Vanderbilt transfer Payton Willis just verbally committed to Minnesota

...recruiting is much tougher that fans can imagine...

I really appreciate your perspective, but I've been waiting for someone to come with the, we need to feel sorry for Pitino because his job is hard. The next stage of that will be, you can't expect anyone to be able to get the really good players to come to the U.

I realize it's only five years in, but at this moment in time Richard is the only head coach going back to before Musselman (excluding interim coaches) who hasn't snagged a five star-caliber or McDonalds All-American recruit. And this in an era of an unprecedented number of that caliber of player being developed locally. And Pitino being someone who was hired in spite of his inexperience due to a belief that he'd be a whiz bang recruiter and get one of the number of anticipated local 5-stars to enroll here.

So yes, recruiting is hard - whether you're talking about high schoolers or transfers - but that's why he and his peers make the big bucks. The weather - which has only gotten warmer since before Muss - is the lamest of excuses, and anyone making it should be made to go spend a summer at UT-Austin and see how they like it.
 

I really appreciate your perspective, but I've been waiting for someone to come with the, we need to feel sorry for Pitino because his job is hard. The next stage of that will be, you can't expect anyone to be able to get the really good players to come to the U.

I realize it's only five years in, but at this moment in time Richard is the only head coach going back to before Musselman (excluding interim coaches) who hasn't snagged a five star-caliber or McDonalds All-American recruit. And this in an era of an unprecedented number of that caliber of player being developed locally. And Pitino being someone who was hired in spite of his inexperience due to a belief that he'd be a whiz bang recruiter and get one of the number of anticipated local 5-stars to enroll here.

So yes, recruiting is hard - whether you're talking about high schoolers or transfers - but that's why he and his peers make the big bucks. The weather - which has only gotten warmer since before Muss - is the lamest of excuses, and anyone making it should be made to go spend a summer at UT-Austin and see how they like it.

Tubby never got a five star- although he signed Royce who never set foot on court. Rodney was a 4 star I think? Monson got two five stars in Rickert and Humphreys but no one would say that Monson was as good of a recruiter as Pitino. Things have changed with the one and done situation where these kids (Trent and the two Jones bros) got Duke offers and they know they could be one and done out of there. Hump went down to Duke and coach K wasn't going to feature him and he was outta there and back home. Did Haskins ever get a 5 star? Voshon was ranked top 50 range.

Pitino has now nailed three very solid classes and I believe he can do it year in an year out here if he gets enough success in the coming year to stay on long term. That's the secret to success here. Stay through the ups and downs. Wait until Pitino has success to sell- the classes will get better and better.
 

This thread is a joke. For those who are bashing this move, how about we wait to see how the other two scholarships are used? I'm sure the kid will be a fine player, sit-out transfers are common, and it's not that big of a deal. I just don't understand why so many posters on here feel the need to be pessimistic and negative about Gopher basketball.. in mid-April!!

There are so many people on this board who pretend to know what is in the best interest of the team. The fact that Pitino has been active and many kids have mentioned the Gophers showing interest in them is enough to convince me that the guy is doing his job. He may not always deliver the preferred player, but at least we're not continuously signing Konate and Diedhiou type players. I'm happy with the caliber of recruit that Pitino has brought in up to this point, and I'll wait to judge Willis until after I've seen him play a few games.
 

Tubby never got a five star- although he signed Royce who never set foot on court. Rodney was a 4 star I think? Monson got two five stars in Rickert and Humphreys but no one would say that Monson was as good of a recruiter as Pitino. Things have changed with the one and done situation where these kids (Trent and the two Jones bros) got Duke offers and they know they could be one and done out of there. Hump went down to Duke and coach K wasn't going to feature him and he was outta there and back home. Did Haskins ever get a 5 star? Voshon was ranked top 50 range.

Pitino has now nailed three very solid classes and I believe he can do it year in an year out here if he gets enough success in the coming year to stay on long term. That's the secret to success here. Stay through the ups and downs. Wait until Pitino has success to sell- the classes will get better and better.

Agreed
 

Tubby never got a five star- although he signed Royce who never set foot on court. Rodney was a 4 star I think? Monson got two five stars in Rickert and Humphreys but no one would say that Monson was as good of a recruiter as Pitino. Things have changed with the one and done situation where these kids (Trent and the two Jones bros) got Duke offers and they know they could be one and done out of there. Hump went down to Duke and coach K wasn't going to feature him and he was outta there and back home. Did Haskins ever get a 5 star? Voshon was ranked top 50 range.

Pitino has now nailed three very solid classes and I believe he can do it year in an year out here if he gets enough success in the coming year to stay on long term. That's the secret to success here. Stay through the ups and downs. Wait until Pitino has success to sell- the classes will get better and better.

I would say that Monson was a better recruiter than Pitino so far. Snatching Rickert out from under Arizona with the sanctions looming? That was no mean feat. Pitino has done nothing like that yet. Monson's class of Rickert, Holman and Hargrow was better than any class Richard has landed. And even though Monson bombed out as a coach in the end, the roster he handed over to Smith was damn good. Smith deserves a lot of credit for coaching them up beyond what Dan was able to do.

I've thought about it, and if you're not going to give Tubby Smith credit for recruiting Royce White, then you have some sort of bias against Smith. The fact of the matter is that Smith signed White to play here, and he was on the verge of playing here had he not gotten in trouble.
 


I really appreciate your perspective, but I've been waiting for someone to come with the, we need to feel sorry for Pitino because his job is hard. The next stage of that will be, you can't expect anyone to be able to get the really good players to come to the U.

I realize it's only five years in, but at this moment in time Richard is the only head coach going back to before Musselman (excluding interim coaches) who hasn't snagged a five star-caliber or McDonalds All-American recruit. And this in an era of an unprecedented number of that caliber of player being developed locally. And Pitino being someone who was hired in spite of his inexperience due to a belief that he'd be a whiz bang recruiter and get one of the number of anticipated local 5-stars to enroll here.

So yes, recruiting is hard - whether you're talking about high schoolers or transfers - but that's why he and his peers make the big bucks. The weather - which has only gotten warmer since before Muss - is the lamest of excuses, and anyone making it should be made to go spend a summer at UT-Austin and see how they like it.

I do not feel sorry for R. Pitino, just pointed out that recruiting at the non blue blood programs is really tough. I think he has been a B as a recruiter and a D as a coach. Can not find anyone who did this poorly in a 5 year stretch at a power conference school that became great. With that said, i was in favor of his returning as i think in a down conference that his roster this year could be top 5. Will he win conference titles, conference tourney titles, that is the question. I leave out the NCAA because that is a crapshoot, very few schools win games every year in that tourney. I THINK ONLY 5 SCHOOLS HAVE A SREAK OF WINNING AT LEAST ONE GAME IN THE TOURNEY FOR 5 CONSECUTIVE YEARS ! As for 5 star players, it is strictly math. There are usually about 25 a year. After Duke and Kentucky take 4 each that leaves 17. After Kansas, UCLA, UNC, INDIANA, ARIZ., get theirs your down to 7-8. Lets say out of those that 6 of them have dream schools not named Minnesota and that leaves just a couple that everyone is fighting over. Further tons of 4 star kids out perform many of those 5 stars, stay longer. Some of the 3's out perform the 4's. Great evaluation is required, grades,ethics, personality and very critical is development. Jeter will be huge on fundamentals. Look at how few 5 star kids UW got during a tremendous run. Look at UVA dominating the ACC with one total 5 star, Until recently Villanova built with 4 star kids and great use of the redshirts. I can offer nothing on the recent transfer as i have not seen him in person but i do like that he will be a experienced junior. This program is not going to win that many recruiting battles against the top programs but there are really good players that you can get that can be developed over a 4-5 year career that win a ton of games.
 

I do not feel sorry for R. Pitino, just pointed out that recruiting at the non blue blood programs is really tough. I think he has been a B as a recruiter and a D as a coach. Can not find anyone who did this poorly in a 5 year stretch at a power conference school that became great. With that said, i was in favor of his returning as i think in a down conference that his roster this year could be top 5. Will he win conference titles, conference tourney titles, that is the question. I leave out the NCAA because that is a crapshoot, very few schools win games every year in that tourney. I THINK ONLY 5 SCHOOLS HAVE A SREAK OF WINNING AT LEAST ONE GAME IN THE TOURNEY FOR 5 CONSECUTIVE YEARS ! As for 5 star players, it is strictly math. There are usually about 25 a year. After Duke and Kentucky take 4 each that leaves 17. After Kansas, UCLA, UNC, INDIANA, ARIZ., get theirs your down to 7-8. Lets say out of those that 6 of them have dream schools not named Minnesota and that leaves just a couple that everyone is fighting over. Further tons of 4 star kids out perform many of those 5 stars, stay longer. Some of the 3's out perform the 4's. Great evaluation is required, grades,ethics, personality and very critical is development. Jeter will be huge on fundamentals. Look at how few 5 star kids UW got during a tremendous run. Look at UVA dominating the ACC with one total 5 star, Until recently Villanova built with 4 star kids and great use of the redshirts. I can offer nothing on the recent transfer as i have not seen him in person but i do like that he will be a experienced junior. This program is not going to win that many recruiting battles against the top programs but there are really good players that you can get that can be developed over a 4-5 year career that win a ton of games.

If it were me, I'd flip the grades around or add a third component: roster management. Imo Richard can coach. Nobody can coach when you are starting walk-ons in conference play. This past season, once again, he had no players once we got to the entire conference schedule. We were a Top 10 team with a healthy roster (even losing Curry-who was going to be a force) ..problem is we had no backups after losing a handful of other guys completely or who played injured. The year before Richard was Big Ten coach of the year when we stayed healthy but we still had no depth and when Springs got hurt we were done. Mason playing hurt sealed it with no depth.

So, Richard can coach when he has a healthy eligible roster, but that hasn't been often. This past season we didn't have people in numbers or health to even practice 5 on 5 effectively even if you dared to try for fear of injury or wearing the couple legit guys out.

Roster management, not coaching. Who you recruit...how many guys you have sitting out as transfers with guys you know shouldn't see the floor because you have recruits on the roster who didn't pan out. Gas, Bakary, Hurt, Fitz, once finally healthy etc

Richard Pitino can coach when he has the players he envisioned having available.
 


to bring is 6 newcomers (3 signees and 3 open) and have them all get their feet wet. We have 5 guys who absolutely will play a lot (Wash, MCB, Coffey, Murph and Curry) then Hurt and the 3 locals. We had to take at least one transfer. Now a graduate transfer and maybe JC guard to fill out.

Im not arguing against bringing in Willis. Im arguing that it was a good move. When you watch him play in a game he looks like a power 5 guard. His stats don't tell the story of his ability. I agree that we need to bring in either a grad or a jucco guy. It would be nice to get some experience off the bench.
 



If it were me, I'd flip the grades around or add a third component: roster management. Imo Richard can coach. Nobody can coach when you are starting walk-ons in conference play. This past season, once again, he had no players once we got to the entire conference schedule. We were a Top 10 team with a healthy roster (even losing Curry-who was going to be a force) ..problem is we had no backups after losing a handful of other guys completely or who played injured. The year before Richard was Big Ten coach of the year when we stayed healthy but we still had no depth and when Springs got hurt we were done. Mason playing hurt sealed it with no depth.

So, Richard can coach when he has a healthy eligible roster, but that hasn't been often. This past season we didn't have people in numbers or health to even practice 5 on 5 effectively even if you dared to try for fear of injury or wearing the couple legit guys out.

Roster management, not coaching. Who you recruit...how many guys you have sitting out as transfers with guys you know shouldn't see the floor because you have recruits on the roster who didn't pan out. Gas, Bakary, Hurt, Fitz, once finally healthy etc

Richard Pitino can coach when he has the players he envisioned having available.

There are tons of guys who can coach when everything goes right for them. The real coaching starts when you have to deal with adversity.
 

If it were me, I'd flip the grades around or add a third component: roster management. Imo Richard can coach. Nobody can coach when you are starting walk-ons in conference play. This past season, once again, he had no players once we got to the entire conference schedule. We were a Top 10 team with a healthy roster (even losing Curry-who was going to be a force) ..problem is we had no backups after losing a handful of other guys completely or who played injured. The year before Richard was Big Ten coach of the year when we stayed healthy but we still had no depth and when Springs got hurt we were done. Mason playing hurt sealed it with no depth.

So, Richard can coach when he has a healthy eligible roster, but that hasn't been often. This past season we didn't have people in numbers or health to even practice 5 on 5 effectively even if you dared to try for fear of injury or wearing the couple legit guys out.

Roster management, not coaching. Who you recruit...how many guys you have sitting out as transfers with guys you know shouldn't see the floor because you have recruits on the roster who didn't pan out. Gas, Bakary, Hurt, Fitz, once finally healthy etc

Richard Pitino can coach when he has the players he envisioned having available.

Your looking at last year, i am looking at all the years, total record. Remember, i am in favor of him still being here but there is zero evidence that he is in the top 8-9 in the conference. He has a historically poor record that looked ill even before last year.
 

Thanks for setting us straight on a message board. Can't believe how we were discussing roster, players, etc., on a basketball forum. Sometimes we just get so dumb. Thanks!

Prolly just a little negativity from the fact that this Minnesota winter may never end.
 




There are tons of guys who can coach when everything goes right for them. The real coaching starts when you have to deal with adversity.

So true Jay Wright, Coach K, and Bill Self dealt with so much adversity this year.... I'm not doing this as a bail out Pitino comment, but no one loses that much and still has a great year. I think we could've won a couple more than we did, but we were not going to be top 5 in the B10 after the injuries/scandals we had. I'd also argue that if Bakary or Gas were better, we may not have gotten Curry or Lynch. This critcizing of the roster's 10-12 guys is ridiculous. Kentucky's 10th guy is Caliparis son. Most teams don't go that deep with great talent.

I like any pick up of a 6'4 guard who can shoot threes. Lets go!!!
 




Top Bottom