Although I know we dont get all the recruiting info ,LU at one time or another was mentioned in recruiting several of the Illinois High School Basketball All State members. Unfortunately none of them chose LU.

Jaquin McCloud / Murray State
TylerUllis/Kentucky
Sean Omara/Xavier
Amanze Egekeze/Belmont
Connor Cashew/ still a junior ( you can watch him tonight in the IHSA semi-final game as well as Sean Omara)

It seems like this is the issue...we need to get some of these guys to get to the top of the MVC. Watching the games yesterday how many of those teams do you think we could of competed with? It seems to me they had better talent. So we were a bottom level Horizon League team who made the jump to the MVC with Horizon League talent. And that is how recruits look at us and our poor history since 1985. So we need to get lucky and get someome to believe we can turn it around or as Porter Moser as said continue to get developmental players and develop them. So this summer till the start of the next season will be critical to see if Turk, Oleary, OSbourne,Johnson and King can get better so we can have a decent season which will allow us to grab some of those All-Staters.
It is interesting that we are after some really good guys and were in the hunt

Amen.

Hopefully Doyle (and maybe Ingram) can open up some doors for us in the area if they really successful four years here. The other thing that will help is if we win. I think when you look at some of these kids (O'Mara especially), they didn't come here because they thought the other schools would win more. The guys we currently have (O'Leary, Osborne, Turk, White, King, & Johnson) NEED TO DEVELOP to a point where we can win big with them. That'll also go a long way in recruiting. I think Porter's proven that he's a good enough recruiter; we got a Rivals Top-150 player to consider us neck and neck with a perennial power like Xavier and over schools like UMass, Seton Hall, Wake Forest, and even Wichita St. But now Porter needs to prove he (and the rest of our coaching staff) can coach and develop players as well.

Yeah, there's something wrong when Illinois gets ZERO teams in the NCAA out of 13 Division I programs. You've got 13 chances to get into the top 68 teams, including teams from the Big 10, Big East, MVC, Horizon, Ohio Valley, MAC, and Summit. Only two of the 13 (Illinois in the NIT and Illinois State in the CBI) got any of the 148 possible postseason tournament births. And this has been going on for years: Last year, only one team in the NCAA (Illinois), 2012 ZERO, 2011 one (Illinois), 2010 ZERO.

And I wouldn't be surprised if 20% of the teams in the NCAA Tournament have one or more players from Illinois/NW Indiana, including some of the best.

Well, there are any number of ways one can look at this--providing the selection Committee is fair of course---I am skeptical !

The schools in-state are located in rural areas--except Chgo of course. And I mean RURAL--Look at Illini as prime. If a recruit loves to look at corn --well OK --same goes for almost ALL of the rest--Now take Chgo--Most good recruits should love to hit the BIG CITY--They do not--BUT the would if we--collectively speaking would be winners --NONE of us are.

SO--If a recruit --a good one--would like to hit the Big City maybe he would pick a city which had winners--DC, Boston, LA, Atlanta et al. If he yearned for rural--well, maybe Lexington, Spokane, Norman et al

The only thing holding CHGO back is we do not win--Our schools are for the most part good ones scholastically.

I wager when we start to win. the recruits will come--Milton can truly help this in many ways. Champaign is hopeless by comparison to other rural areas.

-----BTW Al Hrabosky the old reliever used to say--He always hoped and looked forward to --a standing BOO when he came into a game. !! True story !

The entire State of Indiana was shut out as well this year. I believe the guard on NDSU last night was Jeff White's high school teammate.

As for kids leaving for "small college towns", it shouldn't be that surprising. These are 18-19 year old kids, who could either go to one of the top college towns in the country (both party and academic...pick your Big 10 school), where they would be celebrities, getting whatever they want (if you know what I mean), or stay in Chicago and be second tier to professional teams, and unknown for the most part. I've lived in Chambana and Carbondale, and I can tell you tons of kids from the city and suburbs go there for school for the college atmosphere and to be away from home.

One All State player I've heard we may be looking at is junior Gavin Block from Lincoln, who is currently playing Morgan Park for the 3A title. Kid can light it up.

Jay Knuth made First Team All State in Iowa, and Ben Richardson did the same in Kansas.

Jay Knuth was named MVP of the Iowa Basketball Coaches Assc. All-Star Tourney, scoring 28 in the first round and 15 in the finals to lead his team of all-stars to the title.



http://www.iowabca.com/

Interesting... Next period for Letters of Intent comes up this April 16th....If I am correct he is still a verbal without a Letter of Intent.

Right, Knuth didn't sign in the Fall.

Still unclear if Moser has an open scholarship to offer Nolan Berry. If Knuth signs, that makes 13 scholarships sewed up. Only if Jordan Pickett or somebody else doesn't return do we have one to give Berry.