Top 50 HS Basketball recruits vs the Portal

[muwarrior69]

This is just for college basketball:

Is it easier to land players from the portal than recruiting top 50 HS recruits? Are the top 50 HS recruits better players than players coming off the portal?

Do the top 50 HS players get better NIL/Revenue sharing deal than portal players?

Should Marquette spend the money on at least one Top 50 HS recruit or a portal player for each class to be competitive?

[GoldenEagles03]

It would be easier for Marquette to add good players from the portal than it would be to get Top 50 recruits from highschool. Those guys still chase the brands.

Shaka has already admitted that they have had players and agents reach out during the portal window wanting to play for Marquette. They just don't want to get into bidding wars.

[Galway Eagle]

Historically I'm not sure that pans out for a great freshman team... using 247 here's our historical top 50 guys:

Vander
JJJ
Dawson Garcia
Joey Hauser
Henry Ellanson
Deonte Burton
Markus Howard

Would you take that team to battle? As freshmen not what they developed into

[panda]

Shaka is rubbing two sticks together while everyone else is camping with zippo lighters and propane.

There is no magic bullet to a recruiting mix, but you find kids in HS, sell them your program and set a baseline level of 2 year, three year and then four year expectations for them given their wants/needs. If they don't work out, it is abundantly clear that we're running a high level program, not a charity and we will bring in more players to compete if you can't.

It doesn't matter if those players are high school or college transfers, but a coach needs to maintain a level of expectation with his players. If he's not holding them accountable for growth, he is no longer a responsible leader.

[Silkk the Shaka]

Shaka is rubbing two sticks together while everyone else is camping with zippo lighters and propane.
 

LOL great analogy

[The Equalizer]

The most disappointing thing is that Shaka's history at Texas showed he was able to land the top 50 guys that our prior coaches were never able to turn the corner on.

I don't buy the excuse that it's that we're not a P4 program. St. Johns, UConn, Villanova, Creighton, Georgetown are all regularly brining in top 50 players. We don't have to be in the B10 or ACC to land such players.

And I don't buy the idea that we're not "a brand". With a willingness to hire from another high-major program, a pair of recent high seeds, league and conference tournament success, storied history, an NBA arena with top 15 attendance, there is no reason why our brand isn't as strong as any team (save possibly UConn) in the Big East.

Instead, we recruit like we're Seton Hall or Providence (or G*d forbit Dayton or SLU) and hope for results like UConn or St. Johns or Villanova.

At some point in time, the realization sinks in that you can't have sustained success with overlooked and underrecruited players. Once in a generation you get a Tyler Kolek or an Oso Ighadoro or a Dwyane Wade. 

I'm done believing that Shaka has some innate skill at either predicting future player development or that he has a systemic system that can turn the borderline top 100 into Naismith candidates. For every player you think is the next Kolek you get equal or greater chance he's the next Emarion Ellis. For every guy you think will develop like Ighadoro, you get an equal chance he develops like Hamilton or an Itejere.

Let those unranked players and sub-100 players go to a low- or mid-major. *IF* they develop, they'll be on the market in a year or two and you can get them from the portal.  If they don't, you're not wasting your program's dollars supporting them for several years or trying to compete in the Big East with players that have no business starting at a program like Marquette.

[Billy Hoyle]

Let those unranked players and sub-100 players go to a low- or mid-major. *IF* they develop, they'll be on the market in a year or two and you can get them from the portal.  If they don't, you're not wasting your program's dollars supporting them for several years or trying to compete in the Big East with players that have no business starting at a program like Marquette.

this right here is the reality of college recruiting today. Mid-majors are a farm system for high majors, which we are. A friend is a mid-major coach and joked to me before last season, "I brought in six freshmen to develop for high majors." Three of them are at high majors after one season.

Look at our conference. Creighton did pretty well with Schierman from South Dakota State and Ashworth from Utah State; Xavier with Boum from UTEP via San Francisco; St. John's with Luis from UMass and Scott from UNT; and the season before that, Jenkins from Iona. And let's not forget about that Kolek kid from George Mason.

And speaking of Iona, Florida brought in Clayton, Jr. from Iona, and he was the tourney MOP.