The reality is that each year so far at MU Shaka has gone after some higher profile, highly rated, and sometimes even five-star players, not able to land them, and quickly and quietly moved on to someone else (aka Plan B). That doesn't make Shaka a bad coach or recruiter--but it also means he doesn't have some unicorn recruiting strategy of zeroing in on unknown players early in the recruit cycle--he's following the same pattern as just about every D1 coach.

For example, in the class of '24, it's great that Shaka landed Pahram (#83 in 247's rankings), Owens (#65), and Clark (#200).  But Shaka also offered for example, Joson Sanon (#22) and Kon Knuppel (#17).  And to suggest that Shaka passed on Sanon and Knuppel (after offering them, no less!) because they didn't fit with his culture is as ridiculous sounding as Bo cooling on a particular recruit.

Even all the board excitement over Joshua Clark belies the fact that we had previously offered #110 ranked 6'11" Josh Hill.  Again, great the Shaka got the commitment, and I hope Clark develops into a Big East quality center.  But I don't believe that Shaka pulled Hills' offer because he saw Clark coming down the pike.

Like just about every college coach, Shaka recruits (and offers) a number of players, including many that are highly rated.  Like most other coaches doesn't always land his first choices.  Admitting that isn't a sign of gloom and doom.

I agree that education is way out of control. I have voiced my concerns repeatedly to Marquette's leaders (since they are, after all, my alma mater). Falls on deaf ears.

Jesmu:

Enjoy your's too.

But if you're the age I think you are, you never lived through double digit inflation AND 19 percent interest rates and had to figure out how to deal with it. You have no idea what I made in the late 1970s and early to mid-1980s. Ditto for my wife. Or what it costed then to make ends meet. I don't know what you make today either so comparisons are superfluous. But I would argue the challenges were not easy, then or now, for anyone.

Permit me to be a boomer for a moment but one of the things that's different today, particularly in housing, is expectations. Millennials and Xers likely would scoff at what we bought for our first home. It was small, put together on the cheap and we loved it. Thought we were going to spend the rest of our life there. It was our's, no matter what the warts. To get it decently habitable, my now late Father-in-Law and late Mother-in-Law raced down from Dubuque to help us. They were incredible.

I don't claim Househunters on HGTV is representative of the market at large, but what I see there is obscene. Everybody wants 3,000 square feet, four bedrooms and an office, granite, white kitchens... etc. We would have loved that too but we saved and bought what was available.

Think about what goes into housing affordability for a moment. Building codes, land costs, the aforementioned market expectations, insurance costs and taxes. Yeup, even taxes! The market gives people what they want.

I agree that education is way out of control. I have voiced my concerns repeatedly to Marquette's leaders (since they are, after all, my alma mater). Falls on deaf ears.