OT: Post-Championship Recruiting

[Stainmaster]

I've never believed that winning a championship means a school will immediately get an uptick in blue-chip recruits who want to play for them. This tidbit doesn't seem to support that either.

http://www.verbalcommits.com/players/crew-ainge Kid has 2 DI offers - UNC Greensboro and Binghamton. Surely a title would merit a higher level of recruit that the staff would consider? Especially with 4/5 starters leaving the team due to either the draft or graduation?

As was mentioned here a couple of days ago, http://verbalcommits.com/players/antonio-vrankovic is their latest commit, and while he isn't ranked as lowly, he doesn't even meet the typical Duke recruit standard (much less post-championship).

Feel free to disagree but I think that this does a pretty good job of showing that titles don't automatically bring a higher level of recruit.

 

[tykurez]

Not really great evidence. Let's face it, Duke doesn't need to win a championship to pull in recruits. The title this year for them is zero sum.

 

[FartMan69]

Seems strange to me that Duke would neglect going after a true point especially with Jones raising his draft stock throughout the season. Now they're scrambling but of course they're Duke and something will work out.

 

[jibsey]

I don't think that Duke is having a problem attracting top players championship or not. Maybe K sees something in the kid, but let's not lose sleep over Duke not attracting talent after a title because they seem to always be in the running and their roster ends up very talented. We should have their recruiting problems. It would have made sense that we would have recruited better off the title but our situation is different than Duke's.

 

[BoatShow]

Is he Danny's kid?

 

[superjohn]

I've never believed that winning a championship means a school will immediately get an uptick in blue-chip recruits who want to play for them. This tidbit doesn't seem to support that either.

http://www.verbalcommits.com/players/crew-ainge Kid has 2 DI offers - UNC Greensboro and Binghamton. Surely a title would merit a higher level of recruit that the staff would consider? Especially with 4/5 starters leaving the team due to either the draft or graduation?

As was mentioned here a couple of days ago, http://verbalcommits.com/players/antonio-vrankovic is their latest commit, and while he isn't ranked as lowly, he doesn't even meet the typical Duke recruit standard (much less post-championship).

Feel free to disagree but I think that this does a pretty good job of showing that titles don't automatically bring a higher level of recruit.

Duke is a recruiting behemoth but Crew Ainge seems like quite the stretch, great bloodlines but I didn't even think the kid was a D1 prospect. Maybe coach K is hoping for a little Steph/Seth Curry action where the apple doesn't fall far from the tree.

 

[CallMeBruce]

His name is Crew? Ugh. White people are the worst.

 

[Walker11]

The kid they got last week will be a walk on and this kid will likely be a preferred walk-on as well. They also have David Robinson's son coming in next year as a walk on who had D1 offers. This is a different level of recruiting - getting kids to walk-on when they could get full rides elsewhere.

 

[CallMeBruce]

If Danny Ainge's son, whom I'll again point out is named Crew, ends up playing at Duke, does he instantly become the most punchable player in all of college basketball? I thought Grayson Allen had that on lockdown for the next few years, but this is a pretty serious threat to the title.

 

[Stainmaster]

The kid they got last week will be a walk on and this kid will likely be a preferred walk-on as well. They also have David Robinson's son coming in next year as a walk on who had D1 offers. This is a different level of recruiting - getting kids to walk-on when they could get full rides elsewhere.

I haven't seen anything to validate that Vrankovic wasn't given a scholarship. On the contrary, when Robinson's kid committed the words "walk-on" were attached to him from the get-go by Alex Kline and others.

 

[Walker11]

I haven't seen anything to validate that Vrankovic wasn't given a scholarship. On the contrary, when Robinson's kid committed the words "walk-on" were attached to him from the get-go by Alex Kline and others.

Yea it looks like you were right. There is a headline on reddit College Basketball titled "Duke adds 6'11 Walk-On" but I just read the article and the word walk-on was never mentioned. I need to find better ways to get my College Hoops news than reddit.

 

[Stainmaster]

Yea it looks like you were right. There is a headline on reddit College Basketball titled "Duke adds 6'11 Walk-On" but I just read the article and the word walk-on was never mentioned. I need to find better ways to get my College Hoops news than reddit.

I think the real litmus test is whether or not Ainge's kid gets offered a scholarship. It's no big deal for someone with two low-major offers to walk on at a higher program -- I believe T.J. Schlundt, a current freshman at Wisconsin, had offers from multiple Horizon League schools (and even St. Joe's...). However, if someone who clearly is not Duke-caliber gets an offer, a lot of heads will be scratching.

 

[superjohn]

If Danny Ainge's son, whom I'll again point out is named Crew, ends up playing at Duke, does he instantly become the most punchable player in all of college basketball? I thought Grayson Allen had that on lockdown for the next few years, but this is a pretty serious threat to the title.

Still it's Ainge's kid and Ainge was a tough player. Grayson Allen looks like Ted Cruz Jr. and is already up there with Wojo in terms of being punchable.

 

[Walker11]

I think the real litmus test is whether or not Ainge's kid gets offered a scholarship. It's no big deal for someone with two low-major offers to walk on at a higher program -- I believe T.J. Schlundt, a current freshman at Wisconsin, had offers from multiple Horizon League schools (and even St. Joe's...). However, if someone who clearly is not Duke-caliber gets an offer, a lot of heads will be scratching.

Yeah, they have a lot of spots to fill (7 of 13 filled only, I believe) but you don't tie up a spot for 4 years with Ainge. I wonder if there could be a situation where he was guaranteed a schollie for only 1 year? I don't even know if that is possible - I know the P5 has talked about 4 year commitments.

 

[Stainmaster]

Yeah, they have a lot of spots to fill (7 of 13 filled only, I believe) but you don't tie up a spot for 4 years with Ainge. I wonder if there could be a situation where he was guaranteed a schollie for only 1 year? I don't even know if that is possible - I know the P5 has talked about 4 year commitments.

I don't know how official the 4-year scholarship legislation is. But I think that with a last name of Ainge, any coach in the country would have a tough time forcing him out.

 

[Walker11]

I don't know how official the 4-year scholarship legislation is. But I think that with a last name of Ainge, any coach in the country would have a tough time forcing him out.

Of course not, there would have to be some understanding prior. Someone is eventually going to provide us with a fact or two that will make all this back and forth speculation irrelevant.

 

[BigErnMcCracken]

Feel free to disagree but I think that this does a pretty good job of showing that titles don't automatically bring a higher level of recruit.

I'm not sure why you think it shows that at all. It would be one thing if you had some way of showing that in the wake of their national championship they're having a tough time getting traction with top flight recruits. All this shows is that they threw Danny Ainge's kid a bone.

Your posts are generally pretty well thought out but this one misses the mark entirely.

(Incidentally, I'm not sure what sort of uptick in recruiting Duke could hope to get. They're already basically level 1A right now.)

 

[tcf15]

I'm fairly confident that if we don't win the championship in 2011, DeAndre Daniels ends up elsewhere.

 

[Stainmaster]

I'm not sure why you think it shows that at all. It would be one thing if you had some way of showing that in the wake of their national championship they're having a tough time getting traction with top flight recruits. All this shows is that they threw Danny Ainge's kid a bone.

Your posts are generally pretty well thought out but this one misses the mark entirely.

(Incidentally, I'm not sure what sort of uptick in recruiting Duke could hope to get. They're already basically level 1A right now.)

Duke is obviously in a bit of a tizzy due to so many players leaving. The expectation would be that if they're looking to fill out the roster, they would at least be able to get the "best of the best" in terms of spare parts -- kids with multiple offers from P5 schools or at least the "better" mid-majors (A10, Big East, our dumpster fire, MWC). A kid like Crew Ainge is a huge downgrade compared to that. If championships bred recruiting success, Duke shouldn't have to be reaching so low.

 

[Matrim55]

I think the real litmus test is whether or not Ainge's kid gets offered a scholarship. It's no big deal for someone with two low-major offers to walk on at a higher program -- I believe T.J. Schlundt, a current freshman at Wisconsin, had offers from multiple Horizon League schools (and even St. Joe's...). However, if someone who clearly is not Duke-caliber gets an offer, a lot of heads will be scratching.

There's something to be said for having 4-year kids who create & maintain a culture - guys who maybe aren't super-talented, but have high basketball IQs and leave it all on the floor every single practice. What wouldn't we have given to have, for example, E.J. Harrison and R.J. Evans on this past year's team, helping to share some of the leadership burden with Boat?

Ainge will be the 12th or 13th man for Duke from his first day to his last, but that doesn't mean he won't add value (especially since he appears to be well-liked by his peers - I remember a couple of his AAU teammates tweeting a bunch about him last summer). And since K does so well getting his top targets every season, he can afford to burn one scholarship on a guy who's probably not going to play more than a handful of meaningful minutes between now and graduation day (Ainge) and another on a guy who's a high-upside, long-term project (Vrankovic).

I hate K, I hate Duke, and I think he's an overrated in-game coach. But he's right there with St. Jim as the most masterful program builder of the last 4 decades. If he decides his team will be better for having this kid run the practice squad until 2019, I'm not going to argue with him.

 

[johnhuskies95]

Duke just needs players at this point. Even with the 6'11 kid they got they only have 8 guys on the roster. Derryck Thornton will probably commit to them sometime in the next week and reclassify, but I think Coach K will probably try and have at least 11 spots filled, and since he doesn't believe in grad transfers this is the route he has to go with. David Robinson's kid might end up getting a scholarship after all.

 

[B1GEast]

Meh, dook will have an off year

 

[BearJWS]

Vrankovic is another late riser, despite being 3 stars. I was going to mention him, but saw Duke was on him. He was their backup to Swanigan. Vrankovic really blew up his Senior season. 25 ppg & 16 rpg are impressive. Not athletic, but a very big body.

http://scouthoops.scout.com/story/1513095-top-10-available-senior-centers
http://scouthoops.scout.com/story/1524755-duke-targeting-2015-center-prospect

 

[Fishy]

This thread is pure nonsense - Duke already has two McD's All-Americans in this class and is likely to get a third in Brandon Ingram. They're just looking for some warm bodies after the NBA exodus.

Duke will get whoever they want in 2016.

 

[tcf15]

Welp, there goes your theory lol