Indiana gets an unusual late 2014 commitment

[Da Coach]

Indiana coach Tom Crean realizes his team for this coming season is so severely short of size and talent to compete against the Big Ten, that he has considered a number of unusual options to strengthen his roster.
He has signed several big recruits to add size, but all of his big men signings were widely considered a bit desperate and probably not Big Ten caliber talent-
Jeremiah April & Tim Priller-

http://www.courier-journal.com/story/sports/recruiting/2014/06/09/crean-says-indianas-spring-basketball-signees-bring-upside/10227695/

Max Hoetzel

http://www.insidethehall.com/2014/06/10/freshman-focus-max-hoetzel/

Today he landed an extremely late 2014 recruit. With fall classes starting in less than a week, Crean got a commitment from a 6'7" player from New York named Emmitt Holt. He had a nice high school career, but was not considered by anyone to be a high major recruit. He only got a couple offers from lower mid-majors while in high school. Then, in an unusual move, he decided to play an extra season of AAU ball after he graduated from high school to try to get some better offers. He did get more offers, but they were still not what he wanted. Then he was all set to go to a prep school this fall, hoping to get some better offers, when Crean, still desperate for players with size, swooped in and offered him a scholarship to Indiana. According to this article, Crean apparently believes he could "blow up" into a high major player at prep school and wanted to land him before he does.

http://nextuprecruits.com/2014/08/18/emmitt-holt-is-proving-to-be-a-high-major-player-article-video/

[tornado]

Crean was counting on landing another solid kid, an Oregon decommit, named Ray Kosongo but Kosongo was denied admission for some academic reason...

[SycamoreFanatic]

Crean was counting on landing a solid kid, an Oregon decommit, named Ray Kosongo but Kosongo was denied admission for some academic reason...

Crean does less with more than most any coach in "Merica".

[tornado]

In one sense I do agree - when Crean gets the top players...
like when he landed Dwyane Wade at MU and when he had Cody Zeller & Oladipo -
then he gets a lot from them and they help the team to a successful year...

But Crean had has a tendency to use a lot of scholarships up on terribly overrated and talentless players (Bawa Muniru, Tijan Jobe, Capobianco, Elston, Michel, Etherington, Jurkin, Perea, Fisher, Hartmen..)

I know every coach gets a dud once in a while but almost all those players were guys that everyone but Crean saw miles in advance were going to be flops....
He's sitting right smack dab in the middle of the best college basketball hotbed in the USA - he needs to land more than one stud every 5-7 years as the fan base is getting pretty restless.

[Da Coach]

Here is another unusual late recruit-
Michigan Head Coach John Beilein just got a transfer from Division III Williams College.
Duncan Robinson is a 6'8" forward who just completed his freshman year playing for the Williams College Ephs and averaged 17.1 ppg and 6.5 rpg.
He will have to sit out next season, but will then have 3 years of eligibility at Michigan.

http://espn.go.com/mens-college-basketball/story/_/id/11460487/duncan-robinson-transfers-michigan-wolverines

BTW, the nickname Ephs (pronounced "Eefs") is so unusual and unique, I had to look up what it means. Williams College, one of the oldest colleges in the US, was founded in 1793 with funds bequeathed by Colonel Ephraim Williams, a Colonel in the Massachusetts militia. Thus the nickname "Ephs" was derived from the founder's first name. They refer to the athletes on their men's teams as "Ephmen", and women's teams are called "Ephwomen".
Their mascot is the Purple Cow.

http://ephsports.williams.edu/why_ephs-_purple-_and_purple_cows

[tornado]

Here is another unusual late recruit-
Michigan Head Coach John Beilein just got a transfer from Division III Williams College.
Duncan Robinson is a 6'8" forward who just completed his freshman year playing for the Williams College Ephs and averaged 17.1 ppg and 6.5 rpg.
He will have to sit out next season, but will then have 3 years of eligibility at Michigan....

this turned out to be a pretty good move for Beilein...
After sitting out 2014-15 Duncan Robinson was a key player at Michigan this season, starting most games, playing 28 mpg, averaging 11 ppg and hitting 46% from the arc & 94% from the FT line.

He's a 6-7 wing who played 4 years of high school ball at Governor's Academy in Byfield, MA (enrollment 400), then played a 5th year at Phillips Exeter Academy (Private Prep schools, enrollment 1000).
Then chose DIII Williams College when he had no DI offers.

Wonder how many DIII kids have made the jump to DI and been successful.
One other interesting thing is that his coach at Williams College also made the jump to Division I (Marist)! How many times does a DI school hire a DIII coach?

http://www.iberkshires.com/story/47848/Former-Williams-Basketball-Coach-Settling-in-at-Marist.html

[Da Coach]

...
Wonder how many DIII kids have made the jump to DI and been successful.

There have been a few. Jimmy Gavin is an example this year. He transferred from Division III Wisconsin-Parkside, and was a star at Winthrop.

One similar example from the Missouri Valley- maybe some will recall Matt Schneiderman, who played at Northern Iowa way back in 2002-03 and 2003-04. He was an All-MVC player for UNI. He started and played his first 2 seasons at Morningside College in Sioux City, Iowa, a tiny NAIA school, then transferred and played for Greg McDermott at Northern Iowa..

[tornado]

First -- UW-Parkside is Division II

http://www.parksiderangers.com/sports/2016/3/7/2016-ncaa-division-ii-midwest-regional.aspx?id=334

and Jimmy went as a grad transfer - so as we all know, he didn't transfer for athletics - he just finished his degree program at UW-Parkside then chose Winthrop for his graduate degree - so he had instant eligibility.

And Schneidermann was a DII to DI transfer also - he was at Morningside when they were DII - but when they changed classifications in 2001, he chose to leave and go to UNI (he did have to sit out a year)

http://wcfcourier.com/sports/local/schneiderman-s-shot-invaluable-for-uni/article_a7cb7fc1-eb39-545f-9434-87f262025f9b.html