the problem is the way colleges recruit kids is fundamentally flawed. our entire grassroots system stinks. kids today have more individual and athletic skill and ability than ever before... problem is very few actually know how to use that in a team setting because they've been brought up in a culture where AAU is more important than school ball.
but those are the kids who get "ranked" and rated... and colleges are sooooo stoked on being able to say that they had a great recruiting class, based on the number of ranked players they get, and they completely miss out on kids who actually know how to play. these kids go to the mid-majors and below.
so it plays out pretty much like this... the elite basketball powerhouses get the best of the best... the no-brainer, i don't need to scout this kid 80 times to tell how good he is kids. they always have, they always will. these are the kids who are ranked 1 & 2 in their class. they almost always go to a select group of 7 or 8 schools. the occasional kid will stay close to home (your blake griffins), but the majority go to the same old powerhouses... duke, carolina, kansas, uconn, michigan state, florida, ucla and where ever john calipari is handing out bags of money.
then you have the rest of the power conference teams fighting over the rest of the "top 100" ranked kids... how some of these kids got on the list, i have no idea. but if you're on the list, someone will recruit you. if you're not, nobody will. these are your "other" teams in the power/BCS conference schools.
then you have the mid-majors. the smart schools recruit to fit their style, and hope that they'll get a steal here and there from a local kid who goes under recruited for whatever reason. if they do a good enough job recruiting, building and developing, they can eventually move their program into that gray area between the high-mid-major and the power conference teams... where they still can't get the cream of the crop kids that the unc's and duke's of the world stockpile, but they can certainly steal kids away from the next level of kids that would normally only consider the power conference schools. these are your butlers, gonzagas, xaviers, etc.
the stupid mid-major schools throw shit a the wall and hope it sticks, grab flash in the pan kids who had a nice run at the peach jam or iS8 and hope he turns into a stud. they usually just blow. see fordham.
so now you look at the tournament field of 16, and who do we have left?
Ohio State, Kentucky, Marquette, UNC, Duke, Arizona, UConn, San Diego State, Kansas, Richmond, VCU, FSU, Butler, Wisconsin, BYU, Florida.
we've got 6 of the elite programs still alive & 5 mid-majors.
the other 5... ohio state, marquette, arizona, florida state, wisconsin... ohio state is nearing that elite status thanks to a nice run of success over the past 10 years combined with oodles and oodles of money for their athletic department... arizona used to be one of the elite schools when lute olsen was there and still have a good rep... florida state has a ton of cash... wisconsin has a terrific coach who gets a lot out of a little... marquette's built themselves up a nice rep since they had diane wade.
but the 5 mid-major schools... butler, byu, san diego state, richmond, vcu... all programs loaded with under recruited kids. jimmer is the poster child for the under recruited. not a single big east school seriously recruited him. syracuse had a small flirting with him, but that's it. nobody else even said hello. he just wasn't athletic enough to play at that level. he'd make a nice low major player, but in reality he's probably a high D3 player. bullshit... i saw that kid play. he could flat fill it up from anywhere on the court.
there's a kid who was a senior at holy cross high school in the queens this year who was at the top of the city catholic league in scoring, first team all conference, can flat fill it up. not one single offer from any of the top area schools. nada. zilch. hofstra hasn't even offered him. apparently he can't play at that level. put up huge numbers against the kids who were recruited, but he can't play. he's not "athletic" or "long" enough.
pisses me off.
