I agree that Chicagoland is important, but also agree we may be putting too much stock in recent commitments. In the list below from Suntimes, Quinn is the #5 prospect and we’re still in the running for Avila at #8. Most years that is solid for LUC. 1-4 seem to be going very high major, the only “miss” might be Kraft going to Xavier but it’s still the Big East and a great program. And Amos is probably nationally lower than out of state recruits we are pushing for like JOJ and Dia. I’m sure he’s a great player but we’re by far his best offer, I don’t want a player only because they played for Whitney Young

https://chicago.suntimes.com/2021/7/6/2 ... s-illinois

On a related note, this recent update from the Sun has Avila visiting Northern Iowa in October. While getting Dia or JOJ would soften the blow, I would hate to lose him to a conference rival

https://chicago.suntimes.com/2021/8/20/ ... recruiting

Completely forgot about Avila (due to relying on VerbalCommits). He is perhaps my favorite attainable 2022 recruit. Also completely overlooked Quinn playing for the Illinois Wolves. Bet that stings Mullins a bit.

To jmiller's point, there does seem to be a cutoff of 2022 Illinois guys that are clearly high-high major guys and then guys that might be below what we are targeting.

I really liked Nick Martinelli out of Glenbrook South, but we never got in on him and he is now committed to Elon. Had offers from Valpo, Belmont and a few other low/mid majors. He can score from multiple levels.

A few others I've seen play that I really like, but they haven't really 'blown up' yet are Bryce Moore (Carmel Catholic) and Jackson Munro (New Trier). Ben VanderWal is another one to keep an eye on (Timothy Christian). Trey Pettigrew has some good offers (Illinois, Nebraska, Missouri) and plays for Kenwood. DePaul and Bradley offered in June.

I was more pointing it out as a general observation. I don't think we should recruit local kids just for the sake of recruiting them--especially if we are getting more talented kids elsewhere. But this state has a ton of talent and it has been a recipe for success for us recently. Would hate to see that dry up.

Great point about maintaining the local recruiting pipelines. For example, Butler used to have almost nothing but Indiana kids in their program before Brad Stevens left. I just took a look at their roster, and besides three incoming freshmen, they only have ONE player on the roster from Indiana, a sophomore backup center.

Worth noting we also offered local recruit NJ Benson and have been recruiting Trey Pettigrew (https://www.prephoops.com/2021/07/trey- ... into-july/).

We're pretty firmly in the "mid major plus" category of school right now where we'll be going with kids that are consistently going to be getting mid-tier P6 offers. We got one of the best players in the state to commit, seem to be in a good spot with another top 10 player.

I found a short video of Jayden Dawson that you gotta see. If he ever pulls this move at Gentile the place would go nuts.

https://twitter.com/Juice_Woodard/statu ... 46144?s=20

Just noticed that the defender he beat at the rim looks like a 7 footer.

Visited Minnesota last week and announcing on a Twin Cities tv station, doesn’t feel like good omens for us.

Nah… he’s going to Minnesota. If he is going on a local Minnesota television station to announce he’s going to Loyola, than I don’t think I would want because I assume he’s really stupid.

Good luck to him! I’m glad he was considering us! He seems like a real talent… and … with the transfer portal … you never know if he might just end up a Rambler eventually.

Official, not surprising.

I am shocked. SHOCKED. Well, not that shocked.

When he mentioned in the Star Tribune article that staying home would mean his family would be able to watch him, and then knowing Minnesota was going all in for him, it was a long shot for us. But we had a better shot than every other school offering in him, which is still a huge deal and great sign moving forward.

Best of luck to him.

I only want guys who are 10,000% committed.

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