Basketball and Football - How in the world does a world class university with so many advantages NOT get it's share of local (Florida) top athletes??? I AM SO SICK of watching UF get it's ass kicked in multiple sports by Florida kids that chose to go elsewhere. It's INFURIATING!
Because are coaches are/were recruiting like it’s still 1990 or not recruiting at all. CBN is changing that.
Maybe, they could help CMW in recruiting and getting targeted kids. We need guys that can get their shot, make them, and are alphas types. No choir Boyz. Just good players who can pass, handle the ball, shoot a high percentage and finish drives at the basket like the backup pg for LSU. Their defense just has to be quickness. The NIL is needed to convince top guards to come our way. We can’t let our administration run this, the athletic department needs to help other sports like basketball to reel them in, no matter who is the coach. We can’t sit back and wait till all the good guards are gone. Of course we are going to need another big with attitude also.
In football you can’t win without locking down that home state recruiting, to the extent possible. FL needs to get its share. In basketball I don’t think “home state” recruiting matters. The talent can come from anywhere. Though when there is a 5* in FL it would be nice to get them, FL is not a basketball hotbed. If on the fence I’d actually probably rather have an NYC kid come down. In either case, Whites problem isn’t really recruiting related. That’s the one thing he’s been sort of decent at. Unfortunately it’s only going to get harder if he can’t put it together on the court.
When you include the prep schools in Florida, the state has hands down the best high school talent in the country.
I think at least some of it is just today's world. When I was in Gainesville home felt a world away my freshman year even though it was only about 2 hours away. Today you can be across the country and still see your family on a phone call. The world is smaller. Some kids just want out of Florida foe a new experience.
Well, yeah, you can recruit from anywhere. But it's much easier to identify, scout, recruit, and sign in-state kids. And then KEEP them. Florida has lots of in-state talent. Our last Final Four team was built on in-state guys.
That’s what I thought too, but I wanted to do some research and I was surprised by what I saw. These are the recruiting rankings IN THE SEC for all of Mike White’s seasons (pulled from 247). Reminder these are SEC rankings, not National: 2022: 4th 2021: 11th 2020: 10th 2019: 2nd 2018: 5th 2017: 5th 2016: 13th 2015: 5th This recruiting is not acceptable at Florida. That’s an average of 7th in the SEC. We’ve been blaming him for his coaching but his results are in line with his recruiting. Here’s the SEC standing results for each year: 2021: 6th 2020: 5th 2019: 8th 2018: 3rd 2017: 2nd 2016: 8th Averages 5th in the SEC. So recruiting 7th best but coaching them to 5th best. Seems like recruiting is actually more of the issue than coaching. Now I don’t think the recruiting rankings account for transfers, so that could be where the 2 place difference comes in. But still, 5th in the SEC is not good enough.
Most of the people in Florida aren’t from Florida. It seems like. I’m the only one of my family born here. Many have loyalties else where. That may make it harder for UF. Billy’s new system should help basketball too.