Something ain't right

[hhcmatt]

True we had a rare run of in-state talent that helped, but he brought in some tremendous athletes. I would like to see coach Miles get a couple of great athletes with size that he can either coach up or that haven't been brought in by the traditional basketball powerhouses.

 

I am not overly excited about Morrow, based on the film I have seen.  Not sure how well rounded his game is.  Its great watching his athleticism around the rim.  But that it will be different against B1G talent.

 

If Morrow was still in Nebraska, he'd be the best recruit in the state of Nebraska.

You essentially want a guy exactly like Ed Morrow but have doubts about a guy who is the actual Ed Morrow.  

[huskerbaseball13]

 

 

man, If I started this thread and stated it like you did.... every one would be calling jaysker on me, kreyton this and that..... LOL Welcome to the board Exile. TM is getting the diff makers to look at NU, its a far cry better than the two before him.

 

Try actually talking about Nebraska basketball.  If you've put more effort digging into whomever is coaching the football team than the actual purpose of the forum, you might want to question if you're in the right place.

 

You need to reread my posts, there arent many. your approval I seek not.

 

 

The majority of your post deal with bagging on the football coach or Kenny Bell....or when Crayton is mentioned.  You rarely if ever bring anything to the table in regards to the Husker basketball program.  Probably because you are a Crayton fan.

 

As for the OP, land Cornish and I will be satisfied.  I think 2015 is going to very kind to us on and off the court.   

[OurDecay]

(remember his family moved him out of Nebraska to get more exposure).

 

As I understand it, and per an article in the Chicago Tribune a couple years ago, I don't believe that is the case.  I seem to recall it was family related.

 

The Morrows do not strike me as the type that are overly infatuated with getting maximum exposure for their son.  And further, Edward himself was quoted not long ago as saying that even if high-majors started banging down his door, he wanted to play for one of the schools that had been with him from the beginning.  Minnesota, Nebraska, etc.

 

People seem to keep waiting for the shoe to drop on Morrow and some bluebloods to swoop in and grab him.  I'd be more worried about the schools that have been after him as long as we have.

[The Coach]

 

(remember his family moved him out of Nebraska to get more exposure).

 

As I understand it, and per an article in the Chicago Tribune a couple years ago, I don't believe that is the case.  I seem to recall it was family related.

 

The Morrows do not strike me as the type that are overly infatuated with getting maximum exposure for their son.  And further, Edward himself was quoted not long ago as saying that even if high-majors started banging down his door, he wanted to play for one of the schools that had been with him from the beginning.  Minnesota, Nebraska, etc.

 

People seem to keep waiting for the shoe to drop on Morrow and some bluebloods to swoop in and grab him.  I'd be more worried about the schools that have been after him as long as we have.

 

 

 

I hope so.  Here are some interesting quotes from an article from Bloomberg

 

"Chicago offers a bigger stage, more opportunities to get noticed, more chances to win that golden ticket: a college scholarship."

 

"Edward’s family believes that staying in Nebraska would have robbed him of the training and spotlight a player needs to win a full ride to college."

[Cookie Belcher]

We're always going to lose out on someone we have at the top of our list...this is the nature of recruiting.

We're going to get shot down 4 times for every guy that signs here.

If you want to chart progress, look more at the quality of the guys who are shooting us down and/or the teams we are competing for to get this talent. It definitely has improved.

On mobile but really wish i could arrow up this post. We should add that function to mobile

[Cookie Belcher]

But we have a B1G coach of the year, and one COY award, yet still not able to bring blue chip recruits in. Coach Miles is doing his part in many ways. Our program is still not over the hump with recruiting and talent despite all these things.

Those awards and our end of season run happened a few months ago. 85% of prospects signed back in the fall. With the ones who are left for the spring, how long do you think the recruiting process takes? It is based on building relationships with these kids often over multiple years. It's not common to have no contact with a kid and then all of a sudden jump to the top of their list because our coach won an award. Expecting immediate dividends in the 2014 class from the end of last season is probably a little ambitious.

[hhcmatt]

I hope so.  Here are some interesting quotes from an article from Bloomberg

 

"Chicago offers a bigger stage, more opportunities to get noticed, more chances to win that golden ticket: a college scholarship."

 

"Edward’s family believes that staying in Nebraska would have robbed him of the training and spotlight a player needs to win a full ride to college."

 

 

I think Jordan Tyrance was physically gifted enough to play Div I basketball.

Would he have increased his skill level enough to earn a schollie here had he been playing only basketball against the competition in a place like Chicago?

 

At this point it seems like Morrow would be a Div I athlete wherever he went to school.

While he was a physically gifted 10 year old when they moved to Chicago, there was zero guarantee at that point he was going to be a Div 1 athlete. 

[Red Rum]

This seems a lot like a "If You Give A Mouse A Cookie" kind of scenario.

 

We're still Nebraska Basketball. We need to sustain success before mid to high star talent is going to be beating down our door.

 

 

But it will give me something to read while I'm pretending to work so have at it.

[HuskerCager]

Didn't read through everyone's commments, but quite frankly, 2014 looks very mediocre.  We are spending way too much time combing through leftovers and transfer recruits this spring.  We can't continue to do that and expect to be a consistent upper-division Big Ten team.  I am anxious to see how this summer turns out, and would be very concerned if we don't have at least 2 players signed by fall that were top 250 or better recruits.

I'm sure none of this is lost on our staff.  They are working hard.  And they deserve a long time to turn this program around.  But last year's upper-division finish might be an exception rather than the rule for Mile's first 5 years if recruiting success doesn't turn around this summer.

[Creighton Fan]

I think u can fully support Miles, but still be worried bout recruiting, esp HS recruiting, so far.

[hhcmatt]

But last year's upper-division finish might be an exception rather than the rule for Mile's first 5 years if recruiting success doesn't turn around this summer.

 

I'd agree with what you're saying about adding for the future but wouldn't you expect the 2014-15 team to be as good or better than last years team without adding anyone?

[TheKamdyMan]

Still amazes me how many people do not understand recruiting in basketball.

[PimpMario]

Still amazes me how many people do not understand recruiting in basketball.

 

I will be the first to admit I don't know anything about recruiting.

 

Will you teach me?

 

I have said that I expected to be better off recruiting by now and have had people tell me I just don't get it.

 

I am extremely pleased with Miles but I thought after the initial recruiting hype that we would start to hear some more and bigger "booms!"

[bobcat402]

 

Still amazes me how many people do not understand recruiting in basketball.

 

I will be the first to admit I don't know anything about recruiting.

 

Will you teach me?

 

I have said that I expected to be better off recruiting by now and have had people tell me I just don't get it.

 

I am extremely pleased with Miles but I thought after the initial recruiting hype that we would start to hear some more and bigger "booms!"

 

ill attempt to, it takes multiple years to get in on basketball recruits, and multiple year to build relationships with the true top 150 player, your not going to come in and recruit a top 150 player out of the blue his senior year or even junior year your already to late, Miles' first class that he will have built these necessary relationships with will be in 2015 and beyond. No matter how good we were this past season, its not going to change the minds of 2014 recruits we need to prove over multiple years were the real deal not just a flash, remember we are recruiting against bluebloods for these top recruits to nail these top recruits we almost have to pitch a perfect game, and still hope for a few things to go right, the allure of duke, kansas, texas, kentucky, uconn, arizona,florida, unc, and others will always be greater than ours, we just have to strike and find one kid who dosnt care about all their traditions, and media hype those kids are hard to find...i recruiting strategy for this year is just fine, add to what we have, go after a kid or two or decommits hope they come to us, get a grad transfer, and put all the chips in 2015, 2016 and beyond. 

[Daledangdarn]

Still amazes me how many people do not understand recruiting in basketball.

 

It still amazes me people are actually complaining about Miles. 

 

Most of the people I see complaining about him are bandwagon fans that just started following Nebraska basketball this season, so I try not to take their opinions as anything other than uninformed.

[FredsSlacks]

This will be one of the dumbest topics ever posted if Cornish commits on may 20th.

 

There's no way you could complain if we land 2 guys that were at one time in the top 150 (hammond, cornish)

[huskerbaseball13]

This will be one of the dumbest topics ever posted if Cornish commits on may 20th.

 

There's no way you could complain if we land 2 guys that were at one time in the top 150 (hammond, cornish)

 

It's always a little fishy when someone signs up and posts something like this.  I will admit if we don't land Cornish I will be a bit dissapointed.  But if we do, I think we pulled in a pretty solid class.  And I think 2015 will turn out to be a very nice class for us. 

[HuskerCager]

 

Still amazes me how many people do not understand recruiting in basketball.

 

It still amazes me people are actually complaining about Miles. 

 

Most of the people I see complaining about him are bandwagon fans that just started following Nebraska basketball this season, so I try not to take their opinions as anything other than uninformed.

 

Both of your replies may be directed at someone else, maybe it was mine.  I think if you read through my response again, you will see I wasn't "complaining" about Miles.  Not in the least.  Just suggesting that recruiting here is tough, and that it's my opinion we haven't established ourselves as a permanent fixture in the upper division of the Big Ten just yet given who we have signed the last 12 months.

Kamdy, if you are directing your comment at me that I don't understand recruiting - I'm guilty as charged.  Just sharing my perception of what has transpired the last year.  Who knows.  I could be completely off base and we might have just signed two all-Big-Ten players this past year.  Time will tell.

[Norm Peterson]

Here's how I view it (and I hope I don't come off sounding too defensive when I say it), but basketball recruiting at Nebraska is a tougher deal than I think a lot of us probably thought.

 

Seemed like Danny Nee was able to bring in high caliber recruits, which proved it could be done, right?  Well, but, Danny Nee had some built-in advantages that maybe made him look like a better recruiter than he really was.  First, he hit the jackpot with a bunch of Omaha kids who were legit.  Second, he was able to leverage Prop 48 to our advantage so that we could land guys like Tyron Lue and Larry Florence and Jamar Johnson.  And probably others as well. 

 

The reason we got in on Lue was because other schools assumed he wouldn't qualify academically.  So, we take a flyer on a kid and offer him as a Prop 48 even though that would mean he'd lose a year of eligibility and have to sit out his freshman year.  Enough of a detriment for the big boys to back off but not enough of a detriment for us to back off.  And, as a result, we land Lue.  Because we offered him and we stuck with him so that when the Big Boys came calling, he had some loyalty and repaid us for sticking with him.

 

OK, but Prop 48 went away.  And so did that leverage.  And you can see in some of Danny's later classes that he was taking reaches.  Lief Ericson, Chad Ideus, Andy Markowski and Chris Sallee composed an entire recruiting class, if I'm not mistaken.  And Danny tried to sell us on the idea that those guys were all top 100 players.  Ahem, not quite.  Not even close.  Only Markowski had much of a career here and he probably got every ounce of potential developed that was there to develop.  So, later in Danny's tenure, recruiting started to flag a bit.  But people still believed that Danny's example showed that you could recruit to a place like Nebraska.

 

Then Collier comes along.  And he has this dry personality and he doesn't recruit well and people assume it's only because he has a dry personality and just isn't a good recruiter.  And that's probably part true.  But even when he brings a guy like Scott Spinelli on board to land all these 3-star players, they end up being marginal 3-stars except for Aleks Maric, Joe McCray and two kids from Nebraska, who I think might actually have pre-dated Spinelli.  I think under Collier, the myth of Danny Nee as this great recruiter blossomed.  And I think there were those people -- certainly me among them -- who believed that changing coaches was all it would take to get a good recruiter on board.

 

Enter Doc.  Doc had a significantly more engaging personality than Collier.  I think many of us -- including me -- expected he'd be a  much better recruiter than Collier.  And it turned out he really wasn't much better.  If he was better at all at recruiting.  He certainly made some mistakes in terms of roster turnover and not keeping kids around to develop them (a mistake also made by Collier, by the way.)  But in terms of what he brought in on the ground floor, I guess I don't recall him winning many recruiting battles with conference mates for players who ended up being any good.  We beat Okie State out for the services of Shang Ping.  Yay us, right? 

 

The failure to upgrade recruiting I think was ultimately Doc's downfall here.  And then we landed Tim Miles.  Now, we've all seen Miles in action.  We're familiar with the kind of personality he possesses.  I would suggest that, all things being equal, you'd be hard pressed to find a dozen more immediately likable personalities in D1 basketball.  Which should be gangbusters for recruiting.  He's going after good to great players.  He's making inroads.  But, at the end of the recruiting cycle, we still aren't landing the top players we've targeted and maybe aren't signing guys who are any better than the players we got under Collier or Doc.

 

So, there must be something else.  Because I think as far as Coach-as-recruiter is concerned, Miles is as good as anyone could hope for him to be.  But it's not translating into signed LOIs.  And I don't think you can pin it on "well, he's only been here two years and it takes longer to establish relationships."  I simply think it's going to take some time -- and, more importantly, some winning -- for prospective recruits to believe that they can come to Lincoln and play for a winner.  Miles says "don't put that crap on me" about our historic struggles, but it's still there and he has to somehow overcome the perception than you can't win in Lincoln. 

 

I think if he does that, if we improve on our record from last year, for example, then you'll gradually start seeing a higher level of kid begin to believe and be willing to sign.  Until then, I think we're going to have to win with Doc-level talent.

 

But I could be wrong.

 

(And people should feel free to disagree with me.       )

[Hooper]

Honestly, I see both sides of this argument. On the one hand, Miles has done an incredible job of building this program in the two years he’s been here and has accelerated the rebuilding process to an extent that I don’t believe many with realistic expectations expected.

However, the OP raises a valid concern. We’re where we are right now, aside from all of the outstanding culture building and player development this staff has overseen during their tenure, primarily because of two key players. The first is Shavon Shields, who was a legacy and a Sadler recruit. Of course, Miles would have gotten him too if he had been the coach when Shavon was being recruited, but we were very fortunate to land Shavon. He’s turned out to be better than anyone imagined.

 

And, of course, then there’s Mr. Petteway. This was like a gift from the heavens that no one saw coming. I might add that the guy who recruited Terran (and Tarin Smith and Jacob Hammond too) is now in South Dakota running his own program. I feel we lost our best recruiter when Smith walked out the door.

 

I believe we got very lucky with Petteway. If he had averaged 10 PPG at Tech instead of 1.9 as a freshman, would we have gotten him? Maybe we still would have, but I’m skeptical knowing what his other options would have looked like. I know he loved Smith and Miles, but no one knew how good this guy was going to be, and the competition for his services wasn’t that strong. When Terran transferred here, he wasn’t the guy we know now. He was a guy whose freshman season highlight wasn’t even a basketball play, but rather a hard elbow to the jaw of an opposing player.

 

Now, every team needs a bit of luck, no matter how good, but it’s not every year that you get a legacy recruit like Shields and strike gold with a transfer like Petteway. The Petteway situation was almost like those stories you hear about the woman who goes to a garage sale and buys an ugly painting for $5 because she likes the frame, only to find a priceless Monet hidden behind it when she gets home. We will not continue to be that lucky. Sooner or later we’re going to have to rely on skill to recruit a higher caliber of player.

 

Here’s the bottom line: if we want to compete with the top teams in the B1G, we have to be able to recruit well enough to match up with their personnel. That doesn’t mean our 13 need to be as good as their 13, because that’s never going to happen when you compare our roster to the likes of Michigan, MSU, OSU, etc. What we need, however, is to be able to have a core group of guys who can go out there and legitimately compete against what those teams will put on the court. Though we were a bit short on personnel last season, we had enough talent to compete at the highest level and challenge any team in the country when we were at our best, especially at home. Will that continue in the years to come?

 

Tarin Smith and Jacob Hammond appear to be nice players. Ayegba is a one-year space filler who shouldn’t be counted on for anything more illustrious than basic competence. We’ll see who else joins this class, but signing only one player in the early period was a disappointment. Failing to fill the classes over the past two years was another disappointment that hurt us, and we may come up short once again for the third year in a row.

 

Kenya Hunter, to me, has been a disappointment on the recruiting trail thus far. Moses Ayegba will help us, but even that was a special situation. Has Hunter distinguished himself as a quality recruiter thus far? Have his connections gotten us in the door with players who didn’t go to Georgetown or whose AAU coaches weren’t close personal friends? Hell, he couldn’t even get us a visit from Greg Whittington, regardless of what subsequently happened with his academic status.

 

No matter how much we love coach Miles -- and I count myself among his most passionate supporters – we have to be honest with ourselves and not allow our affection and admiration for him to prevent us from engaging in a sincere critical analysis of his recruiting performance. Eventually, the guy has got to start recruiting at a higher level, and he’s got to start filling the scholarship numbers. If he doesn’t, this thing is eventually going to run out of steam and we’re going to start losing ground, not only to the Wisconsins and Ohio States of the world, but also to the second-tier programs in the Conference.

 

I’ve posted before that I’m a bit disappointed that the recent elevation of the Nebrasketball brand hasn’t given our recruiting a major boost thus far. Sure, it helped us land Tarin Smith, but look at the competition there. The St. Joe’s offer was decent, but after that you’re talking about a guy whose best offers were from teams like Delaware, Buffalo, Bucknell, Detroit and Ole Miss.

 

Despite all of the publicity, great press and on-court achievement over the past few months, the impact on late-period recruiting for 2014 has been muted at best. Its impact on the transfer market has been especially disappointing. Now, I know many of you are preaching about how basketball recruiting is 2-3 years out and that 2015 is the defining class, but if we come up short again, the excuses will start to look very hollow.

 

Ed Morrow is a must get. If we strike out there, it will be a very bad general indicator of the strength of our recruiting. It’s time for this staff to take care of business in recruiting the way they’ve taken care of business on the court.

 

I hope people understand that I’m not trying to be negative or highly critical of the staff. Like Central said, I believe it’s possible to both love and appreciate coach Miles and what he’s done, but also be concerned about the way we’ve recruited during his time in Lincoln. I don’t care how good a coach you are. If you don’t have the players, you won’t win in this league.

[Hooper]

Still amazes me how many people do not understand recruiting in basketball.

 

Kamdy, I respect the hell out of you and believe you have a better overall understanding of both the game of basketball and basketball recruiting than I do. However, this is about more than just relationship building over time. What about the transfer market, and especially the grad transfer market? That has absolutely nothing to do with long-term relationship building. It's about convincing guys, some of whom have only one year of on-court eligibility left, that Nebraska is a place where they can take their talents, experience success and play in the tournament. That really has very little to do with the type of long-term relationship building with high school players that you're talking about.

 

This year, we were simply unable to parlay our momentum into real success in the transfer market. Now, I know we're a Johnny-come-lately type of program right now without an established history of success, but when I look at the type of transfer Creighton is bringing in, for example, relative to what we're doing, it's really disheartening to me.

 

I was personally hoping to see a greater degree of success in courting transfers in the 2014 late period, and especially grad transfers. I felt that some talented transfers would see what we're building, the conference we play in, the success we had last year and the type of team we have coming back, and want to be a part of it. I was wrong.

[Norm Peterson]

Hooper, I agree with this.  I would say that we still have to make believers out of guys who don't yet perceive us as being a program that can get it done.  It's a lost cause with guys who've been around and already made their minds up, i.e., graduate transfers.  But it's a battle we can still win with high school underclassmen.  And I think the key is we have to make the tournament next year and make some noise when we get there.  Until then, we're still just a program that's never won in the NCAA tourney, albeit one with a great arena and a really cool coach.

[PimpMario]

 

ill attempt to, it takes multiple years to get in on basketball recruits, and multiple year to build relationships with the true top 150 player, your not going to come in and recruit a top 150 player out of the blue his senior year or even junior year your already to late, Miles' first class that he will have built these necessary relationships with will be in 2015 and beyond. No matter how good we were this past season, its not going to change the minds of 2014 recruits we need to prove over multiple years were the real deal not just a flash, remember we are recruiting against bluebloods for these top recruits to nail these top recruits we almost have to pitch a perfect game, and still hope for a few things to go right, the allure of duke, kansas, texas, kentucky, uconn, arizona,florida, unc, and others will always be greater than ours, we just have to strike and find one kid who dosnt care about all their traditions, and media hype those kids are hard to find...i recruiting strategy for this year is just fine, add to what we have, go after a kid or two or decommits hope they come to us, get a grad transfer, and put all the chips in 2015, 2016 and beyond. 

 

 

So what you are saying is that in 15, 16, and 17 we should see the results of 3 and 4 year relationships?  So if we get in early on a guy and scout him well and he ends up developing into a top 50 player we should have a leg up, right?

[uneblinstu]

I don't think what Petteway did was nearly as big a surprise to the staff, who had known the kid for quite some time, as he was to all of us.

[uneblinstu]

Hooper, I agree with this.  I would say that we still have to make believers out of guys who don't yet perceive us as being a program that can get it done.  It's a lost cause with guys who've been around and already made their minds up, i.e., graduate transfers.  But it's a battle we can still win with high school underclassmen.  And I think the key is we have to make the tournament next year and make some noise when we get there.  Until then, we're still just a program that's never won in the NCAA tourney, albeit one with a great arena and a really cool coach.

But there also a team that actually did make it to the NCAA tournament. That stigma is gone and that might have been the biggest hurdle of them all. No doubt they gotta build off this year and if they fall flat next year (which is a possibility) they might be back to square one, but the pitch changes now that they did make it to the dance.