Attrition Among Top 5 Classes

[JustinesGuy]

Baylor's WBB 2015 recruiting class was rated as the 4th best by ESPN. Ranking them as the #4 class is just wrong. No top 10s. Two top 20s. Other three are 66, 87, and 100. Baylor's 2015 class:
11 Kalani Brown, P STARTER
20 Beatrice Mompremier, P University of Miami Hurricanes
66 Alexandria Gulley, PG at Baylor on a medical scholarship - no basketball
87 Justis Szczepanski-Beavers, P dismissed from the team for violating team rules
100 Alyssa Dry, G left of her own volition - where? ?

Alyssa Dry was by favorite all time non uconn women's basketball player.

 

[triaddukefan]

In the modern era - say the last 8-10 years - I think it is really hard to keep a five member class together for four years, and even a four member class can be tough because it is rare to get the range of complementary skills among that many players in a class, and combined across the classes before and after. Most coaches would love to have consistent 3 member classes of talented players - that gives a revolving 12 player roster, but with injuries, transfers, and the ups and downs of recruiting too many classes end up as 2, 1 or even 0 to start or at the end of four years and so coaches take the talent when they can get it even if it means expanding to five players in a single class. .]

Duke had the #1 rated class in 2010...... a 5 player class...... and they all stayed 4 years. 2 PG's, a SG, a SF, and a PF.

 

[cockhrnleghrn]

It's not just in basketball; when I'm hiring at work I'm shocked at how frequently people change jobs these days. I've only worked for 2 companies in the last 30 years. I can't fathom changing jobs or colleges every year or two.

 

[Fairfield Fan]

Baylor's WBB 2015 recruiting class was rated as the 4th best by ESPN. Ranking them as the #4 class is just wrong. No top 10s. Two top 20s. Other three are 66, 87, and 100. Baylor's 2015 class:
11 Kalani Brown, P STARTER
20 Beatrice Mompremier, P University of Miami Hurricanes
66 Alexandria Gulley, PG at Baylor on a medical scholarship - no basketball
87 Justis Szczepanski-Beavers, P dismissed from the team for violating team rules
100 Alyssa Dry, G left of her own volition - where? ?

The practice of simply adding up the number of ranked recruits signed to rank recruiting classes is silly. It counts a national player of the year as no more important than a #40 recruit.

What these ranking services should do is weight the recruits. For example, give 20 points to a POY, 10 points to a 2nd through 5th recruit. 5 points for #6 through #15. And 1 point for recruits ranked #16 through 30. Something like that.

Doing so would highlight the recruiting classes with the most talented individual player, and also give weight to players who are considered vastly more talented than the rest. Would also give some weight to better, but undifferentiated players in the second tier. If that were the metric, Connecticut would be ranked far higher in most years than they usually are.

 

[oldude]

I think there is an inherent problem that starts when a team exceeds 3 recruits in any one class, and certainly when a class gets to 5 or 6. There is simply not enough PT to get everyone quality minutes.

From a coach's standpoint, I understand the dilemma. You wait for answers from top recruits. They haven't said yes, but they haven't said no either, so you cover your backside and sign lesser players and then maybe the top recruits say they're coming.

Even UConn struggles with this dilemma. Four years ago, it was down to the wire with A'ja Wilson who ended up in SC. Two years ago it went down to the wire with Lauren Cox who ended up in Waco.

This past year it went down to the wire with Megan Walker, who's coming to Storrs along with 3 earlier signees who can all basically play the same position.