Tim Dalger has been playing well. In 14 games, he's averaging 17 points and 7 rebounds. Shooting 36% from three and 76% from FT line. I share your concerns about Link Year.
Congratulations to ORU
- Thread starter I.I.
- Start date
I understand that several folks are upset enough about the last half of this season for TU that they want to see a coaching change. I'm not for or against anything, I'm just giving you facts on TU recruiting to help the conversation. All of my posts in this particular thread have been about the recruiting differences between TU and ORU, mainly over the past 25 years, regardless of coach.
If you get specific about the past seven years under Haith, there's actually a bigger disparity, as the two schools have recruited the same players much less during that time. Haith's staff has recruited at the higher end of the player pool out of necessity. They have to in order to compete in the AAC. And those are players that ORU can't access for the most part, because those kids won't give ORU the time of day.
I'm not just "saying" that Tulsa is offering higher caliber players than ORU and getting "some" interest from them. It's what's happening. Tulsa recruits many 3-star and 4-star prospects, guys in and around the top 150. And they get plenty of interest from them, and they've signed some. They've done this at a higher rate under Haith. Several 4-star prospects have made visits to TU over the past seven years, and that didn't used to happen. TU has signed several players out of high school that spent months in the top 150...then add the transfers that had been 4-star, top 150 guys. It is what it is, as my great friend Doug Wojcik used to say.
This isn't my opinion on Haith's recruiting...it's just facts about TU recruiting while he's been coach. Many of the kids he's signed haven't worked out, but he is definitely recruiting higher-level talent out of necessity. Just for comparison, under Wojcik, TU signed nine 3-star prospects. In the same amount of time under Haith, TU has signed 22 3-star prospects with another one committed. Wojcik didn't sign anyone that had spent time in the top 150 and nobody that finished ranked nationally at their position. Haith has three that spent time in the top 150 (if you count Lenard) and two that finished ranked nationally at their position. But it had to be that way to compete at the AAC level.
Tulsa also needs to look elsewhere and find gems where they can, because it's cut-throat when recruiting that top end of the talent pool. TU gets burned many times when going after top players. Rotnei Clarke (ranked #104) was a killer for Woj. Haith's staff spent lots of time recruiting about 11 4-star and 5-star guys in the 2020 class, getting many of them on campus for visits. The biggest one that they spent the most time on, didn't work out - 5-star Bryce Thompson. Then they had Trey Phipps decommit and go to OU.
Again, I'm not pointing out this information to say Haith has done some incredible recruiting job. But it does show that his staff has recruited at a much higher-level than the 10 or so years prior. Any coach at TU will have to do that in order to compete in the AAC and get to the NCAA tournament...and they'll have to find some overlooked gems as well. This also shows that TU is mostly recruiting much higher-level talent than ORU. But that doesn't mean that ORU doesn't find some guys that TU would be happy to have.
Maybe it just speaks to talent evaluation. It seems like, when we inevitably strike out with the high end HS kids, we backfill with a bunch of kids who might be three star players, but they don’t pan out and they are hardly worthy of a 3 star rating.
Also, I would argue that our status in the AAC has artificially inflated the recruiting grading / perception of some of the players we are getting, even though they might be of equal or lesser ability to some of the guys that Wojcik or Manning signed. Guys like Eric McClellan or Donte Medder had just as good if not better offer sheets (even adjusting for the time period) as did some of our current 3 star players even though they are Listed as 0 star players and they were much better players than guys like Peter Hewitt (3-star), Manny Ugboh (3 star), Josh Earley (3 star), Travis Atson (3 star)
P.S. the dissatisfaction with Haith isn’t just about the second half of one season. It’s been ebbing and flowing for 6+ seasons filled with a lot of talented kids that either a) never had enough talent around them or b) never had good enough coaching ....to make the dance.
BTW, I’m not arguing there isn’t a difference between the talent that we’ve been recruiting and ORU has been recruiting. Just that we’re not as far ahead of ORU as we might be lead to believe based on recruiting rankings. It shows based on the fact that they whipped our butts multiple times in the past 10 years and that one of our best players in the past 10 years was formerly their player. Their program also had to suffer through some failing Sutton seasons and a subsequent rebuild so it might not be a fair comparison either.
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Tim Dalger TU signee JUCO with 3 years eligibility Starts for Independence CC and averages 18.5 PPG with 7.4 Rebounds. 47% from FG Only weakness was 48 turnovers in 13 games. Only 7 blocks in 13 games so not a rim protector.
Sure, some of Wojcik's best unrated recruits may have had offer sheets comparable or better than some of Haith's "worst" 3-star recruits. That's not really a good comparison though. Regardless, I'm just providing raw facts related to the rankings of the kids when they were signed.
Talent evaluation is a huge piece of recruiting, so that certainly could be part of it. I'm not debating whether a kid was deserving of 0 stars, 3 stars or whatever at the time they signed -- just providing the data.
I meant that Guys like Medder and EMac had offer sheets similar to some of Frank’s better recruits (taplin, Joiner, Gaston, Hill, etc...) those two guys have no rivals rating but they had offers from decent basketball programs. I just feel that, either the rivals rating algorithm (process) in mbb changed in the interim, or they started looking at kids we were recruiting more kindly as we were in the AAC.
I could be wrong, but I’ve been amazed by some of the 3 star ratings we’ve seen. (That could just be because of our talent evaluation though). I know in football it shifted the other way and they’ve been stingier with 3 star ratings.
Nothing has changed in regard to basketball recruit rankings. You are right that Haith signed some guys with similar offer sheets to Medder and McClellan. Again, finding gems is part of it too...Taplin was definitely a gem. Joiner was in a different category though. He had 16 offers, including Missouri, Iowa State and Texas A&M. However, I was specifically comparing Wojcik's highest rated recruits to Haith's highest rated recruits.
Haith’s highest rated recruits have been JUCO’s or transfers. The transfer market wasn’t nearly the same during Wojcik’s tenure. Still he got a good one in Haralson (who I would compare to Horne in terms of talent and pedigree). Haith has had a few good ones in Etou, Rachal, Horne, and Jeffries. Clarkson is as good if not better than all of Haith’s HS recruits in terms of offers. So was Uzoh. Then you have Woodard, Wright, and Zeldric King as well who have similar (or better) offer sheets to some of Haith’s better recruits.
The only thing that really sets the two coaches apart in top end recruiting is Frank’s transfers.
Well, that...and the fact that Haith has signed 22 recruits ranked 3-stars, while Wojcik signed only 9. And Haith has signed players that spent months in the top 150 or finished ranked nationally at their position -- two things Wojcik never did. Again, I'm just looking at the rankings. I'm not looking at how any of the players developed after they were signed.
Medder had six offers, and the best were Rutgers and Fresno. McClellan only had six offers as well, and the best were Wichita State and Fresno.
Uzoh was a 3-star with 8 offers, including OU and Nebraska...that gets closer to Joiner's 16 offers with Mizzou, Iowa State and Texas A&M. Clarkson would be the best comparison to Joiner. Clarkson had 12 offers, including TCU, Texas Tech and Texas A&M.
Last year, Keshawn Williams had 18 offers, including Colorado, Kansas State and West Virginia. Haith's recruits had many, many more P5 offers than Wojcik's overall.
Calvin Walls was one of Wojcik's higher rated recruits. 3-star prospect, ranked No. 60 nationally in the juco rankings with an offer from Penn State.
I still think Haith’s recruiting of HS students has been poor. Therefore he has focused heavily on Jucos & transfers to compensate. I base this off of his first 7 seasons of results. Here’s my proof:
In 7 seasons, only one freshman player (Igbanu 6.3 pts.), averaged more than 4 points a game.
In 7 seasons, only one player Haith signed out of HS led the team in scoring. Again Igbanu in 2020.
In every other season, either Manning players (Woodard, Harrison) or jucos/ transfers were our leading scorers.
Haith may have signed many HS players. Some were good, like Taplin, Igbanu, Jackson, Joiner, but most left the team or didn’t live up to expectation. The majority of players that kept us competitive have been jucos or transfers. These would include Birt, Etou, Henderson, Scott, Jeffries, Horne, Rachal.
Much like his Missouri tenure, I think his inability to recruit high schools successfully has been his biggest problem.
In 7 seasons, only one freshman player (Igbanu 6.3 pts.), averaged more than 4 points a game.
In 7 seasons, only one player Haith signed out of HS led the team in scoring. Again Igbanu in 2020.
In every other season, either Manning players (Woodard, Harrison) or jucos/ transfers were our leading scorers.
Haith may have signed many HS players. Some were good, like Taplin, Igbanu, Jackson, Joiner, but most left the team or didn’t live up to expectation. The majority of players that kept us competitive have been jucos or transfers. These would include Birt, Etou, Henderson, Scott, Jeffries, Horne, Rachal.
Much like his Missouri tenure, I think his inability to recruit high schools successfully has been his biggest problem.
It shows how far we’ve fallen in basketball that there’s a thread for the abominable ORU on our basketball board. The whole thread and anything about ORU is highly offensive.
This obviously has much more to do with the players after they got to campus, which means they either didn't develop or were busts. That's a different conversation than what I was pointing out, which was recruiting rankings, but you bring up a good point.
It's a given, TU should be recruiting higher caliber of players than ORU. We're in a higher rated conference. The door is open for Tulsa to recruit higher rated players than ORU. What are the results at the end of the season is what matters. And the results haven't been anything to feel good about.
The issue is Haith is missing on too many players or he and his staff aren't developing the players once on campus to win conference championships. I think it's both, but player development seems the bigger issue.
Yes, I know we ended up as tri conference champion last year, in year six. I guess I'm not part of the culture that takes great pride in that. But, that's me.
The issue is Haith is missing on too many players or he and his staff aren't developing the players once on campus to win conference championships. I think it's both, but player development seems the bigger issue.
Yes, I know we ended up as tri conference champion last year, in year six. I guess I'm not part of the culture that takes great pride in that. But, that's me.
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I don't find ORU offensive. I want to beat them badly each year but applaud their successes especially when they are the only team in town headed to INDY this year. I hope they get a 2-15 upset but don't think they have the rebound or inside defense ability to stick with the bigger teams. I would not want their coach as some have suggested. But love their players' chemistry.
Sure. At least OSU is an accredited university and not some grifting organization like the one on south Lewis. f*** ORU.
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