Just a follow up about Coach Weber and the Illinois team. Weber tried to clarify his earlier comments. http://espn.go.com/chicago/ncb/story/_/id/7586669/illinois-coach-bruce-weber-says-resign
Perhaps this should go on a different thread, but there is an Illinois connection so here it is. This article gives examples of top players from Chicago and the entire state that went out of state to play basketball. Illinois and Depaul have dropped in stature over recent years at the same time they were missing out on top in-state talent. Moral of the story for MSU on a smaller scale is keep the local talent home! http://espn.go.com/blog/chicago/colleges/post/_/id/5453/top-100-hits-misses-of-illinois-depaul
My thoughts are that a kid who learned to play the game on the street or local playground, learn to play the game with toughness and without officials. There, tougher players win! Smaller players like guards learn to use their quickness to score over bigger players at a young age and develop a quick shot release because they have to! If they could not score, no one selected them to be on their team, so developing the ability to score becomes a have to, to play. No sure that in our area as many kids develop the game with as much game toughness as in the intercity playgrounds. Most great guards come from where they have had to build their game around a very physical system where they get hammered often and just have to get up and give it back. As a great coach once said, when they took the games out of the streeets and organize them with officials in nice facilities, they took great player development out of the game. A lot of kids do not devlop a good quick release shot anymore because they do not have to, to score. Just my thoughts.
Keep the local talent home only if you cannot get something better elsewhere. Bring in the best talent you can, end of story.
I am thinking of Norman and Ruder from the Nixa team. Norman is getting serious attention from the top programs all over the country. Can MSU win a recruiting battle against Kansas and Duke for a Chicago kid? Probably not without some non-basketball influence being a factor. If the player is not from the south side of Chicago, but south of Springfield, MSU in some cases has an ace they can "play". No guarantee that the blue chip player would decide to stay near home, but the convenience for his family to attend games and being able to enjoy a meal prepared by "mom" might carry the recruiting day with some talented players. That is what I am talking about-----get the local kids that KU or Arizona or Tennessee wants to sign.
I do not claim to know anything about where recruiting stands with Norman or other players, but there are a lot of lists of schools that are supposedly interested in him. I do not see a list like this when I pull up players MSU has signed or is supposedly actively recruiting. Is there any player you can name that has this kind of interest as a junior? http://rivals.yahoo.com/ncaa/basketball/recruiting/player-Jalen-Norman-117984
