Problem was keeping Greenspan at Rice. But some of those players weren't exactly good academic students. Ibrahim wasn't coming back, Ennis was packing, and I think one more wouldn't have returned either RG or no RG.

(10-07-2015 09:02 PM)Buho00 Wrote:  Braun was a good recruiter. Kazemi, Ennis, Obi, Debose, Reischel?, Oraby, Ibrahim, etc. Most or all had numerous P5 offers. Rice was named the 2nd best recruiting class among all of G5 schools by espn one year under Braun. The problem was keeping the players at Rice.

Even so the players Rhoades is targeting are a step up.

(10-07-2015 09:07 PM)cr11owl Wrote:  

(10-07-2015 09:02 PM)Buho00 Wrote:  Braun was a good recruiter. Kazemi, Ennis, Obi, Debose, Reischel?, Oraby, Ibrahim, etc. Most or all had numerous P5 offers. Rice was named the 2nd best recruiting class among all of G5 schools by espn one year under Braun. The problem was keeping the players at Rice.

Even so the players Rhoades is targeting are a step up.

The players he's targeting, maybe. Per ESPN, Debose, Ennis, Reischel were all rated 86 or above. That's in one class. Kazemi, Tamir Jackson were 86's the year before. By comparison, our two current 2016 commits are rated 72 and 70. Ratings don't mean much and they will vary if you compare Rivals, 247, etc. Maybe Braun has some contacts at whoever does the ESPN ratings. The key is to develop and keep them at Rice, and I sense Rhodes is finding better fits.

http://espn.go.com/colleges/basketball/r...class/2011

(10-07-2015 08:47 PM)Fort Bend Owl Wrote:  Going back a few years too, Morris Almond was a national top 100 recruit. So was Jason McKrieth. And while he was a transfer, Bobby Crawford was a national top-25 recruit (which tells you a little about some recruiting rankings).

Maybe you saw different rankings than I did but IIRC Almond was top 200 and McKrieth was lower than that (but still a good recruit for the WAC). Both turned out to be better players than recruits.

Transfers from big programs tend to be the guys that turned out to be worse players than recruits.

(10-07-2015 09:02 PM)Buho00 Wrote:  Braun was a good recruiter. Kazemi, Ennis, Obi, Debose, Reischel?, Oraby, Ibrahim, etc. Most or all had numerous P5 offers. Rice was named the 2nd best recruiting class among all of G5 schools by espn one year under Braun. The problem was keeping the players at Rice.

Those were good recruits but mostly not as good as you described. According to rivals, Ennis and DeBose did have numerous other offers but none from P5 schools. Ibrahim had only one P5 offer. Oraby and Obi aren't listed, but Oraby seemed to be way off the recruiting radar. I don't remember about Obi: I wasn't paying much attention by then.

Braun also brought in a bunch of guys with no other offers at all. Most of them left as quickly as Ennis and Ibrahim, presumably for different reasons.

On paper, the 2015 class seems to be in the same arena as 2011 which was Braun's high-water mark for recruiting. (I'm going by competitive offers, not ESPN ratings.)

Standard disclaimers about recruiting rankings apply.

As for Josh Hall, his list of finalists is, uh, a bit unusual for a national #130 recruit with multiple big-time offers. I suspect there is more to his story.

(10-07-2015 09:32 PM)Buho00 Wrote:  

(10-07-2015 09:07 PM)cr11owl Wrote:  

(10-07-2015 09:02 PM)Buho00 Wrote:  Braun was a good recruiter. Kazemi, Ennis, Obi, Debose, Reischel?, Oraby, Ibrahim, etc. Most or all had numerous P5 offers. Rice was named the 2nd best recruiting class among all of G5 schools by espn one year under Braun. The problem was keeping the players at Rice.

Even so the players Rhoades is targeting are a step up.

The players he's targeting, maybe. Per ESPN, Debose, Ennis, Reischel were all rated 86 or above. That's in one class. Kazemi, Tamir Jackson were 86's the year before. By comparison, our two current 2016 commits are rated 72 and 70. Ratings don't mean much and they will vary if you compare Rivals, 247, etc. Maybe Braun has some contacts at whoever does the ESPN ratings. The key is to develop and keep them at Rice, and I sense Rhodes is finding better fits.

http://espn.go.com/colleges/basketball/r...class/2011

I think ESPN changed their numbering between that class and now. The star system and the offers don't match up with that (or their position in the class).

(10-07-2015 10:51 PM)Gravy Owl Wrote:  

(10-07-2015 08:47 PM)Fort Bend Owl Wrote:  Going back a few years too, Morris Almond was a national top 100 recruit. So was Jason McKrieth. And while he was a transfer, Bobby Crawford was a national top-25 recruit (which tells you a little about some recruiting rankings).

Maybe you saw different rankings than I did but IIRC Almond was top 200 and McKrieth was lower than that (but still a good recruit for the WAC). Both turned out to be better players than recruits.

Transfers from big programs tend to be the guys that turned out to be worse players than recruits.

Almond and McKrieth weren't consensus national top-100 recruits but I recall they were top 100 in some publication or another. From Morris Almond's Rice bio, he was rated 118th in the nation by Hoop Scoop and 123rd in the nation by PrepStars.

http://www.riceowls.com/sports/m-baskbl/...ris00.html

I hadn't looked at future150.com to see if they had ranked any of the 2015 signees or 2016 commits. Not sure how they are viewed compared to Rivals, Scout, 247sports, and ESPN. It doesn't look like they do a good job of updating their official rankings if you click on the "Rankings" link, but the player pages seem more updated.

2015 signees:
Marquez Letcher-Ellis - 3-stars (81).
Chad Lott - 3-stars
Connor Cashaw - 3-stars
Amir Smith - 2-stars
Marcus Evans - not in database

2016 commits:
Ako Adams - 3-stars (86), ranked #135 nationally
Tim Harrison - 3-stars

Main reason I included this was because I hadn't seen Ako Adams ranked so prominently anywhere else.

Also, I remember reading that Amir Smith was young for his grade, with mentions of his size 17 show as a suggestion that he might grow some more. No idea whether he has grown more, but I just noticed that he is 15 months younger than Marcus Evans and 11 months younger than Connor Cashaw. Letcher-Ellis is fairly young as well, basically 12 months younger than Evans.

Evans was a 3 Star by 247 Sports.

(10-08-2015 11:05 PM)bobreinhold1 Wrote:  Evans was a 3 Star by 247 Sports.

This year's class looks great on paper. The only one I saw that wasn't a 3 star somewhere was Amir Smith and he looks like a solid projection signing. Still some room to grow to give us size since he's young, and his dad was a great basketball player. Excited to see them on the court!

That's interesting about Ako. I also hadn't seen him ranked that high. Hopefully Rhoades found a steal that the main recruiting websites have overlooked. With his early offers on some other guys that shot up to 5 stars after good summer campaigns I have no doubt in his ability to scout talent.

Josh Hall commits to Nevada. Good luck to him there.

OT but they had a silent auction at the soccer game benefiting breast cancer awareness. I am now the owner of this.

This will look great in my office.

(10-18-2015 04:54 PM)Antarius Wrote:  OT but they had a silent auction at the soccer game benefiting breast cancer awareness. I am now the owner of this.

This will look great in my office.

Well done!

(10-18-2015 04:54 PM)Antarius Wrote:  OT but they had a silent auction at the soccer game benefiting breast cancer awareness. I am now the owner of this.

This will look great in my office.

My employer will not allow your pic to be shown. Must be good stuff !!

Saw Chad on crutches with a large knee brace on campus today. Anyone have any info?

(10-28-2015 12:36 AM)OwlWind Wrote:  Saw Chad on crutches with a large knee brace on campus today. Anyone have any info?

Yesterday was media day and Rhoades mentioned that he was due for some major playing time so either it happened after that or hopefully it's not a big deal.

(10-28-2015 06:01 AM)cr11owl Wrote:  

(10-28-2015 12:36 AM)OwlWind Wrote:  Saw Chad on crutches with a large knee brace on campus today. Anyone have any info?

Yesterday was media day and Rhoades mentioned that he was due for some major playing time so either it happened after that or hopefully it's not a big deal.

Rumor is a torn meniscus and out for the year most likely. Very disappointing. At least he can maybe red-shirt?

(10-31-2015 04:18 PM)OwlWind Wrote:  

(10-28-2015 06:01 AM)cr11owl Wrote:  

(10-28-2015 12:36 AM)OwlWind Wrote:  Saw Chad on crutches with a large knee brace on campus today. Anyone have any info?

Yesterday was media day and Rhoades mentioned that he was due for some major playing time so either it happened after that or hopefully it's not a big deal.

Rumor is a torn meniscus and out for the year most likely. Very disappointing. At least he can maybe red-shirt?

Any confirmation on this rumor from tonight? Rhoades seemed pretty high on him on media day and I see he was still at the event tonight from the pictures.

He said it was a torn meniscus and he would probably be out for the year. He might be well enough to play by the end of the season, but it's more likely to be a redshirt year than to waste a year's eligibility. Several coaches and players told me he was playing very well. It does look like we have much more depth than in the past.

(11-02-2015 09:11 PM)bobreinhold1 Wrote:  He said it was a torn meniscus and he would probably be out for the year. He might be well enough to play by the end of the season, but it's more likely to be a redshirt year than to waste a year's eligibility. Several coaches and players told me he was playing very well. It does look like we have much more depth than in the past.

Damn. Wish him a speedy recovery.

FWIW, the early signing period is November 11-18 for Men's Basketball. I assume the hope is that Tim Harrison and Ako Adams both sign their NLI during that time. I believe Rice still has 1 available scholarship. Any insiders know whether Rice is hoping to get another commit for the early signing period, or are they holding that spot open until the spring signing period after high school basketball?

Verbalcommits shows Rice with 9 offers to uncommitted players.
Rivals shows Rice with 8 offers to uncommitted players.
247sports only shows 4.

Not much overlap between the lists and I trust verbalcommits more, since some of the guys on the Rivals' list recently committed elsewhere accoring to verbalcommits.