Swan88

Ha! Didn't know that. Thanks for the info. It at least makes sense. These five-star and four-star recruits at Missouri demonstrate, anew, that unusual results have unusual causes. But the family hiring cause (whether legal or not) is still slimy. And the hiring confirms that Missouri is willing to flirt with the edge in "buying" commitments. This must be one of those things Bruce Rasmussen means when he says, "There have been a lot of things that I think are not right about recruiting in Division I college athletics that are within the rules, let alone those things that are outside the rules." It'd be great to see a listing from Bruce Rasmussen on the "lot of things" he has in mind.

So . . . Missouri has two Rivals five-star and two Rivals four-star players in their 2017 recruiting class. Hmmmm . . . which shoe company are they with?

Remember when the NCAA put Nebraska football on probation for self-reporting that some of our players sold their used text books and kept the money? Yeah. The NCAA has never served its enforcement function well. It often punishes minor infractions harshly and lets whopper violators skate.

Yikes! Does he care whether the coaches cheat while they’re trying to meet his winning standards? Seems a little heavy on the “win at all cost” idea. And sounds like a “let’s fire our way” to a winning program. One of our problems in the past decade or so is instability in leadership through firings. This is a bit scary, in my book.

Here is an article on Florent Thamba from back in January. The article starts out like this: When Florent Thamba says he’s only been playing basketball for 5 years, it’s unbelievable to see how good he has become in such a short time. The long & lanky 6’10 big man, who is featured on a young & talented team at Mountain Mission, is quickly developing into a significant two-way force.

Here is a video:

Minnesota sounds like the team to beat. The article linked above reports: Nnaji grew up a fan of the Gophers. "That would be pretty great," he said of a potential offer. "That's my hometown school. That would be great to get one where I'm from."

Here is a highlights video:

ha! I misunderstood the point at first, Good point.

Recent events create an entirely new set of assumptions, including these: —any school that’s anywhere near a five star is, at the very least, flirting with the edge —any school whose recruiting successes suddenly improve dramatically is asking for greater scrutiny —any school with a significant connection to an NBA agent is, at the very least, flirting with the edge —any school with a recent NBA draft pick is dealing with opportunities and possibilities and choices that can backfire. I dont think any of the foregoing assumptions apply to Minnesota. But (as suggested above) the old, “Apples don’t fall far from the tree,” adage certainly raises eyebrows.

$$$$?

Here’s the paragraph about Glynn (and there is a photo to go with it): Glynn Watson, Nebraska: Tim Miles has had to turn over rocks to find players during his tenure in Lincoln. You better believe he is grateful on a regular basis to have a Watson. The 6-foot point guard had 27 points last year in a loss against UCLA and 34 in a win over Iowa. The most underrated thing about Watson? How well he takes care of the ball. Watson averaged only 1.5 turnovers last season in 31.6 minutes — an impressive number considering how much he has the ball. If this guy played at a program like Michigan or Ohio State, he’d regularly be talked about as one of the top players in the Big Ten.

A news article reports on the Duke basketball coach's recent comments on the scandal. The writer reports on the coach's comments and provides editorial comments in parentheses as follows: With nary a “student-athlete” to be heard, in a matter of (several) minutes Krzyzewski pointed out that the college game is unequipped to handle all the money swirling around players before and after they’re in college (true), that there’s nothing illegal or unethical about shoe companies recruiting elite players with financial incentives (true), that college basketball is a billion-dollar industry (true), that no one in college basketball has the power or platform to fix any of this (true), that one-and-dones should be free to turn pro straight out of high school (true) and that the NCAA is basically funded by men’s college basketball revenue (true). So . . . what's with the shoe companies providing financial incentives to high school recruits? Is that really ok? Doesn't that jeopardize their eligibility? What if shoe companies funnel kids to particular teams? What if it's an agent providing the financial incentives and doing the funneling? And what if the agent funnels recruits to a school that provided him/her a contract with a new NBA player? Are all those things ok?

This is another one of those “show my ignorance” times. What does this mean: “Thomas Allen - Can really shoot the ball...is more off guard than 2 guard at this point”? I thought “off guard” meant the 2 guard, in contrast to the point guard.

The Crystal Ball is 50/50 for Syracuse and Nebrasketball

Loved hearing his pitch on how well Nebrasketball does with transfers—making them successful. You’ve gotta’ figure there will be a plethora (or maybe it’s a cornucopia or herd or gaggle or any other word meaning “lots of them”) out there in the months to come. That, in conjunction with assurance that Nebrasketball is doing things the right way, is encouraging.

The depth observation in this blurb from the article is different: “I’m really excited about this team,” Miles said. “We’ve got excellent depth. The quality of our practices is going to be better than ever.” No one has ever suggested, to my memory, that Nebrasketball has depth of talent since before the Collier years. We've always had good players. But the margin-for-injury or non-performance has always been slim. Miles started out with the thinnest of margins. And he has been able to overcome the injury bug only once: and that year got him to the Dance.