For recruitniks (non-UConn) - Hollivay

[HuskyNan]

[Rachel] Hollivay, a 6-foot-5 center, took the first of her five official visits to the University of Mississippi two weekends ago. She also plans to take official visits to the University of Oklahoma (Sept. 23-24), Tennessee (Oct. 8-9), and Rutgers (Oct. 14-15). Hollivay said all of the schools were "on the same page" entering the visits, and that she plans to make a decision in November in time for the early signing period.

She is currently at Miss. State for an official visit.

MSU women's basketball will play host to top recruits

 

[EricLA]

i'm really rooting for Oklahoma or Rutgers. i know some on here don't like RU, and while Stringer is not my favorite by a long shot, i like the RU fans and hope they put together a really good class. her recruitment is really fascinating as Pat is desperate for a post player. Some think they can have Ariel Butts if Pat wants her, but she's ranked outside of the top 70 and with solid but unspectacular Harrison, would give Pat zero elite centers going forward and pretty much make Russell a must get for them.

 

[tnvolfan65]

butts had an offer but she has taken tennessee off of her list if i remember correctly...it was news that she had an offer a while ago, because like you mention no one knew much about her, but i believe she is down to auburn, georgia, fsu, and rutgers.

but yes we are definitely desperate for an elite center. hollivay would be a great pick-up, and russell is already a must-get. if we don't land hollivay though, we still have talent across the board. we'll just be small with probably graves and burdick holding down the paint, with jones and harrison backing them up.

hollivay has the power to alter a number of things on the wcbb landscape, and that's why i love recruiting!

 

[Coler]

I think it's a good thing Rutgers is her last visit. From her twitter, she also has a home visit from CVS on Monday.

She is good friends with April, and she plays for the same club team as April, Erica, & Chelsey did. Now all we need to do is make a lasting impression on her when she goes up to NJ to visit.

 

[EricLA]

butts had an offer but she has taken tennessee off of her list if i remember correctly...it was news that she had an offer a while ago, because like you mention no one knew much about her, but i believe she is down to auburn, georgia, fsu, and rutgers.

but yes we are definitely desperate for an elite center. hollivay would be a great pick-up, and russell is already a must-get. if we don't land hollivay though, we still have talent across the board. we'll just be small with probably graves and burdick holding down the paint, with jones and harrison backing them up.

hollivay has the power to alter a number of things on the wcbb landscape, and that's why i love recruiting!

while i agree Hollivay is an elite center, how does she alter the WCBB landscape? she's never made any of the US national teams for her age group - in fact she's never even made the final 15 IIRC. i'm not saying she isn't elite - i believe she is, especially given the lack of elite centers yearly, but to say she will change the landscape of WCBB is overstating for a player who's not even a consensus top 10.

BTW thanks for the clarification on Butts. apparently my info was REALLY old lol.

on edit, she is consensus top 10. PBR, Blue Star and ASGR all have her identically ranked at #10. and ESPN has her at #8. she used to be just outside the top 10 on several of them so it appears they have updated their rankings...

 

[doggydaddy]

while i agree Hollivay is an elite center, how does she alter the WCBB landscape? she's never made any of the US national teams for her age group - in fact she's never even made the final 15 IIRC. i'm not saying she isn't elite - i believe she is, especially given the lack of elite centers yearly, but to say she will change the landscape of WCBB is overstating for a player who's not even a consensus top 10.

BTW thanks for the clarification on Butts. apparently my info was REALLY old lol.

Eric, you beat me to it. Altering the landscape of WCBB? Only a few players have done that and certainly not a #8 player that, as you mentioned, has not been on the national scene.

Not to take anything away from Holivay. She sounds like a great kid with some terrific skills.

 

[EricLA]

I think it's a good thing Rutgers is her last visit. From her twitter, she also has a home visit from CVS on Monday.

She is good friends with April, and she plays for the same club team as April, Erica, & Chelsey did. Now all we need to do is make a lasting impression on her when she goes up to NJ to visit.

good luck with that. anywhere but tennessee is my motto! (sorry LV fans!)

 

[HuskyFan1125]

I just posted this on another thread!

Hollivay is club ball teammates with the Rutgers girls and she wants to play college ball with someone she already knows so that bodes well for Rutgers. Butts has been off the list of Tennessee for some time. I know UT wanted her but I dont know what happened.

As far as Mercedes Russell goes, I know Volunteer fans want her bad. I was just wondering if anyone knew if there was a connection with Russell and the Schimmel sisters at Louisville. All are from Oregon and the Schimmel''s mother is a coach. Not sure if they all played AAU ball together or not. I was curious becasue Louisville fans think that have a legitimate shot at Russell and they did add Samantha Williams to their coaching staff and she was a great recruiter at Duke.

Should be fun.

 

[tnvolfan65]

Sorry for the confusion...I didn't mean that Hollivay alone will alter the landscape of wcbb but her decision will definitely affect those involved with her and indirectly the rest of wcbb.

For example, like we were saying earlier she either gives Tennessee its only true 5 player or we are left playing small ball and puts even more pressure on landing one in the class of 2013, who will of course have to come in as freshmen.

Or she can anchor the paint for a rutgers team that is quietly gathering quite a bit if talent.

Likewise she could attract other quality players to a school like Oklahoma who has been on the verge of greatness a number of times. As you can tell with a player like Diggins, she can have as much of an impact in recruiting than with play on the court.

Of course in this context, nearly all top 10 players can have this type of impact but I was just specifically talking about Hollivay bc that's who was being discussed and also my dear UT is one of the schools being affected.

 

[HuskyFan1125]

tnvolfan65,

Welcome to the board. I like to get a Volunteer perspective on certain things. First off, good luck on your up coming season. Should be a good one.

I was just wondering if you guys don't get Jordan Adams or Rachel Hollivay how will that impact next season as that will take your roster to 8-9 ( I may be wrong on the number? i just know that 5 seniors are graduating I think). It's gonna be a short bench?

 

[tnvolfan65]

thank ya huskyfan...right now we have a roster of 10 for this season. kamiko williams, imo, will redshirt this year as she is coming off of an acl tear but that hasn't been confirmed yet. she would make 11.

if she does redshirt then following the graduation of stricklen, johnson, manning, bass, and baugh we will have:

sr: spani
jr: simmons, williams
soph: massengale, burdick, harrison
frosh: graves, carter, jones

which is a total of 9. again, not ideal but it may have to work. a juco post would be a nice addition to go along with simmons and williams' class. but i do feel like we'll get at least one more player in this class. i'm rooting for hollivay, but if she decides to play elsewhere, we could get involved with another player. we had success with simmons and massengale even though we got a late start, but also missed on a player like bria smith, so you never know. no one can deny tennessee definitely has a sale to recruits.

if we play with 9, i look for tennessee to load up on the 2013 class, which already looks promising. we return 8, so with a class of 4 or 5, we could bring our numbers back up to 12/13. i won't complain if we go ahead and take russell, davis, deshields, reimer, and greenwell and just call it a day. somewhat joking, but we're definitely involved with all 5!! and i can dream right...i feel like it's been a while since we got some good news lol.

 

[MLTS05]

I think she does land at Tennessee, and I think they get Russell next. Add in Graves and Harrison the post there could be very good. But I dont think any backcourt in America will be as talented as UCONN when Jefferson and Hartley take the floor together

 

[tnvolfan65]

i'll take massengale, simmons, and davis anyday

 

[HuskyFan1125]

i'll take massengale, simmons, and davis anyday

I'm still not sold on Simmons

Massengale will be good! Davis-I'm not sure about yet!