I know not being part of the Geno is god crowd tends to draw extreme anger from many of you, but I agree with Charlie that some of Geno's personal and public ridicule of the freshman class last year might have more of an effect on recruiting than on the 3 remaining frosh. I commend MW for, at least at this point, sticking with the program and working so hard with Pheesa. Hopefully Megan can give us a lot of what Gabby did the last couple of years. I think MW's ceiling might actually be higher than Gabby's.
I don't think Walker will match Williams defensively. However, I think she may end up being better offensively, due to being a better overall shooter.
With regard to the future recruiting issue, it is too early to form any solid opinion, HOWEVER, could Geno's public criticisms, have been a factor in us losing next years' top recruit to ND and will that loss have any carryover to recruiting losses (e.g. PB and Fudd) in future years? In spite of all the "Don't worry, be happy" talk after losing SB, I think she was our #1 target for the 2019 class and would have been a perfect replacement for KLS. IF we land Jones it might work out ok, but the odds of getting a West Coast player, especially as the competition out West is getting tougher (Oregon and Or St.), are longer than the odds of landing a star player from Virginia.
The loss of SB can have a significant impact on the next two recruiting years. Only time will tell if that works out to be the case. What I do know is that our rival, ND, is now the #1 team coming into next year and we, at this point, do not have replacements lined up for the loss next year of KLS and NC.
Sorry for the not-so-happy talk, but every once in a while I think The Boneyard needs an injection of reality.
Lot's of people need injections of reality. Geno has been publicly criticizing players for years. Hasn't seemed to affect recruiting all that much. According to many we get all the best players. And have for years. Why do you think it would change THIS year?
Why do you think Brunelle was our #1 target? There has been quite a bit of talk on here that UCONN actually backed off of her?? How accurate that is, is up for debate, but it didn't seem like UCONN was going out of it's way in recruiting her at the end. They seemed, from reports, to be spending more time on other recruits. Which to me, would make it seem like she was not the #1 target.
Also down recruiting years are usually followed by outstanding recruiting years. For example after the Faris year, we brought in Dolson/Hartley/Walker/Engeln/Johnson. Followed by KML/Banks/Stokes and then Stewart/Jefferson/Tuck (6 AA's in 3 years). After the Chong year, we brought in Williams/Nurse/Ekmark/Edwards and then KLS/Collier/Boykin (3 AA's and a 4 year starter). Dangerfield class wasn't down, but not great, but has been followed by Walker/Coombs/AEH/Hunter and now Williams/ONO. So, excuse me if I'm not too worried about recruiting for 2019/2020/2021. UCONN doesn't have too many down years and if they do have one, it's usually followed up by some pretty good recruits.
It's sometimes harder to bring players cross country, but that's always been the case. However as programs go, UCONN is probably better than most at doing just that. We've gotten recruits from Alaska, Arizona, Arkansas, California (7), Colorado, Florida, Georgia (5), Nevada, New Mexico, Oklahoma, Oregon, Texas, along with Canada, Croatia, New Zealand, Nigeria, and Russia. We do ok. Distance doesn't seem to be that big of deal.
Reality is, people can chillax. It's gonna be ok.
Personally, I never had any doubts that Megan would blossom into the elite player she's projected to be. Because of Geno's rigorous indoctrination and conditioning program, plus the fact that he himself says that very few freshmen come in, adapt and learn his system right away. I'm just following Geno's lead. In Geno I trust!!!
