Revisiting Big East Recruiting

[GumbyDamnit!]

Great job by SJU landing a quality player in Ponds. Congrats Johnnies fans.

There was much discussion a few years back about the nBE being able to recruit effectively over the long term. I recall a lot of "we'll have to wait and see but expect a major drop off" type comments (usually from people who are not true fans of the BE).

Well we've had several solid classes in a row, up and down the conference, and I think we can now answer emphatically that recruiting in the BE is not a problem.

Since 2013 (first class of the new conference) we've pulled in 36 Top 100 (ESPN) recruits, and the 2016 class is still in progress. That's roughly 10 a year or 1 per program per year. That is akin to asking the ACC, SEC and B1G to pull in 14-15 a year (which admittedly they mostly do as well). Point being we are recruiting as a major conference.

Those 36 players, broken out by team:

Marq. - 7
G'town - 6
Nova - 6
X - 5
SHU - 4
Prov - 3
SJU - 2
Butler - 1
Creighton - 1
DePaul - 1

What's interesting though is looking at how players were ranked then and how you might rank them now. Take the 2013 recruiting class as an example. Ranked in order on the ESPN 100:

Jordan - SJU
J. Johnson - Marq
Burton - Marq
Du Wilson - Marq
Austin - Prov.
Cammeron - G'town
Jenkins - Nova
Randolph - X
Sina - SHU
Hart - Nova
Garrett Jr. - DeP

I would think that the two lowest ranked players in that class have made the biggest impact in the league. So while rankings might serve as a decent measure of talent coming in to a program, we have to remember that some of these kids have peaked and some have a LOT more room to develop and flourish. Exhibit A: Darrun Hilliard was ranked # 163 in his recruiting class, and Ricardo Ledo and Brandon Austin never stepped foot on the court at the Dunk (not trying to put down our PC brethren, just trying to make a point how inexact recruiting can sometimes be in predicting the overall success of a player).

[stever20]

you would have to take the 2013 class out of the equation.

2016 class- starts Nov 2016- signed Nov 2015
2015 class- starts Nov 2015- signed Nov 2014
2014 class- starts Nov 2014- signed Nov 2013
2013 class- starts Nov 2013- signed Nov 2012

while true the 2013 class was the first class of the conference, it was signed before the split happened. So pretty tough to include them in this.

Looking though quickly, there were 11 guys in that 1st year.

so the true number so far is 25 in the 3 years- or 8.3 a year. That's .83 per program

The problem with your assumption looking- I don't think the ACC/SEC/Big Ten just are getting 14-15 per year.
ACC- 2014- 18 2015- 21 2016- 17. So that's 56 in 3 years or 18.7 a year. That's 1.23 per program. 2 year 2014/15 average of 19.5 per year
SEC- 2014- 16 2015- 20 2016- 7. So that's 43 in 3 years or 14.3 a year. That's 1.02 per prgraom 2 year 2014/15 average of 18 per year
B10- 2014- 13 2015- 16 2016- 13. So that's 42 in 3 years or 14 a year. That's 1.00 per program 2 year 2014/15 average of 14.5 per year

So looking the ACC is pretty far ahead in recruiting. SEC at least last year cleaned up- and I'm sure they're still in a lot of battles right now. Big Ten is just consistent. Big East is down- but not by much.

just was curious
B12 2014- 6 2015- 9 2016- 2. That's only 17 in 3 years or 5.7 per year. that's 0.57 per program!(and a LOT of those guys are Kansas).
P12 2014- 12 2015- 17 2018- 6. That's 35 in 3 years or 11.7 per year. That's 0.98 per program.

2 things...
1- how does the Big 12 maintain? That's really the Big 1 and little 9. No wonder Kansas has won all those years.
2- look at the p5 by year... 2014 65. 2015 83. 2016 45 so far. 2015 is pretty concerning. Big East only had 5 guys that year(by comparison by my count already 7 this year).

[Hoya Hoya Hoya]

pretty good for a low major league that should have stayed in the same conference as Tulane to keep ESPN coverage.

[MUBoxer]

If you count players who committed to Buzz but only left due to him leaving or Wojo rescinded offer after the kid went psycho that'd add two more top 100s.

You should also count former top 100s who transferred into the Big East like Fisher.

I mean if I was trying to brag about recruiting id go all out.

[GumbyDamnit!]

If you count players who committed to Buzz but only left due to him leaving or Wojo rescinded offer after the kid went psycho that'd add two more top 100s.

You should also count former top 100s who transferred into the Big East like Fisher.

I mean if I was trying to brag about recruiting id go all out.

You could... of course you'd be opening yourself up to scrutiny regarding why a program that has recruited so well has not been able to translate it into more wins. I'd hate to have to dust off the "underachiever" moniker. (JK)

Teams would also have to consider how many of those kids left the program. Gained Fisher but lost Burton, etc...

[MUBoxer]

If you count players who committed to Buzz but only left due to him leaving or Wojo rescinded offer after the kid went psycho that'd add two more top 100s.

You should also count former top 100s who transferred into the Big East like Fisher.

I mean if I was trying to brag about recruiting id go all out.

You could... of course you'd be opening yourself up to scrutiny regarding why a program that has recruited so well has not been able to translate it into more wins. I'd hate to have to dust off the "underachiever" moniker. (JK)

Teams would also have to consider how many of those kids left the program. Gained Fisher but lost Burton, etc...

Well I mean point is we've had 10 top 100s commit to the BE, lost one to a coach change, one to him losing his mother so wanting to start anew, and one to the kid going psycho. None were Big East related which is nice.

Yes that's hugely underachieving, see I'm admitting it

But certainly looks decent that none of the guys have just pointlessly transferred out like the epidemic the AAC is facing with their top 100 recruits.

[Xudash]

I prefer to stay focused on your main point, which is a very good one:

There was much discussion a few years back about the nBE being able to recruit effectively over the long term. I recall a lot of "we'll have to wait and see but expect a major drop off" type comments (usually from people who are not true fans of the BE).

It's kinda like what a stock analyst would do in evaluating the health of an entity isn't it: establish what you believe to be the key evaluative criteria for that entity and benchmark them against their peers and how they're otherwise trending on their own?

An athletic conference must be evaluated for its long-term prospects in part on how well it continues to bring in talent to its member teams. It's bullsh-- to argue that "some recruits don't work out, etc." That's a given. That isn't up for debate. But it also isn't the point, because, overall, the PREDICTOR is the amount of talent that is flowing into the conference.

The fact of the matter is that the Big East isn't dropping off in its ability to attract top flight talent. Reasons for that should include our basketball-centric nature, the caliber of programs that comprise the conference, the Fox media deal, and our tie-in with MSG for our conference tournament. We also have talent in the front office.

It is a key predictor, and so far, so very good. It absolutely is bad news for those who wish us ill, and for those wishing for expansion.

[marquette]

I just did a quick run-down on 24/7 with their composite. The BE has 6 teams with composite top 100 kids for 2016.

ACC-10 teams
B1G-8
BE-6
SEC-6
PAC12-5
B12-3
AAC-2
A10-2
WCC-2
MWC-1

There's still plenty of recruiting to come in the class of 2016, but we are solidly holding our own in the middle of the power conference pack.

[GumbyDamnit!]

I just did a quick run-down on 24/7 with their composite. The BE has 6 teams with composite top 100 kids for 2016.

ACC-10 teams
B1G-8
BE-6
SEC-6
PAC12-5
B12-3
AAC-2
A10-2
WCC-2
MWC-1

There's still plenty of recruiting to come in the class of 2016, but we are solidly holding our own in the middle of the power conference pack.

You have to take the #'s one step further.

ACC - 10 recruits for 15 schools = .67 per school
B1G - .57
BE - .60
SEC - .43
PAC - .42
B12 - .30
AAC - .18
A10 - .14

You can't expect the BE to bring in more Top 100 recruits than leagues who have 50% more teams.

The other issue that skews these #'s a bit are the one and dones. UK, KU, Duke, maybe even AZ now, seem to land most of the kids who bolt for the NBA after 1 year. So over 4 years it may look like the SEC is recruiting very well but at any given time the collective # of Top 100's still in that league will not be as high as conferences like the BE, AAC A10, etc. There are exceptions (Ellenson, Otto Porter), but we mostly are recruiting 4 year players. UK cycles in 5-6 high level recruits every year and 4 of them bolt for the NBA right away. Of course when you are a one and done you're also a stud so their ability to impact the game as a Frosh is much greater than a kid in the 80's or 90's.

[redmen9194]

The Big East is very much alive and well. Over the last two seasons, we have had 9 of 10 teams ranked at one point or another. We have sent 7 of 10 teams to the NCAA. We have had a number 1 seed. We have averaged 50% participation in teh NCAA tourny over the two years. We also had the 2014 Wooden Award winner and a slew of major non-conference victories. There has been a lot of talk about needing to do better in the NCAA tourny. While that is true, there is no doubt it will come and just about everyone in the league is contributing to its overall success. It's a great league and a power basketball conference for sure.