Great news: one of UWM's most promising and earliest commits in program history just decided to decommit.
This isn't the end of the world by any means, but it does deal a blow to the program's attempt to rise above it's status as a Plan B destination for the nation's top recruits. Time and again fans of the Milwaukee program have overestimated our status in the D-I college hoops community.
We have made incredible strides during our short history, but as far as considering the ability to land top-ranked recruits, "a shoe-in" for a program that struggles to draw 3,500 fans for conference games- we have to be (somewhat) realistic.
People fear us to a certain (relative to the game) extent (esp. when we make noise like 2000-2006), but they also want to pretend we don't exist.
To be fair, the linked article mentions that Texas Southern is Calvin's leading recruiter right now. That "may" suggest that factors other than wanting to open up his recruitment to higher major schools led to this abrupt turn of events.
The facts of the matter are that:
a). Milwaukee will not be on par recruiting-wise with BCS schools anytime soon and should accept the role of recruiting "under the radar" guys like James Eayrs and Tony Meier and welcoming home prodigal sons like Joah Tucker, Avery Smith, etc. and,
b). College basketball recruiting will always be a crap-shoot to a large extent. These are high-school aged kids we are talking about- we can't expect them to honor commitments like business contracts- it is their life after all, know?
Will I stop reporting on recruiting developments because of this routine uncertainty? Heck no!
These developments are interesting to the Panther Hoops fanatics (which, if you read this blog, you probably are), and they add to the beautiful drama that ever-so-often culminates in a championship or a thrilling string of victories in March.
As mentioned in recent posts, things are looking up for this season, but 2010 will be much different. Boyle, Franklin, Eayrs, Porte, and Averkamp will all be gone. Michael Tyler, and the then-eligible Mitchell Carter and Christian Wolf will be welcomed..., but who then?
Alas!, we absolutely will still have Tony Meier (who btw has apparently worked his 6'8" frame up to 243lbs.), Deonte Roberts, Ant(thony) Hill, Ryan Haggerty, Riley Walker, Patrick Souter, Quinton Gustavson, and Lonnie Boga, Ja'Rob McCallum, Jerard Ajami and 2010 freshman Evan Richard to fill the void..
The staff is reportedly actively recruiting some JUCO forwards and still looking for a point man for 2010. If you look at recruiting in the big picture, we have actually landed some pretty impressive players (Big James, Tony, and Tone?) and we should all be confident that recruiting in the next year or so will will be no different.
Things don't always work out as planned (in fact they almost never do- esp. in recruiting..). But(!), I think this team is going to be resilient as always, and that everyone's decisions will work out for the best.
This isn't the end of the world by any means, but it does deal a blow to the program's attempt to rise above it's status as a Plan B destination for the nation's top recruits. Time and again fans of the Milwaukee program have overestimated our status in the D-I college hoops community.
We have made incredible strides during our short history, but as far as considering the ability to land top-ranked recruits, "a shoe-in" for a program that struggles to draw 3,500 fans for conference games- we have to be (somewhat) realistic.
People fear us to a certain (relative to the game) extent (esp. when we make noise like 2000-2006), but they also want to pretend we don't exist.
To be fair, the linked article mentions that Texas Southern is Calvin's leading recruiter right now. That "may" suggest that factors other than wanting to open up his recruitment to higher major schools led to this abrupt turn of events.
The facts of the matter are that:
a). Milwaukee will not be on par recruiting-wise with BCS schools anytime soon and should accept the role of recruiting "under the radar" guys like James Eayrs and Tony Meier and welcoming home prodigal sons like Joah Tucker, Avery Smith, etc. and,
b). College basketball recruiting will always be a crap-shoot to a large extent. These are high-school aged kids we are talking about- we can't expect them to honor commitments like business contracts- it is their life after all, know?
Will I stop reporting on recruiting developments because of this routine uncertainty? Heck no!
These developments are interesting to the Panther Hoops fanatics (which, if you read this blog, you probably are), and they add to the beautiful drama that ever-so-often culminates in a championship or a thrilling string of victories in March.
As mentioned in recent posts, things are looking up for this season, but 2010 will be much different. Boyle, Franklin, Eayrs, Porte, and Averkamp will all be gone. Michael Tyler, and the then-eligible Mitchell Carter and Christian Wolf will be welcomed..., but who then?
Alas!, we absolutely will still have Tony Meier (who btw has apparently worked his 6'8" frame up to 243lbs.), Deonte Roberts, Ant(thony) Hill, Ryan Haggerty, Riley Walker, Patrick Souter, Quinton Gustavson, and Lonnie Boga, Ja'Rob McCallum, Jerard Ajami and 2010 freshman Evan Richard to fill the void..
The staff is reportedly actively recruiting some JUCO forwards and still looking for a point man for 2010. If you look at recruiting in the big picture, we have actually landed some pretty impressive players (Big James, Tony, and Tone?) and we should all be confident that recruiting in the next year or so will will be no different.
Things don't always work out as planned (in fact they almost never do- esp. in recruiting..). But(!), I think this team is going to be resilient as always, and that everyone's decisions will work out for the best.
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