(04-01-2021 04:12 PM)Fort Bend Owl Wrote: [ -> ]Here's who Pera has recruited to Rice (I'm not going to bother to check on that 1st class if it was a Pera recruit or a Rhoades recruit). My comments follow just on their sheer talent and ability.
2017-18
Dylan Jones - grad transfer from Penn
Miles Lester
Malik Osborne
Najia Hunter
Josh Parrish - sit out transfer from TCU
I actually think Osborne might have been a Rhoades early signee? Anyway, he was the class of this group. Parrish was a good signee. Hunter was good at Rice but probably not fit for the school academically. Jones and Lester were very late signings and both were what I would classify as misses (Jones stayed two years and gave us some minutes up front when we needed it).
2018-19
freshman group of Moore, Murphy, Peterson, Mullin and Millora-Brown
Jack Williams - grad transfer
This was an outstanding class, probably in retrospect one of Rice's top classes in the past 30-40 years.
2019-20
Quincy Olivari
Max Fiedler
Zach Crisler
Tommy McCarthy - grad transfer from Harvard
Malik Ondigo - regular transfer from Texas Tech
Again a really good class, although McCarthy was a miss. And Ondigo still gets an incomplete grade.
2020-21
Hutchins, Lieppert, Havsa and Clark (grad transfers), Evee and Abercrombie (traditional transfers who didn't have to sit out), Poteat, Sheffield
Huge class necessitated by our defections. But honestly, a pretty good job especially when one considers most of the late recruiting was done in the Covid world of zoom visits. It's still too early to judge Hutchins, but without him, I'd rate this as a solid group but not as impressive as the two previous classes.
The point of this is criticize Pera for his in-game coaching, or his ability to keep the good players at Rice. But questioning his ability to evaluate talent is a big stretch. He's a 6-4 guard starting for an A-10 team that had a winning record in conference play, and had better stats than Clark and Havsa. I'm pretty sure he can be a factor for the Owls.
I think it's a bit more complex. While his recruiting generally speaking is pretty good, there's an argument to be made that he struggles getting impact big men and point guards, which in turn impacts his ability to coach.
His ability to find talented off-ball guards and wings is undisputed: Evee, Olivari, Sheffield, Murphy, Peterson, Mullins, Hunter, and Parrish were all very good additions. But apart from that, I think the jury is still out. While QMB and Fiedler are both really talented big men, they leave a lot on the table defensively. Now Poteat has shown real promise (I think), and Ondigo could still be an impact guy, but at best I think the jury is still out when it comes to finding big men. One of the reasons for that? These are our ranks on defensive FG% on shots taken at the rim over the past four years: 231 (2021), 346 (2020), 341 (2019), 287 (2018). We are pretty consistently awful at defending the paint, and that's at least partially attributable to recruiting.
As for PGs, I think Pera's record is worse. Lester was a last minute addition who provided a bit off the bench. McCarthy didn't do much. Moore made the occasional big plays, and was serviceable off the bench. Havsa drove us all mad, but also had some important stretches. Hutchins, I have massively high hopes for. But as a whole? Hoo boy, that's not great. It maybe gets a bit better if you want to include Hunter, but I think he was more a 2 than 1. Now you can make an argument that this doesn't matter. Pera's system isn't necessarily designed for a true point guard. But I think you saw the impact of not having that go-to primary handler when we played the likes of UNT and La Tech, who were able to shut down our perimeter game.
This is all a long way of saying, coaching and recruiting go hand-in-hand. I think Pera still has some growing to do on the coaching side, but I also don't think he makes his own job easier (see sacrificing interior defense for big men who can pass and run offense).
And, that said, Pierre is still a great addition. I think he'll thrive in our offense and take the stress off of some of the other guys. Fiedler banging down low with Evee, Olivari, and Pierre as options on the perimeter could be lethal.