From LeRoy, IL

Apparently we have been on him for awhile but just pulled the trigger on an offer: http://www.news-gazette.com/sports/prep ... lling.html

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I feel bad about bashing this kid, having seen/knowing very little of him. Quite frankly, I feel like our recruiting (especially forwards) is starting to regress back to Horizon League levels, which weren't very good to us to begin with.

Porter knew 2 years ago he'd have at least 4 scholarships to spend on the 2016 class. As of now, we have 2 intriguing guards, a MASSIVE HOLE AT FORWARD, and few options to solve the problem. His size is OK for the wing, but he'll probably be thrown down low (like the vastly misused Donte Ingram) due to our lack of depth there. Rajala, Kirby, and Knuth are OK role players. Maybe Rajala can develop into a good player.

As for the optics of this specific offer: We are his only Division 1 offer, and Furman is the only other D1 school interested. But we're offering this kid on the same day Shaq Morris totally dominated us down low? And who here expects us to win in the MVC with this kind of recruiting? Didn't Porter let the Whitesell kids go in year 1 for basically not being D1 talented?

Superfan has a good point. LeRoy is a small town about 18 miles from me. That means it's about 18 miles from ISUr, about 55 miles from Bradley, about 40 miles from U of I, and about 95 miles from Eastern Illinois. And this kid has no D1 offers from any of those nearby schools? Odd.

I've been checking in with Verbal Commits on our offers every several days and have been alarmed that we don't have more offers for size guys. When the 7' freshman on Drake (Olejniczak... I have to get used to spelling that guy's name, I guess, because he's going to be very good) just broke us in half in an important game with a lot on the line, it should have been another alarm bell. That kid's previous career high was 14 points against Missouri State, and he goes for 19 and 9 against us. He's just destroyed the teams with weak inside presence... averaging 14.7 points in three games against MSU, had double figures against us, ISUb, and SIU. His low games were against Bradley, Evansville, and WSU.

If Drake and Bradley are going to have front court sophomores who develop and dominate like they did late this year and we're without Montel James, where are our wins going to come from next year? To make matters worse, we're losing the best three point shooter in school history, so expect us to have to rely on more inside scoring through drives or mid-range jumpers.

I'd hate to go back to relying on more jucos while freshmen and sophomores go un-developed. But we may have to. I never could predict when Kirby would appear or disappear this season, and Adgei got a total of 47 minutes of court time the whole year-- less than the full Indiana State OT game.

It does appear that PM does NOT like to play big men--OR the few we have have yet to develop. Either is bad considering our League Pals. Hence a reason to make a change. He brought us UP to better than average BUT in my eyes---NOT good enough.

Others have BIGS , why not us ???

First, I did speak too soon about our newest offer. In addition us, he also received another D1 offer last night from Southeastern Louisiana, whose most famous basketball alumnus is Good Morning America's Robin Roberts. So we're in a recruiting battle with them, Furman and, according to the article ahunte linked, D2 Nova Southeastern in Ft. Lauderdale.

But the principle of the matter is we should NOT be recruiting in these types of circles. Even though we swung and missed at O'Mara, we need to be recruiting more against Xavier and other similar schools (i.e. our MVC foes, Dayton, Butler, SLU, Marquette, DePaul if they get their on-court act together and turn Rahm Emanuel millions into wins, Creighton, even Detroit) rather than Furman & SE LA.


Drives especially because mid-range jumpers are becoming extinct in basketball as a whole. I'm not Red Auerbach either, but if I were an opposing coach trying to beat next season's Ramblers, I would have 4 guys collapse on Doyle or Custer the instant they dribble inside of the 3 point arc. Richardson's a nice, hardworking (that Bradley play was great) player, but he's going to have to shoot at Splash Brothers levels for us to win next season. And quite frankly, the time to be developing players and changing the culture of the program has long passed for PM.

I watched his recruiting mixtape and he looks pretty good to me. Athletic with plenty of righteous dunks. Nice form on his jump shot. Nifty behind the back dribble in the open court. Had scored over 2K points in hs career. Not his fault he was born/ raised in LeRoy, Il.

I would be happy if he came to Loyola on a basketball scholarship. I tend to put more emphasis on productivity over projevtion when evaluating prospects.

I wouldn't be so quick to knock him down to a D2 talent either. Just searching his name on twitter you can find that at the very least he's gotten looks from the Utah Utes, Utah State, DePaul, Valpo and Drake in the past few days. I'm perfectly comfortable being in early on what may be a late riser. Another tidbit (per verbal commits) is that the only other D1 offer Earl Peterson got happened to be from South Eastern Louisiana. And I'd say he worked out!


Furthermore i'm sure there are plenty of other offers we just don't know about it. I don't remember Tyson being a public offer until he committed; same with Bruno Skokna. A current example was that by just searching potential UIC/DePaul recruits I was able to find that we offered Marcus Ottey; an explosive point guard in the Kay Felder/Washpun mold (no way to say he will project to play as well but he looks promising). Unfortunately he doesn't seem to be looking our way as of now, but saying that we're settling for lesser recruits may be an over statement. Especially if this long term Cam Krutwig recruitment is fruitful!

You can only sign players that are interested in your school. At which game this year at the Gentile would you have liked to have had a recruit attend for them to say. " I really want to go there" These are not the days of George Ireland when you could show kids from New York pictures of your campus. Getting someone to come to a program that essentially has 30 years of nothing impressive (last year exception). We never get any pub......The Ohio Valley Tnmt was on Espn yesterday and where was the MVC ? Where were the LU fans at Arch Madness???? without doubt we were the smallest group of fans .......So dont pretend that this is going to be an easy thing to do. PM has gone after some fairly big recruits but loses them when schools with more recent success and more complete programs offer. I bring TYler Ulis of Kentucky as an example..we were first at his doorstep. So if you really want to see us recruit better think about what you can do. Have you joined the Rambler Varsity Club? Have you got season tickets? Did you go to Arch Madness?
So dont just point fingers ask what you can do to be part of the solution. Money certainly isn't the only thing.......Write a note to the seniors.....drop an email to AD Watson with your ideas.......etc.
I dont know most of you so I dont pretend to know if you are already doing things to contribute. I would love to see the Ramblers succeed and I just think we are part of that.
GO RAMBLERS

Especially if this long term Cam Krutwig recruitment is fruitful!

Krutwig scored 18 in Jacobs Regional win over Dekalb last night. Jacobs will be playing Rockford AUburn Tuesday at Rock Valley Community College in ROckford. If Jacobs get through the Sectional they will be playing in Hoffman Estates at the Sears Centre next Tuesday.

Sure, let's get a team of 6'11", 230 pounders who play run and gun...

Once again swellafelon is a voice of reason.

Question: How many D1 offers did Ron Baker have?

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