PF Mamadou Diarra (Signed LOI on 11/14)

[Chief00]

Quite frankly, I think this is a good pick up. He is a live beastly body on the offensive glass with a great motor.
We need that.

 

[Sky ball]

Quite frankly, I think this is a good pick up. He is a live beastly body on the offensive glass with a great motor.
We need that.

The breakdown of him on the Boneyard Blog was very promising.

 

[jibsey]

When did I say the staff could not recruit? All I said was why was THIS board getting their panties wet over a 3 star prospect with few big school offers?
[
He gets plenty of exposure on the AAU circuit with NY Jayhawks. I don't think HS play is as important as it once was in may instances.

In the past several weeks I got my panties wet. All KO did was take me from apathy to excitement over our upcoming season, then put a nice start onto 2016. Hope and change.

 

[UConnSwag11]

Ollie is playing no games!

 

[Go_Huskies]

Not trying to be a negative Nancy but Diarra had how many quality Offers? We beat out the St Peter's and Iona's. Did we land just an OK Mid-major player?

School Interest Offer Visit Recruited by
Connecticut COMMITTED (05/22/2015) Offered None
VCU High Offered None
Boston U. None Offered None
Drexel None Offered None
Duquesne None Offered None
Iona None Offered None
Minnesota None Offered None Kimani Young
Norfolk St. None Offered None
Quinnipiac None Offered None
St. Peter's None Offered None

I would tend to agree with you except for one point. The fact that the staff was so interested in him this early means the staff has him high on their list. If this was a late recruitment like Lubin I wold be less excited. With Lubin it was obvious that the staff struck out on the first choices and settled for Rubin. With Mamadou he is one of the first choices and the staff knows basketball more than me or the recruiting services so we can be confident that Mamadou is going to be good.

 

[Sky ball]

I would tend to agree with you except for one point. The fact that the staff was so interested in him this early means the staff has him high on their list. If this was a late recruitment like Lubin I wold be less excited. With Lubin it was obvious that the staff struck out on the first choices and settled for Rubin. With Mamadou he is one of the first choices and the staff knows basketball more than me or the recruiting services so we can be confident that Mamadou is going to be good.

Agree but still, he does have a lot of offers so it's not like no one knew about him. I guess all the other good basketball schools coaches can't judge talent. Overall I'll take Ollies judgement of talent over the rating services but still overall and year by year if we get 4 recruits I would rather have 4 - 5 stars than 4 - 3 stars that Ollie thought were underrated. I hope Ollie is right, and yes he and his staff are better judges of talent then you, me not so much...LOL (Joking for all you literal readers)

 

[HooperScooper]

That is interesting as a coach is not allowed to talk about a prospective recruit until after the kid sign's an LOI.

The recruiting gurus can correct me if I'm wrong but I'm pretty sure the only thing a coach can say is they can confirm scholarship offers.

 

[tzznandrew]

Agree but still, he does have a lot of offers so it's not like no one knew about him. I guess all the other good basketball schools coaches can't judge talent. Overall I'll take Ollies judgement of talent over the rating services but still overall and year by year if we get 4 recruits I would rather have 4 - 5 stars than 4 - 3 stars that Ollie thought were underrated. I hope Ollie is right, and yes he and his staff are better judges of talent then you, me not so much...LOL (Joking for all you literal readers)

Let's re-examine these star ratings next spring. Will you feel better when he is 4-star, Top 70? That's a real possibility.

 

[Sky ball]

The recruiting gurus can correct me if I'm wrong but I'm pretty sure the only thing a coach can say is they can confirm scholarship offers.

I believe a verbal commitment is non-binding and the kid is officially (legally) still on the market. Not 100% on this?

 

[Sky ball]

Let's re-examine these star ratings next spring. Will you feel better when he is 4-star, Top 70? That's a real possibility.

Yes

Will you feel better if he is a 3 star top 300?

 

[HooperScooper]

Not trying to be a negative Nancy but Diarra had how many quality Offers? We beat out the St Peter's and Iona's. Did we land just an OK Mid-major player?
a recruit's
School Interest Offer Visit Recruited by
Connecticut COMMITTED (05/22/2015) Offered None
VCU High Offered None
Boston U. None Offered None
Drexel None Offered None
Duquesne None Offered None
Iona None Offered None
Minnesota None Offered None Kimani Young
Norfolk St. None Offered None
Quinnipiac None Offered None
St. Peter's None Offered None

My only addition to this discussion is that it's pretty common to see a recruit's ranking go way up or down the summer before their senior year when the recruiting analysts see them in all these AAU tournaments and the kids have improved a lot over their junior years in high school when recruiting analysts aren't seeing them play. Rudy Gay went from the 75 range to top 10 that summer before his senior year and UConn was on him before he rose in the rankings. Jeff Adrien also went up a lot that summer and then saw lots of big time schools come after him, including UConn. Before July he probably had offers like Diarra had.

As others have mentioned the key is to see the potential in a recruit before everyone else does. Diarra isn't one of those lock top 50 recruits at this point but that's not to say he may end up looking like one. As always you have to trust your coaching staff. Ollie likes kids with a high motor, athleticism, good work ethic and high character because those things usually can't be gained at this age. You can work with kids like this and teach them skills. Let's see how Diarra progresses.

 

[Go_Huskies]

I guess all the other good basketball schools coaches can't judge talent.

I agree I would like to see more big time schools offering him. It would be definately more reassuring. But just because coaches didn't offer him doesn't mean they don't think he has talent. There could be other reasons.

1.) They don't think they have a legitimately shot at him given that Uconn was his dream school - so why waste your time.

2.) They didn't see enough of him to make an evaluation. A very strong likelihood this early in recruiting.

3.) When they did see him he wasn't as good as he as now because he either grew or just got better. I believe this is probably the case with Mamadou by reading his coach's comments. It definitely is the case with Enoch.

4.) They don't have a scholarship to give

5.) They don't need a PF

 

[HooperScooper]

I believe a verbal commitment is non-binding and the kid is officially (legally) still on the market. Not 100% on this?

Yes, correct. Unlike football it's more frowned upon in basketball recruiting for other coaches to go after verbal commits. But it does happen and you'd have to be naive to think it doesn't happen a lot.

 

[husky99]

Played last night. His team lost by 20 but he had 12 and 9 rebounds. 6 on the O side

 

[Chief00]

Played last night. His team lost by 20 but he had 12 and 9 rebounds. 6 on the O side

We haven't had a good offensive rebounder in a long time. I don't recall his stats but Roscoe was a decent offensive rebounder. AD was too but only played a year.

 

[UConnSwag11]

We haven't had a good offensive rebounder in a long time. I don't recall his stats but Roscoe was a decent offensive rebounder. AD was too but only played a year.

09. Maybe AO

 

[tcf15]

We haven't had a good offensive rebounder in a long time. I don't recall his stats but Roscoe was a decent offensive rebounder. AD was too but only played a year.

Oriakhi in 2011 and Drummond in 2012. Both were top 30 in offensive rebounding %.

 

[Pudge]

2 Things:

I'm totally tired of the who offered crap. Particularly in Football. But also here with Diarra. It's not a solid metric or significant qualitative value. Kids lie. Recruiting services lie. It's just crap. There are little facts mixed with speculation. And, when a kid says ... Dream School ... I think he's unlikely to see 30 more offers.

Lubin. He's clearly not the worst recruit in 15 years. He is more skilled than some of the Bigs who came through. I hope he has a HUGE few years at a Western Kentucky or something. I liked his game. Neither he or UConn waited to see it development in our little farm village / Collegetown.

 

[Matrim55]

Oriakhi in 2011 and Drummond in 2012. Both were top 30 in offensive rebounding %.

Kentan was way up there until about mid-January as well. I bet he surprises folks this year - ideal "energy big" off the bench.

 

[James]

the fact that diarra has been playing at a very high level of competition is more than encouraging. I also like his top ten player in new england ranking off NERR, one of the best sites for ranking nepsac competition going back to when napier reclassified

 

[Catsailor]

LOL ..Yesterday I looked at his Star ranking and he was 3 star at Rivals, Scout and one other with an ESPN exception of 4 star. Just now I see he is 4 Star at Rivals. Quick rating change? Hopefully our staff sees the potential in Diarra and are correct in their assessment.

From the Boneyard Blog:
His rankings:
247Sports: 3 star
ESPN: 4 star
Rivals: 3 star
Scout: 3 star

I just find the rating services to be just a little loose in the accuracy of their information. Makes me a little skeptical regarding their evaluations.

For example today on 247:
Mamadou Diarra is a 7-0, 235-pound Center (BK) from Putnam, CT.

Stars/# grade seems very inconsistent

EG. ESPN grades
Tyler Olander as a 3* yet his grade is 90
Philip Noland 3* 91
Kentan Facey 4* 82
Terrence Samual 3* 74
Amida Brimah 3* 70
Ryan Boatright 4* 94
Mamadou Diarra 4* 80

Anybody here thinks this makes sense?

I have more faith in eyeball test/coaching staff >ratings services

 

[Leebo]

EG. ESPN grades Tyler Olander as a 3* yet his grade is 90
Philip Noland 3* 91
Kentan Facey 4* 82
Terrence Samual 3* 74
Amida Brimah 3* 70
Ryan Boatright 4* 94
Mamadou Diarra 4* 80

Anybody here thinks this makes sense?

I have more faith in eyeball test/coaching staff >ratings services

I think it's understood that the numerical ratings won't be consistent from year to year, because the rating services adjust their scoring systems, and as such, a number in one year won't mean the same thing 5 years down the road. I wouldn't worry about that.

 

[Gurleyman]

Agree but still, he does have a lot of offers so it's not like no one knew about him. I guess all the other good basketball schools coaches can't judge talent. Overall I'll take Ollies judgement of talent over the rating services but still overall and year by year if we get 4 recruits I would rather have 4 - 5 stars than 4 - 3 stars that Ollie thought were underrated. I hope Ollie is right, and yes he and his staff are better judges of talent then you, me not so much...LOL (Joking for all you literal readers)

I think there are a few factors at play that have people excited beyond the recruiting rankings.

1) Based on nothing but instinct, but others have the same view, I think that Diarra will be a valuable college player. Probably not a star, but a guy who gets you some rebounds and hustle points, plays solid interior defense, and stays for four years, hopefully improving his offense as he goes. He seems to be active around the rim and a quick leaper. There's value in those guys - even if he is closer to Marcus White than Jeff Adrien.

2) We are going to have massive roster turnover in the next two years. If Hamilton doesn't become a senior and Adams doesn't make it to junior year, both of which we have to be prepared for, then Steve Enoch will be the only guy left from this year's squad in two years. We need bodies. If we hold out for only top 50-75 recruits, we'll find ourselves with little depth and reaching to fill out our roster. This past year showed how tough it can be when you get nothing from your bench. An injury (or a starter in a funk) means you struggle since there aren't other options. Diallo is a great start in that regard. Maybe he doesn't start, but he hopefully means we don't have a big drop off when we rotate our bigs. If we only had 2-3 scholarships open, maybe we could be more choosy, but that's not our world at the moment. And Diarra could be top 75 before the final 2016 rankings are done.

3) While I don't think that you can or should plan for package deals, Diarra can't hurt with getting a top 50 wing one class in behind him in Diallo. For a program worried about roster replenishment, that's a big leg up on another key piece.

Locking in a future rotation guy this early in a recruiting class that you need to be a big recruiting class is good news. More work to be done, but if Diarra went somewhere else, we'd still be at the bottom of the uphill climb.

 

[BigErnMcCracken]

I know from personal correspondence with site staff that VerbalCommits cross-references these offers with coaching staffs. The AZ offer is reported as coming in late March of Nolan's senior year, which makes sense; plenty of programs up and down the hierarchy extend offers to kids who may or may not be "reaches" due to missing out on previous targets and needing to fill scholarships. We've seen it happen here before to mixed results. You are right in that I downplayed their importance a bit too much in my initial post. But you cannot judge a kid like Diarra and immediately conclude that he's an "OK mid-major player" just by looking at which schools were the first ones to see him. To make that judgement, you have to watch his tape, hear what analysts and coaches are saying, and look at where he's ranked on some of the more trustworthy sites in addition to seeing which schools are interested. Citing Samuel and Nolan's offers were to prove the point that if you solely go off of lists, you get a skewed picture. BTW, I think that the point on his school's situation is still valid; if he were at a school in Class AA, I'd be willing to wager money that he would have more P5 offers than Tyrique Jones does at Vermont Academy. PSA/Woodstock being an independent really cuts down on the chances that coaches are going to be coming out and seeing him.

The pretty simple point is that some of the crowing about the Diarra commitment would be a little more warranted if some heavy hitters had prioritized him and we beat them out for the kid. You can tie yourself in knots arguing that that's not the case but it's not persuasive.

 

[Catsailor]

I think it's understood that the numerical ratings won't be consistent from year to year, because the rating services adjust their scoring systems, and as such, a number in one year won't mean the same thing 5 years down the road. I wouldn't worry about that.

Nevertheless suppose to make sense and be somewhat consistent
guidelines from ESPN:

RecruitingNation High School Basketball Grading System
90-100: High-major plus prospect (5 stars)
Player demonstrates rare abilities. He should have an immediate impact at a national program with the potential for early entry into the NBA.

85-89: High-major prospect (4 stars)
Player is the centerpiece to a high-major program who starts three to four years.

80-84: High-major minus prospect (4 stars)
Player has the potential to significantly contribute to a high-major program over four years.

70-79: Mid-major plus prospect (3 stars)
Player is a fringe high-major recruit who contributes or a standout mid-level recruit.

65-69: Mid-major prospect (2 stars)
Player is a multi-year starter at the mid-major level.

60-64: Mid-major minus prospect (2 stars)
Player is a role player at the mid-major level.

50-59: Low-major prospect (1 star)
Player is a low-major Division I prospect.

NR: Pending Prospect
Player evaluation is pending film.

How RecruitingNation evaluates

In order for RecruitingNation to grade any high school prospect, we must have seen the player in action, either on tape or in person.