Ncaa

[Da Coach]

But all 3 of those guys had offers from Illinois schools??¦.they chose not to take them.

There are many more examples other than the 3 I mentioned.

But those three-
The only D1 offer that I can find Bisping had from an Illinois school was SIUE, just about as low as you can get other than Chicago State. All other Illinois schools whiffed on him. Our coaching staff laughed at the idea of recruiting him and felt he was not D1 material, and they had a lot of people recommending to them that they recruit Bisping. He would have been our best big man the last 3-4 years if he'd have come to Bradley.

Same with Peters. Many people recommended Bradley go after him. Peters wanted to come to Bradley, but again, our staff felt he was not athletic enough to play for them and never showed any interest. Valpo just wanted him more and made him their top priority recruiting, while probably the other Illinois schools recruiting him just didn't show enough of that kind of interest. Not all "offers" are the same.

I believe Church could play for any Illinois school, including U of I. But somehow they all missed on him. Church reportedly picked Missouri State because they wanted him more than the Illinois schools did, and he was given the opportunity to play right away as a freshman and not red-shirt.

These guys, and many others, all left the state. Maybe there were a couple of them who wanted to play outside of Illinois, but that is not the reason most of the Illinois kids leave Illinois. It has mostly to do with poor programs, and coaches who are lousy at evaluating talent and recruiting.

[lefty]

There are many more examples other than the 3 I mentioned.

But those three-
The only D1 offer that I can find Bisping had from an Illinois school was SIUE, just about as low as you can get other than Chicago State. All other Illinois schools whiffed on him. Our coaching staff laughed at the idea of recruiting him and felt he was not D1 material, and they had a lot of people recommending to them that they recruit Bisping. He would have been our best big man the last 3-4 years if he'd have come to Bradley.

Same with Peters. Many people recommended Bradley go after him. Peters wanted to come to Bradley, but again, our staff felt he was not athletic enough to play for them and never showed any interest. Valpo just wanted him more and made him their top priority recruiting, while probably the other Illinois schools recruiting him just didn't show enough of that kind of interest. Not all "offers" are the same.

I believe Church could play for any Illinois school, including U of I. But somehow they all missed on him. Church reportedly picked Missouri State because they wanted him more than the Illinois schools did, and he was given the opportunity to play right away as a freshman and not red-shirt.

These guys, and many others, all left the state. Maybe there were a couple of them who wanted to play outside of Illinois, but that is not the reason most of the Illinois kids leave Illinois. It has mostly to do with poor programs, and coaches who are lousy at evaluating talent and recruiting.

I'm not disagreeing with you DC....we did go after Church didn't we?


And Geno was all over Taphorn instead of Peters.......they both had some good offers


Lots of folks missed on Bisping because his offers weren't all that impressive really....and just because someone is doing well somewhere doesn't they would have done well here either.....there are a lot of moving parts to consider

[Da Coach]

...How is it the former staff saw their potential and was recruiting them then the next guys dropped the ball like a hot potato/

The same can be said for guys like Remy Abell and Fred Van Vleet.
Remy still wanted to come to Bradley after the coaching change, but the new staff was not high on him and were happy to let him out of his commitment and felt they could do better.

And this has been mentioned before- Bradley was also recruiting Fred Van Vleet in 2010-11 until the coaching change, then the new coaches felt he was not athletic enough and dropped him. I have heard the story directly from Willie Scott. Willie was primarily involved in recruiting FVV, and stayed on as an assistant another year after the coaching change. He had a great relationship with Van Vleet and his family, and pleaded with Geno to offer him. He believes FVV would have committed to Bradley. But that didn't happen, and FVV blew up over that summer and fall of 2011, and committed to Wichita State his senior year. Just one of way too many "recruiting misses".

BTW, This can easily be verified- I am sure Willie would be happy to talk to any fan or anyone in the media about this. But our media did everything they could to heap accolades on the former staff and protect them against criticism, so not surprisingly, they never reported things like this.

[lefty]

The same can be said for guys like Remy Abell and Fred Van Vleet.
Remy still wanted to come to Bradley after the coaching change, but the new staff was not high on him and were happy to let him out of his commitment and felt they could do better.

And this has been mentioned before- Bradley was also recruiting Fred Van Vleet in 2010-11 until the coaching change, then the new coaches felt he was not athletic enough and dropped him. I have heard the story directly from Willie Scott. Willie was primarily involved in recruiting FVV, and stayed on as an assistant another year after the coaching change. He had a great relationship with Van Vleet and his family, and pleaded with Geno to offer him. He believes FVV would have committed to Bradley. But that didn't happen, and FVV blew up over that summer and fall of 2011, and committed to Wichita State his senior year. Just one of way too many "recruiting misses".

BTW, This can easily be verified- I am sure Willie would be happy to talk to any fan or anyone in the media about this. But our media did everything they could to heap accolades on the former staff and protect them against criticism, so not surprisingly, they never reported things like this.

Geno missed on quite a few for sure.....which wouldn't bother me so much if we could have developed some of they guys we did get.....but really none of them got better while here either

[tornado]

there was some "meddling" from higher up that handcuffed Geno tho not as much as there was the few years prior to Geno...so in all honesty, Geno did have a couple handicaps while recruiting...
But his tendency - especially on big men like Chris Blake & Jermaine Morgan, to tremendously overstate their athleticism, their scoring prowess, and their boundless "motor" - really hurt us more than anything else.
Funny how even tho Dave Reynolds & Kirk Wessler actually sat in on practices and workouts - echoed Geno's tremendous misjudgement & overstating of talent as well.
Those guys wrote at least four columns touting our big men under Geno (Shaw, Blake, Morgan..) as tremendous talent & depth that had no equal all the way back to the David Thirdkill/Donald Reese, Mitchell Anderson era, and likened the recruiting classes with those guys as being on par with the classes that contained Deon Jackson, Marcus Pollard, Anthony Parker, Cellus, Zach Andrews and Patrick O'Bryant! Talent, depth, strength, athleticism, leadership, etc...all were said to be the best it had ever been in their lifetimes

- all of which most of us sensible fans could readily see was insane & turned out in reality to have been 100% wrong.

[Da Coach]

Thursday games-

http://espn.go.com/mens-college-basketball/scoreboard

Other than a couple minor upsets by #9 seeds over #8 seeds, there was 2 upsets so far, both by #12 seeds over #5 seeds-
#12 Yale beat #5 Baylor 79-75-

http://espn.go.com/mens-college-basketball/boxscore?gameId=400871276

#12 Arkansas-Little Rock beat #5 Purdue 85-83-

http://espn.go.com/mens-college-basketball/boxscore?gameId=400871264

[Da Coach]

Wichita State still didn't shoot well from outside (just 3-20 from three), but their defense helped force 19 Arizona turnovers, and they won 65-55-

http://espn.go.com/mens-college-basketball/boxscore?gameId=400871273

All NCAA scores from Thursday-

http://espn.go.com/mens-college-basketball/scoreboard

[tornado]

Former Bradley recruits in the NCAA

-Max Bielfeldt scored 10 pts/7 rebs in 19 minutes Thursday - they face Kentucky Saturday

-Nick Zeisloft (not sure if he was a BU recruit) but he started for IU and had 3-5 from the arc, 9 pts

-Kyle Kuzma of Utah - started, 6 pts, 2 rebs

-Jamari Traylor (BU once targeted him) is a fairly deep sub for Kansas - was scoreless Thurs.

-Iowa's Christian Williams - Iowa plays today, averages 1.2 ppg

-Tevin King (3.7 ppg) & George Marshall (14.9 ppg) of South Dakota State - they play today

-CUSA's champion, MTSU's Aldonis Foote (2.8 ppg) from Peoria Central - plays today

-Purdue's Johnny Hill (again- not sure if BU recruited him) got 4 pts in Purdue's loss

-Remy Abell of Xavier - plays today

-Warren Jones (Green Bay), Josh Cunningham (Dayton), Brady Ernst (Iowa), Caris Levert (Michigan), Peyton Allen (Wichita State) are all on rosters of NCAA teams but currently not playing or redshirting.

-In NIT - Alec Peters had 26pts (9/14fg), 9rebs in win over Florida State


I'm sure there's more - let me know who I mighta missed

[tornado]

Hawaii with Roderick Bobbitt is schooling Cal - one of the teams that some had going all the way!


as was Oklahoma's Dinjiyl Walker -
Walker doesn't play a lot and averages 3.7 ppg...
he's in the NCAA but had he gone midmajor he'd have sure played a bunch more - considering he's stuck playing the same position a couple notches behind the premier shooting guard in the nation Buddy Hield

http://www.bradleyfans.com/vb/showthread.php?t=23901

Here's a tweet about Bradley transfer (to Dayton) Josh Cunningham
"Bradley transfer Josh Cunningham said he's
100 percent after knee and shoulder surgeries.
Will be able to play next season for Flyers."

https://twitter.com/DavidPJablonski/status/710903846600507392

[bigjimmy]

WINNER WINNER CHICKEN DINNER! Paul Jesperson made a half court shot at the buzzer to help UNI beat Texas 75-72. MO VALLEY 3-0 BABY!

[valleyclimber]

MVC is now 3-0, while the Big12 is 3-4. Feel really bad for UE as they got screwed on not getting an invite to the NIT. Think the Aces could have rolled in the NIT.

ROCK IT VALLEY!!

[tornado]

congrats to UNI!

[AZ BU Fan]

The Big Dance

The NCAA Men"s BB Tourney is the best post season playoff of all sports. Perfect blend of action, heroics, suspense, excitement, emotion... Has it all...

[Da Coach]

It has been fun watching. Lots of great games, and I love the upsets.

Right now, Wichita State is trailing Miami 32-19 at halftime, after Miami lead by as many as 21 points.

http://espn.go.com/mens-college-basketball/boxscore?gameId=400872163

They need to start making shots and get their defense going. Miami shot 60% in the 1st half (12-20). WSU shot just 24% (7-29). Baker & Van Vleet are 3-13 so far, and 1-6 from three.

[Da Coach]

Wichita vs. Miami was another fantastic game. After falling behind by 21 points midway through the first half, Wichita State started to slowly climb back. Midway through the 2nd half, they finally took their first and only lead 43-42. But then both teams traded clutch baskets, until Miami pulled ahead and held on in the final couple minutes as WSU made a couple turnovers and missed shots, and was forced to foul. Great season for the Shockers.
Final score- Miami 65 WSU 57

http://espn.go.com/mens-college-basketball/playbyplay?gameId=400872163