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recruiting?

C

citygriz

Well-known member
recruiting is half the battle in college basketball, and for a while there, it appeared tinks and company had made a huge leap by getting will cherry and thurman woods. these kids played for two of the top basketball programs in the state of california, and in fact met year before last in the state championship game. both were elite players, and most recruiting experts were baffled that montana was able to land them. more, it seemed possible that with them on board, we'd have a pipeline to more top california talent, especially in the bay area.

so? so woods washes out on a technicality. the one commit the griz have is a second-tier player from washington. and if we're to believe mslacat (always a good idea), we're now hot after another second-tier player from oregon. i know we have one or two extra 'ships next year, but it'd sure be nice to see some of that top-flight california talent back on our radar screen.

http://mslacat.wordpress.com/
 
citygriz said:
recruiting is half the battle in college basketball, and for a while there, it appeared tinks and company had made a huge leap by getting will cherry and thurman woods. these kids played for two of the top basketball programs in the state of california, and in fact met year before last in the state championship game. both were elite players, and most recruiting experts were baffled that montana was able to land them. more, it seemed possible that with them on board, we'd have a pipeline to more top california talent, especially in the bay area.

so? so woods washes out on a technicality. the one commit the griz have is a second-tier player from washington. and if we're to believe mslacat (always a good idea), we're now hot after another second-tier player from oregon. i know we have one or two extra 'ships next year, but it'd sure be nice to see some of that top-flight california talent back on our radar screen.

http://mslacat.wordpress.com/
Click to expand...

Define second tier. Do you mean a player who was passed over by Pac-10 schools or do you mean a player who is a second rate Big Sky Player.

Hutchison is going to be a very good player for the Griz, but typically most true big men at this level need a redshirt year. With out going back reviewing all of the Big Sky conference signies from last year, I can not think of any freshman big man that is clearly rated better than Huchison. Personally I really like N. Colorado's 6-8 Emmanuel Addo as possibly the cream of the crop for freshman big men but other may disagree. Hutchison, is right there with Addo (N. Colorado), Osborne (N. Colorado), Budinich (Montana State), and Jacobson (Portland State).

When Tinkle signed Cherry he was not as highly thought of as he was at the end of the season. There were questions about whether he would have a true position in college. By the time the season ended he had made believers out of a lot of coaches, unfortunately for them he had already committed. he is for sure a top tier Big Sky player, most like a little above even that.

As far as Weisner goes, I admit it is hard to peg him right now. He does play for a very good team with another D-1 player in Gary Winston (who was/is getting Pac-10 looks) who sucked up much of the points on the team. I am not even sure if he small forward or power forward.

Reader is intriguing because he is still so young. He just turned 17 is still growing, and will most likely top out at the 6-10+ range. He has also added about 15 pounds of muscle since the end of the basketball season. He was know last season as a defencive stopper, but this summer in AAU ball he had some very big offencive outing. Potential is what has coaches are talking about with him. he seems now to just be coming into his own. I would also like to point out that Lake Oswego has put out quite s few very talented big men recently, including Kevin Love.

Over all when you look at recruiting, you will have some players who fail to meet expectations and some players who exceed projections. That is the problem when you look at recruiting on a player basis. One player can always fail. What is telling though is when you look at a program who continually lands the top rated players. Overall that team is going to excel. That is why I like the recruits and the direction Tinkle is going. He continues to land some of the best talent at each position.

As far as the Griz signies, I would not be surprised if someone else commits this week. The Griz always do good on Home Coming weekend recruiting wise, plus I have been hearing rumbling that one of their top guard prospects maybe close to committing.
 
mslacat: i guess by "seocnd tier" i meant kids who are seen as big sky prospects (projects?) only, versus kids like cherry and woods who are capable of playing at a big-time level. as posted here, i saw cherry play against several pac-ten recruits last june, and he flat-out was the best player on the court. woods was compared in some quarters to one of the o'bannon brothers from u.c.l.a. you won't see or hear those kinds of things when it comes to most big sky recruits.

i was hoping tinks had developed a pipeline to oakland, because a lot of big-time talent has come out of oakland over the years. but it just seems, based largely on what you're posting on your blog, that that pipeline has perhaps dried up a bit, as the griz pursue kids from washington, oregon and the midwest.

that's all.
 
citygriz said:
mslacat: i guess by "seocnd tier" i meant kids who are seen as big sky prospects (projects?) only, versus kids like cherry and woods who are capable of playing at a big-time level. as posted here, i saw cherry play against several pac-ten recruits last june, and he flat-out was the best player on the court. woods was compared in some quarters to one of the o'bannon brothers from u.c.l.a. you won't see or hear those kinds of things when it comes to most big sky recruits.

i was hoping tinks had developed a pipeline to oakland, because a lot of big-time talent has come out of oakland over the years. but it just seems, based largely on what you're posting on your blog, that that pipeline has perhaps dried up a bit, as the griz pursue kids from washington, oregon and the midwest.

that's all.
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I think the Griz are in a decent position to possibly land Frye from the Cherry's old AAU team bay City Hoosiers. Not guarenteed, by any means but I think they are right there with TCU. If Cherry has a good year at Montana this year I think it could go a long way to opening a pipeline to Bay City Hoosiers.
 
Cherry's only one guy and it's less than a couple months into the semester. Sure he's a pretty big name in the CA high school basketball world, but I think the only way any kind of pipeline can be established is if he actually likes Missoula/UM/Tinkle. If he enjoys himself and has great things to say, then there's potential. If he has lukewarm things to say, then he's not going to have much influence on recruits.

I could be wrong, but didn't Cameron Rundles come from a pretty decent BBall powerhouse in Minnesota? I feel like people were talking about pipelines then. Just gotta hope Cherry has a good season and enjoys himself.
 
The preseason enthusiasm regarding Will Cherry reminds me an awful lot like the Cam Rundles talk before he arrived. I'd be interested to hear from those that have seen both play give us their opinion on how Rundles and Cherry compare. I felt Rundles was ok and a decent Big Sky athlete. His washout is still a mystery. I haven't seen Cherry live but am buying into the hype and hoping that he is demonstrably better. Will Will be a rock star in the BSC?
 
General Disarray said:
Cherry's only one guy and it's less than a couple months into the semester. Sure he's a pretty big name in the CA high school basketball world, but I think the only way any kind of pipeline can be established is if he actually likes Missoula/UM/Tinkle. If he enjoys himself and has great things to say, then there's potential. If he has lukewarm things to say, then he's not going to have much influence on recruits.

I could be wrong, but didn't Cameron Rundles come from a pretty decent BBall powerhouse in Minnesota? I feel like people were talking about pipelines then. Just gotta hope Cherry has a good season and enjoys himself.
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Now a day's D-1 coaches want pipelines to AAU team's rather than high schools. While a high schools team might have 1,2,or 3 D-1 athletes, and AAU team will have 8-10 prospects. Additionally, it is now the AAU coaches who are pulling all the strings now-a-days. In states like California the high school basketball coach have very little influence over prospects, it is the AAU coach who influences the prospects. I do not think it is a coincidence that 4-5 members of the Bay City Hoosiers AAU team are listing the Griz as a team they are considering.

Rundle was a very good player. His problem laid between his ears. Once things started going south, which happens with all players at some time, he could not get out of his funk, and he bailed. He is expected to start this year for Wofford so it should be interesting to see what happens.
 
If playing defense is "between the ears," then I agree. Personally, I thought Rundles was lazy. But I wish him well at Wofford and hope he's motivated to play there.
 
For the most part, any kid who winds up in a Big Sky program is there for a reason. You're not going to outrecruit PAC-10 schools for players. EWU's Stuckey wound up there because he was a non-qualifier. Had he chosen to go to a JC for two years, he would have been recruited at a much higher level. Other than Stuckey, when is the last time a Big Sky player has been drafted in the NBA? I can't think of one in the last 15 years, although I admit the ole memory ain't what it used to be.
 
bengal said:
For the most part, any kid who winds up in a Big Sky program is there for a reason. You're not going to outrecruit PAC-10 schools for players. EWU's Stuckey wound up there because he was a non-qualifier. Had he chosen to go to a JC for two years, he would have been recruited at a much higher level. Other than Stuckey, when is the last time a Big Sky player has been drafted in the NBA? I can't think of one in the last 15 years, although I admit the ole memory ain't what it used to be.
Click to expand...

So much to discuss and not enough time.

You make a big leap from "Big Sky schools can compete for recruits with pac-10 schools" to the "Big Sky have only had one NBA draftee in the past 15 years". Remember only about 5% (that is an estimate) at most, of Pac-10 schools recruits ever get drafted by the NBA. So you are looking at the cream of the crop even for the Pac-10.

There are Pac-10 caliber players playing in the Big Sky every year, and just not low end players. These are the kids that every coach hopes to find. These are usually kids the Pac-10 schools simply misjudged on before they committed or they did not know about. Montana signed Cherry early last year, I know by the end of last season quite a few Pac-10 schools were interested in him. Derek Selvig had quite a few offers from Big-10, pac-10, and Big West teams but he decided to go with the home school. Brian Qvale was located up in the boonies in North Dakota and was an unknown quantity. Jack McGillis started as a sophomore for a pac-10 school, and finally I would bet Johnson could start for a handful of Pac-10 schools today.

Overall when a Big Sky school goes head to head with a Pac-10 school for a recruit I would say, yes 9 out of 10 times the Pac-10 will win, but if you look at the end of results there are always few kids who slip through the cracks to the Big Sky, and these are the Kids the Big Sky coaches covet. One or two of these kids can make a huge impact on your program.

Stucky - Stucky had a couple Pac-10 offers, not to mention offers from a lot of other schools. Yes when he found out he would have to sit out the first year of college he did decide to stay closer to home, BUT the EWU staff was the first program to recruit him years earlier, and he had a great deal of trust in them that they could get him though the NCAA process and restore his eligibility. Despite being a partial -qualifier (as they called it then) he had other programs interested. No one predicted Stucky was going to be as good as he was. If coaches would have known, every Pac-10 (save Stanford and California) would have offered him.
 
Mslacat said:
bengal said:
For the most part, any kid who winds up in a Big Sky program is there for a reason. You're not going to outrecruit PAC-10 schools for players. EWU's Stuckey wound up there because he was a non-qualifier. Had he chosen to go to a JC for two years, he would have been recruited at a much higher level. Other than Stuckey, when is the last time a Big Sky player has been drafted in the NBA? I can't think of one in the last 15 years, although I admit the ole memory ain't what it used to be.
Click to expand...

So much to discuss and not enough time.

You make a big leap from "Big Sky schools can compete for recruits with pac-10 schools" to the "Big Sky have only had one NBA draftee in the past 15 years". Remember only about 5% (that is an estimate) at most, of Pac-10 schools recruits ever get drafted by the NBA. So you are looking at the cream of the crop even for the Pac-10.

There are Pac-10 caliber players playing in the Big Sky every year, and just not low end players. These are the kids that every coach hopes to find. These are usually kids the Pac-10 schools simply misjudged on before they committed or they did not know about. Montana signed Cherry early last year, I know by the end of last season quite a few Pac-10 schools were interested in him. Derek Selvig had quite a few offers from Big-10, pac-10, and Big West teams but he decided to go with the home school. Brian Qvale was located up in the boonies in North Dakota and was an unknown quantity. Jack McGillis started as a sophomore for a pac-10 school, and finally I would bet Johnson could start for a handful of Pac-10 schools today.

Overall when a Big Sky school goes head to head with a Pac-10 school for a recruit I would say, yes 9 out of 10 times the Pac-10 will win, but if you look at the end of results there are always few kids who slip through the cracks to the Big Sky, and these are the Kids the Big Sky coaches covet. One or two of these kids can make a huge impact on your program.

Stucky - Stucky had a couple Pac-10 offers, not to mention offers from a lot of other schools. Yes when he found out he would have to sit out the first year of college he did decide to stay closer to home, BUT the EWU staff was the first program to recruit him years earlier, and he had a great deal of trust in them that they could get him though the NCAA process and restore his eligibility. Despite being a partial -qualifier (as they called it then) he had other programs interested. No one predicted Stucky was going to be as good as he was. If coaches would have known, every Pac-10 (save Stanford and California) would have offered him.
Click to expand...

Selvig was not recruited by anyone in the big 10. WAC yes, MTN west Maybe.
 
There probably are a few lower-end PAC-10 quality kids in the Big SKy each season and, occasionally, a kid who could play significant minutes for many PAC 10 schools. Anthony Johnson certainly could play for most teams in the PAC-10, and play well. That doesn't change the fact that if a PAC-10 school wants a kid, it will outrecruit a Big Sky school every time.

To be successful in Big Sky recruiting, you have to pick up the kids that slip through the cracks. Idaho State had Matt Stucki last year, he was a kid who played well against high-quality teams. He nearly had a triple-double in the win over Utah (27 points, 9 rebounds, 9 assists). ISU got him because he was a Pocatello kid who didn't make the camp circuit. He was an excellent athlete and he got better as a basketball player every year. He certainly could have played in the PAC-10 at some level.

There's a lot of hype about Will Cherry and I understand that -- I saw him play in high school on DISH and he's a good athlete. But if you look at his senior year stats, he shot only 30 percent from 3 point range, and 52 or 53 percent from the foul line. Those kinds of numbers tell me he's a not a polished shooter. He'll do fine in the Big Sky because he can make plays on both ends of the floor athletically. And I'm sure he'll improve his shooting as he gets older, stronger and more experienced. But again, there are reasons kids wind up in the Big Sky. It doesn't mean that aren't good players or couldn't contribute on the PAC 10 level.
 
bengal is right about cherry--he's an awful shooter, both from the field and the free throw line. but i believe you can teach shooting technique, while you can't teach athleticism and all the other intangibles cherry brings to the court. if a pac-10 coach had seen him in the all-star game i witnessed in june, where cherry dominated several other pac-10 recruits, i doubt there's a pac-10 coach that wouldn't have taken him.
 
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