I hope she watches BY, the one and only one UConn fan site, and, make a verbal because she will have so many fans already.
Low 70s and sunny in NoVa this weekend. I hope that Storrs is nice too.
I think it's a dumb strategy that they may want to revisit if they hope to draw top recruits. I mean Geno can show off his 11 rings, an office that looks more like a basketball HOF exhibit (thanks Marisa), Gampel and the practice facility with all those banners and murals of some of the greatest players to ever play the game not to mention an overwhelming majority of the top picks in the pros, and a trophy case that can't be enlarged quick enough to hold all the trophies and accolades, oh yeah plus every game televised (half of which on national TV), players and a coach that are constantly in the national media especially come March and April. What does Muffet show and tell recruits? Touchdown Jesus, that one trophy ND won before said top recruit was even born, and hey at least some of our games will be on TV? Geno can't wait until things bloom on campus... Connecticut is a late bloomer as we're still getting regular frosts and freezes in April. If he waited much longer all the players would be home and the campus deserted.
+1000
Kids make decisions for a variety of reasons, but I suspect that a (say) top 20 recruit (McD's AA) pretty much puts the look of a campus low on her list. She's thought and rethought all variables for the past 3-4 years, and is going to chose because of:
One major edit!
A good list, but ... there is a visceral reaction most people have arriving in any knew place, especially a place they may (or have) committed to moving that cuts across all the rest of the crap. It is like house hunting and walking into 20 different houses and 18 of them you know right away you will never live in regardless of amenities and price and square footage and location. They just feel alien. And the same may happen just driving on the block before you see the house itself.
I appreciate what you say, but I'm having a hard time buying it, because it's not (as it usually is for the average kid) a spontaneous decision. Everything's been pointing to it for 3-4 years; nothing is new, all is calculated, with massive amounts of input from parents, coaches, and friends. All the noise of weather, type of town, dorms, etc. has been normalized out. It's inconceivable to me that a highly recruited all-american returns home from a college visit, and says to her parents: I really think this is the best WCBB program for me, but it just seemed like a dreary campus in April; I think I'll go somewhere else that's sunnier and has almost as good a program. I think that's a far more likely decision by a 3 or 4 star athlete. But 5 star athletes have been conditioned by all their support people to be singularly focused on achievement. IMHO.
One of my sons was down to three colleges. one of which was UVA and another U of Mich. He had always liked Mich sports, but swore up and down that he wanted warmer than Connecticut. So after he was accepted, we visited UVA in early April. It was a lousy early spring here in CT. Charlottesville was mid-80s. student in shorts, the perfect weather to validate my son's vision. At the end of April my wife and he went to Ann Arbor (my father had just died, in fact Tax Day is the anniversary, so I was home with my mother). The weather in Mich was still clammy and cold. Of course, he picked UM, sports was higher on his list than warm weather, at least for a CT kid who was used to cold. Let's hope for MW that a series of NC banners is more her dream than going to a school that is typically a pretender in her sport, but 18 year olds do what they do, which is mess with their parents' minds.
Probably not ... but she is driving in from the airport and smells cow manure for the first time, and the IPhone map says they are two miles from Gampel and they are driving through grey woods with no sign of any houses, the ground is semi - frozen and her first step out of the car goes an inch deep in mud with water seeping into her shoe, and then the grey day gets just a little worse as the heavens open and a downpour soaks through her jacket. She is cold, uncomfortable and tracking mud after her as she heads in to meet the coaching staff - probably not in the best frame of mind to be wowed by the program they have built and how she would fit into the future.
It's UConn in April. If it's not snowing, we're already winning, OK? Just don't tell the recruits to visit the beach where it's frigid until mid-June.
Ucalum, you took the question right out of my mouth. Has she been spotted yet?Has anyone spotted her on campus as of yet? Want to make sure that she actually arrived.
You mean Acura, don't you?
Agree. Walker has the talent and drive to excel wherever she goes to school. I imagine we'll know shortly her choice after her series of visits.
