I'm watching the OKC-Houston NBA game tonight. The announcers told a story about Westbrook being lightly regarded in high school and was recruited by only "a handful of MAC schools and San Diego State." It turns out UCLA coach Ben Howland was persuaded to watch him play and he "took a chance" on offering him a scholarship. The rest is history.

(12-09-2016 09:23 PM)Okie Chippewa Wrote:  I'm watching the OKC-Houston NBA game tonight. The announcers told a story about Westbrook being lightly regarded in high school and was recruited by only "a handful of MAC schools and San Diego State." It turns out UCLA coach Ben Howland was persuaded to watch him play and he "took a chance" on offering him a scholarship. The rest is history.

He took an official visit to Kent State.

He's no Westbrook, but CJ McCollum had his heart set on playing for Akron and was disappointed when no offer came. The Zips only had 1 scholarship that year and offered Zeke instead. Makes me think what could have been had they managed to free a roster spot and got both CJ and Zeke.

http://www.ohio.com/news/top-stories/210...k-1.398905

patrick beverly whose defense on westbrook just won houston that game was a toledo commit during the stan joplin years, but there was some questions about joplin's job security which dogged his recruiting and beverly had a great senior year and backed out and went to arkansas and eventually the NBA

Interesting thread----Lots of "near misses" for the MAC. "Always the bridesmaid and never the bride", I guess.

Football related, but Santana Moss was initially a WMU verbal before the U swooped in.

Cozelle McQueen was down to UT or NC State and made the wrong choice but lucked into an NCAA title. ?

On the flip side, Big Ben would've certainly gone to Ohio State if they recruited him for QB. They wanted him for TE, so he wound up at Miami.

(12-11-2016 07:16 PM)Love and Honor Wrote:  On the flip side, Big Ben would've certainly gone to Ohio State if they recruited him for QB. They wanted him for TE, so he wound up at Miami.

I think the same is essentially true for Julian Edelman and Josh Cribbs. Kent was willing to have them play QB rather than some other position and so went ot Kent.