Something recruiting wise is off here. UConn just comes off a NC against a highly hyped opponent, opens a new state of the art practice facility, has a young, charismatic coach that is targeted by the NBA greats and is lauded by guys recruits look up to like Durant and Lebron, and yet we are wiffing on nearly every single target we set our sights on, to lesser opponents no less. In fact, right after winning the title when things were looking grand, what happens? Our two commits Jackson and Ali both decommit (I know we got Adams out of it but still, we never really got a good reason for why those guys left).
UConn has never been a very "flashy" or "sexy" program compared to some of the competition, and personally I think a lack-luster campus life has a little to do with all this but still come on, these are not the recruiting results a program the caliber of UConn should be getting. UConn can step up the recruiting by (a) hiring outside of the UConn family for a proven recruiter (Ive spoken to Glen Miller a few times and hes a great guy and bball mind but today's recruits are not exactly signing on the dotted line when he walks in the room) and (b) STEP UP OUR NATIONAL BRANDING/IMAGE. I've harped on point (b) several times now and there are always a few posters here who try to dismiss my point and try to make me seem like a fool but its the truth. Recruits, and generally teenagers of this generation, have different attitudes than those of the past. Prestige of the names that came before you mean nothing anymore, guys want to go somewhere where they will be under the national spotlight and treated like kings. Social media and the "internet's" opinion and perception of a school means a lot to these guys. These guys want to go somewhere where the coach sells them to the media and NBA scouts as a top product, a program that attracts a great deal of hyped up matchups and attention. Historically UConn has not had success with this type of player, and rightfully so as we have been able to develop our hard working guys over a period of a few years, yet this strategy comes with its costs, that being what we are seeing on the court this year. Big gaps of talent and a great deal of risk taking on "Project guys".
This current squad is essentially made up of one sure-fire stud (Boat), one solid recruit who has shown he can play and just needs some time to get to speed (DHam), and a bunch of project guys (TSam, Brimah, Facey, Cassell, and frankly Purvis, he was never known as a skill player and more of a supremely athletic body who needs to work to learn the game). Our entire front court (Facey and Brimah) have only been playing the game of basketball for 5 or 6 years now! How can we expect to be regular final four/title contenders by gambling so big on guys that will either become Thabeets/Armstrongs or the opposite - duds. Some on the yard say recruiting is over-rated and UConn will continue to get it done. That may very well be true, but if it was up to Vegas setting the odds on where I was gonna put my money, it wouldnt be that the trend UConn has experienced over the last five years will continue indefinitely. We cannot lose sight that our last two titles were essentially very fortunate in that the pieces fell in the right place and the teams both stepped up way beyond what they had showed their entire respective regular seasons. Oh yea, also lets not forget having two generational all-time great college players leading the way. 3 star guys arent going to keep turning into Bazz's and Kemba's every four years.
Other top programs at UConn's level lose as much talent as us to the draft each year, yet they replace that talent with highly touted incoming freshman. Why not bring in guys that are already more skilled and talented that we can develop into our system as opposed to starting with guys who are at a lower level skill level that we develop into our system (with some simply not working out, for every guy that gets better every year they play for us, there is the occasional guy who never gets it together ala Coombs-McDaniels).
