lack of length. He has an array of moves and a high motor, but how gets blocked at the rim by wings really exposes our lack of range on the front line. Rawson is 6-10, a decent athlete, who can hit some threes. If he can make strides in the offseason, he's my early pick for most improved next year. Not bad for a late find, "filler" recruit.
Whatever the chemistry issue was this year, I have some hope Barfield will grow up and be productive, and Zamora - when he has his long game going - is a 8 man rotation guy. Maybe Bealer will break out in an unexpected extra year. Kids grow up, some bloom late.
Chris Seeley unquestionably has an NBA body, with that level of athleticism. The rest of the ingredients are yet to be seen, but he'll be just a freshman. Tillman and the other talented wing are yet to be seen.
If Seeley really plays at about 6-10, maybe the front line issue fades. Kuzma is really our most important recruit, for next year.
Signed,
Larry Brown.
2016 was the first year that we really had opportunities to bring in high end recruits and failed to land them. In fairness, we did land Johnson and Daniels, who both had several good offers. I believe Larry really believed that he had a chance with Jackson and Markanen and devoted a lot of time and energy into those guys. In hindsight, it would have been better to devote the time and energy to Childs and the kid who went to USU. I think all of us would feel a little more optimistic if those guys were here instead of Rawson/Jokl and Zamora/Coleman. I wonder if Larry believes he made an error in not going after those two. If he does, lesson learned. If he doesn't, I don't know what to think.
I guess the question for me is whether Daniels, Barefield, Seeley and Tilman (if he signs), are significantly better than Loveridge, Taylor, Tucker and Chapman. I'm not sure that they are. At best it is a push.
With the commitments of Epperson to Creighton and Akot to Arizona, it does not appear that there are a lot of recruits left on the table. Assuming Tillman signs, we have 12 scholarship players who could return. Seniors: Collette, Kuzma, Rawson, Bealer, Zamora; Juniors: PVD, Barefield; Sophomores: Daniels, Johnson, Jokl; Freshmen: Seeley, Tillman. My guess is that at least two of those guys are not on the roster next year, with Jokl and Kuzma being the most likely candidates to not be here.
Do you make 2/3 panic pick-ups this spring knowing that you already will have 4/5 spots to fill in 2018 or do you hold a couple of spots? These are significant numbers to fill in the next 12 months.
Childs was never coming to Utah. He is a Collette clone...maybe.
It really sounds like Kuzma is gone, he'd rather play in the NBA DL than college again.
I've heard K say that they would rather leave spots open this summer than fill with a one year stop gap.
That makes 2018 a 6 or 7 person recruiting class.
Thatwoul
That would be crazy. Let's go find our LP7. lol. We could recruit a whole AAU team.
Looks about right.
http://www.verbalcommits.com/schools/utah
It's a little discouraging that the coaches haven't found their sweet spot for recruiting yet (as in, we can't get the 5's and high 4's, but we shouldn't have to take many 3-stars or panic pickups anymore either). It is a bit of a moving target with a program still climbing up from its historical rock bottom, so I'm not saying it's easy, but I would have thought by now the coaches would be better able to more consistently identify and sign the best kind of players that Utah basketball can attract in the early signing period.
I think we need to remember that some of these kids are bought and paid for. I have no idea how many of these kids would fit in this category but we know it is happening. LK has even talked about this. This is high stakes stuff and careers are made by landing 1 or 2 high level kids. I think something needs to be done on this issue but until that happens we are going to lose out on kids since we don't pay for players.
Another thing to consider is that we have NEVER landed a 5-star recruit. Majerus couldn't even pull that off. One of the things we see in the NBA is the trend toward super teams. Big stars want to team up and play with one another. I think this applies to college ball as well. Whether it is a byproduct of the AAU culture I don't know but elite kids want to play with other elite players. We need to break through that barrier by landing a couple of these kids and others will want to come join them.
Just my 2 cents.
According to ESPN, the last two years we have signed three 4 stars, two 3 stars (including DD who was almost a 4 star) and one two star (Seely), along with JC guys and foreign players they don't rate. That seems like a good spot to be in. And we are getting better players and just missing on guys we wouldn't have had a chance at before. I think, like football recruiting, we will continue to get incrementally better, but probably never be a top 20 recruiting school.
It's a mixed bag, for sure. Like you mention, we've gotten some wins in recruiting. It's not all bad news. But there are just enough head scratchers (both the busts and the whiffs) that you start to wonder. Every programs suffers whiffs and busts, but when you examine them closely, some of Utah's are puzzling.
Like the whole Mawien recruitment. They watched him for like three years in our own backyard. Was that not enough to know that he was not D1 quality? Or is he? Like is he so unpolished that they don't think they can coach him up over five years? Or the Jokal and Tim Colemen signings; we had to go to Eastern Europe to find a kid of Jokal's skill level? Seems there were half a dozen lightly-recruited kids in Utah alone that could have given us as much as he has/will. Just pure WTF allocation of recruitment time and $$$.
Again, I'm not expecting our recruiting to match UofA and UCLA, but man, I hope for it to look better than MWC, BYU, or low-level PAC-12 stuff. And then you look at what pillars the team will be building a foundation on the next season or two and it has a bit of a womp womp feel to it. We're holding out hope for Collette, Van Dyke, JoJo and Bealer to carry us through the PAC-12 and to the Dance next year? Really?
I'm bullish on Daniels, Jayce, and Tillman. I'm hopeful for Barefield. Curious about Seely. I'd love to see some recruiting that instills a little more confidence. More filling out our team in November and less in April.
It will be interesting to see what shakes out with the recruits and players for Washington and CAL. I believe we were interested in a couple of CAL commits.
Also, we have to be bringing in a PG at some point. I can't imagine we go into next season relying on Barefield and Van Dyke. That turnover problem has to get solved.
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