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PostPosted: Fri Sep 07, 2007 1:20 pm 
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Weber looking for native son

Bruce Weber is looking for a recruiter, preferably a native of Illinois.

It's important to get a person who will sell Illinois, who has a passion for Illinois and can create a good relationship with Chicago-area coaches and throughout the state, the Illinois coach said Thursday, a day after losing assistant Tracy Webster to a similar job at Kentucky.

Webster, a native of south suburban Harvey, had been recruiting forward Darius Miller of Mason County, Ky., for Illinois, which is competing with Kentucky and others.

Weber said Webster told him he felt the move would help him improve his résumé and bring him closer to his goal of being a head coach.

Webster's move comes at a difficult time for Illinois, with recruiting re-opening next week. Illinois has no commitments from the high school class of '08 and has two scholarships to give. Illinois also is talking to 6-foot-5-inch forward Mario Little, a Chicago Washington graduate who's at Chipola (Fla.) Junior College.

Weber said Thursday he might not use both scholarships this year if the right prospects aren't there.


So, it would appear, for once, Tall Midget is correct about something. Illinois' BB recruiting is in shambles and remains there. It is beyond comprehension that they have 2 scholies and no one to give them to.

Also, I saw an item last week that a couple of the guys we were targeting were also considering NIU, Miami of Ohio, and some others. No offense to Musty Rob and the other NIU backers, but we should be targeting a higher caliber prospect. And, now we are losing our top recruiter in the Chicago area a week before recruiting opens up.

It's getting exceedingly more difficult to imagine us winning the 5 consecutive national championships that I had envisioned.


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PostPosted: Fri Sep 07, 2007 2:34 pm 
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Sorry... can't help. My school hasn't had a competitive B-Ball program in how many years? Oh I remember... NEVER!


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PostPosted: Fri Sep 07, 2007 2:47 pm 
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Illinois only targeted top caliber recruits. They had no backup plan so even players they could have had a good shot at, such as Lewis Jackson, from Decatur,IL chose to go elsewhere. It really is a mess recruiting wise there but Bruce Weber is probably a good enough coach to keep Illinois afloat through it. It's a shame because I really like Weber but he isn't long for Champaign. He will move down to a mid major and be successful there but I think his job security at Illinois is beyond repair unless he finds a way to shock everyone and win the Big Ten this year.

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PostPosted: Fri Sep 07, 2007 2:56 pm 
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I agree. My original comment should have read we should be "landing" more top caliber guys rather than "targeting".

His biggest problem is he is missing his "targets". Maybe this massive 2007 class will be more special than they appear to be on paper.

I still think he is an excellent coach - he just hasn't capitalized on the national exposure the team received during the Brown/Williams/Head era and it's disappointing.


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PostPosted: Fri Sep 07, 2007 3:43 pm 
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Excellent coaches recruit good players and make them better, sometimes great players. When was the last time you saw Wisconsin hit it big with a top notch recruit. Get'm in, coach'm up and win!

Don't bitch about how you got screwed by a rival coach or how tough it is to recruit.

Player play, Coaches coach and good coaches make good players better!


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PostPosted: Fri Sep 07, 2007 3:56 pm 
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Badger Vince wrote:
Excellent coaches recruit good players and make them better, sometimes great players. When was the last time you saw Wisconsin hit it big with a top notch recruit. Get'm in, coach'm up and win!

Don't bitch about how you got screwed by a rival coach or how tough it is to recruit.

Player play, Coaches coach and good coaches make good players better!


I'm not going to bitch about being screwed...anymore.

I don't want him to make good players better. I want him to make great players superlative.

You're not going to find a more strident supporter of Bruce Weber around here than me. But, his continued lack of ability to get the kids that he IS targeting is disappointing.

He's not getting kids that HE feels are the ones he wants and he is having to settle for his own second choices and I think that's a problem. Illinois has a tremendous track record the past decade or so of success in the Big Ten and I don't think we are currently capitalizing on it.

I hope to hell he can make good players better and I think he can. My point is that he shouldn't have to.


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PostPosted: Fri Sep 07, 2007 4:07 pm 
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I need to run that theory past Bo Ryan. I think you can get a greay deal out of good players and you don't always need to have the big recruits to be successful.


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PostPosted: Fri Sep 07, 2007 4:14 pm 
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You don't need them. But, it sure doesn't hurt.

I'd rather have them than not. I've espoused the "get good players for four years and let them develop together and be cohesive" mentality for quite a while under the Bruce Weber regime.

I think you can have very good teams with that approach but you usually need at least one top-line guy to get you to the "great" stage. Deron Williams was that guy for us to go along with Brown, Powell, and Augustine.

We should have had opportunities to get at least one "top-line" guy like that based on the national exposure of the Final Four team and we got nothing out of it. It was a waste of opportunity. That's my only point.


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PostPosted: Fri Sep 07, 2007 4:26 pm 
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Badger Vince wrote:
I need to run that theory past Bo Ryan. I think you can get a greay deal out of good players and you don't always need to have the big recruits to be successful.


Wisconsin has had some very good teams, but unless you have that superstar player, you aren't going to go very far. Highly recruited players are much more likely to become superstar players. Bo Ryan is probably a better coach, but Thad Matta is having more success than Bo Ryan since Matta joined the league. Tom Izzo is a good coach, but he also has some very good players to work with.

Gene Keady was a good game coach but an average recruiter at best. He was able to have consistently good teams and make decent runs in the NCAA tournament but he also had a lot of failures in the tournament. Wisconsin has been great in the Big Ten, but besides a final four and an elite 8 appearance, they have failed to produce in the NCAA tournament.

Recruiting is incredibly important, but a great coach can overcome it to a point.

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PostPosted: Fri Sep 07, 2007 4:32 pm 
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On a complete side note, Rick, I told one of my kids,

"You don't talk to me like that!"

...last night. I about started busting out laughing. I was thisclose to yelling "I drive a DODGE STRATUS!!"

I love that skit.


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PostPosted: Fri Sep 07, 2007 4:49 pm 
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That's awesome. I can't wait until I have kids I can yell at. All my discipline strategies will come from Will Ferrell.

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PostPosted: Fri Sep 07, 2007 5:03 pm 
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I got a big day tomorrow. Actually, a pretty nice little Saturday, we're going to go to Home Depot. Yeah, buy some wallpaper, maybe get some flooring, stuff like that. Maybe Bed, Bath, & Beyond, I don't know, I don't know if we'll have enough time.


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