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Well the good news is we don't have to get jerked around anymore. Hyatt is gone

just like I have a perception that West Virginia is not a good academic school. Maybe I am wrong but since i have followed RU for 30 years WVU has that reputation.
 
It seems some programs can instantly excite a recruit. Hyatt seemed all but signed before setting foot on the LSU campus, where we have to establish a relationship and show continual attention to just stay in it

I feel like saying ‘not fair’

Our time will come. I feel more confident saying that now than I have at any point during the past 25 years.
 
Point taken.

Can we get Southern in a home & home? I mean 2 home games for us. Any sport.
LOL going to have to be a football game to get those girls to come along. Florida State does the same thing. When they have kids in for an official visit they try to make sure that whoever their host is takes them to a party at FAMU
 
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Hey now step one is getting a grad transfer like right now to add to the depth. Anyone that can contribute for a few min/game in any position.

Then go all in for Massoud.

Honestly if we replace Hyatt with these two then we actually are in a better position both short term and long term.
 
I realize basketball recruiting can be really shady, but at some point I hope jilted fans can stop defaulting to $$$$ whenever a kid chooses another program. Kinda like when some UConn fans were blaming adidas $$$ when Mathis picked Rutgers.

I get that people are bummed that a kid didn't pick their favorite school but c'mon.
I agree Russ partially. There are a lot of sour grapes and people are far too cavalier about throwing out scandalous accusations. But I'm genuinely curious. We hear so much, and read good journalism, about how prevalent bag men and money are in SEC recruiting in particular. So question: what percent of SEC schools regularly cheat in recruiting? Only 1 or 2? Who? Half? Most?
 
Shaq. Pistol Pete. Ben Simmons. Vs. Souf Mensah and Gene Armstead . How could he???????!!!!!

Don't forget the great Chris Jackson aka Mahmoud Abdul-Rauf. That dude was a player in college. He averaged > 30 PPG as a sophomore at LSU on some very efficient shooting. 2 years in college, 2 time SEC POY, 2 time 1st team All American.
 
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I agree Russ partially. There are a lot of sour grapes and people are far too cavalier about throwing out scandalous accusations. But I'm genuinely curious. We hear so much, and read good journalism, about how prevalent bag men and money are in SEC recruiting in particular. So question: what percent of SEC schools regularly cheat in recruiting? Only 1 or 2? Who? Half? Most?
I read the bagman article a couple of years ago. That was a great read. It was also about football.
 
I didn't say it didn't.

The Bagman article from a couple of years ago was about the SEC. Which is what I was asked about.

So what John Wooden and Rick Pitino did have zilch to do with my response to Eagleton96.

But thanks nonetheless.

So by writing off that article as being about football, are you implying that while SEC athletic programs and boosters may have a deeply ingrained culture of paying players for football, they are simultaneously squeaky clean for basketball?

Or was that just your way of sidestepping the questions Eagleton96 asked entirely?
 
So by writing off that article as being about football, are you implying that while SEC athletic programs and boosters may have a deeply ingrained culture of paying players for football, they are simultaneously squeaky clean for basketball?

Or was that just your way of sidestepping the questions Eagleton96 asked entirely?
I didn't imply anything. Basketball recruiting is not squeaky clean regardless of conference.

Also I didn't write off the article as "being about football", that's literally what it was about. Football recruiting in the SEC.

If you didn't read it the article is headlined:

MEET THE BAGMAN

With a sub headline of:

HOW TO BUY COLLEGE FOOTBALL PLAYERS, IN THE WORDS OF A MAN WHO DELIVERS THE MONEY

Do some SEC programs cheat in basketball recruiting? Probably. How many? I have no idea.

So far though, I think that the SEC is the only conference that doesn't have a member school's MBB program involved in the investigation by the FBI.
 
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So by writing off that article as being about football, are you implying that while SEC athletic programs and boosters may have a deeply ingrained culture of paying players for football, they are simultaneously squeaky clean for basketball?

Or was that just your way of sidestepping the questions Eagleton96 asked entirely?

Outside Kentucky, most SEC fan bases could not care less about basketball. Alabama literally has free admission for students to all men’s hoops games and they can’t come close to filling their student section.

If someone wants to suggest LSU landing Hyatt is likely because they bought him, well that’s kinda crazy. He’s just not that big of a recruit. I mean Louisville was getting in trouble for offering a 5 star recruit like Bowen $100K. Would that make the going rate for Hyatt something like $5000?

AAU and hoops recruiting is a cesspool. This just isn’t evidence of it.
 
Outside Kentucky, most SEC fan bases could not care less about basketball. Alabama literally has free admission for students to all men’s hoops games and they can’t come close to filling their student section.

If someone wants to suggest LSU landing Hyatt is likely because they bought him, well that’s kinda crazy. He’s just not that big of a recruit. I mean Louisville was getting in trouble for offering a 5 star recruit like Bowen $100K. Would that make the going rate for Hyatt something like $5000?

AAU and hoops recruiting is a cesspool. This just isn’t evidence of it.
I dunno about that. Having lived in both Knoxville and Gainesville there are some passionate basketball fans there. When Thompson-Boling Arena opened in Knoxville it was the largest facility ever built specifically for basketball in the United States, in terms of seating capacity. IIRC it was built to have one more seat than Rupp Arena. TBA has been renovated and has fewer seats now but the seating capacity is still slightly over 21k.

Gainesville has a smaller arena but just as passionate fans. Back-to-back national championships and five final fours since '94 will do that.

LSU has decent basketball history, most of it is just old history, and was in the final four in 2006. Their practice facility is pretty dope.
 
I dunno about that. Having lived in both Knoxville and Gainesville there are some passionate basketball fans there. When Thompson-Boling Arena opened in Knoxville it was the largest facility ever built specifically for basketball in the United States, in terms of seating capacity. IIRC it was built to have one more seat than Rupp Arena. TBA has been renovated and has fewer seats now but the seating capacity is still slightly over 21k.

Gainesville has a smaller arena but just as passionate fans. Back-to-back national championships and five final fours since '94 will do that.

LSU has decent basketball history, most of it is just old history, and was in the final four in 2006. Their practice facility is pretty dope.
Ditto Vandy----one of the best venues for CBB I've ever been in.
 
I didn't imply anything. Basketball recruiting is not squeaky clean regardless of conference.

Also I didn't write off the article as "being about football", that's literally what it was about. Football recruiting in the SEC.

If you didn't read it the article is headlined:

MEET THE BAGMAN

With a sub headline of:

HOW TO BUY COLLEGE FOOTBALL PLAYERS, IN THE WORDS OF A MAN WHO DELIVERS THE MONEY

Do some SEC programs cheat in basketball recruiting? Probably. How many? I have no idea.

So far though, I think that the SEC is the only conference that doesn't have a member school's MBB program involved in the investigation by the FBI.
----
most of us have no personal experience with
a good player being recruited.... the one I had was back in the early 80's, I believe it was

there was a North Jersey quarterback who drew a number of offers...... His dad came into the store where I was working as a regular customer

.... the player narrowed his choice down to Syracuse and RU, and ultimately picked Syracuse......

one thing the dad said to me, without being asked, was that RU would not give them anything..... I did not probe what that meant in full, but I could guess some under the table money or benefit was the difference.... to be fair, at this point in time Cuse was probably a better team and appeared to be a better destination, football wise.....but, the dad did say it.
 
----
most of us have no personal experience with
a good player being recruited.... the one I had was back in the early 80's, I believe it was

there was a North Jersey quarterback who drew a number of offers...... His dad came into the store where I was working as a regular customer

.... the player narrowed his choice down to Syracuse and RU, and ultimately picked Syracuse......

one thing the dad said to me, without being asked, was that RU would not give them anything..... I did not probe what that meant in full, but I could guess some under the table money or benefit was the difference.... to be fair, at this point in time Cuse was probably a better team and appeared to be a better destination, football wise.....but, the dad did say it.
Read that Bagman article. It's lengthy but a good read. Details how buying a $200 TV swayed a kid and how paying for the surgery of one recruit's sister got another kid done. The thing that really blew me away was the role that some church's play as a middle man/conduit for the money from Bagmen to prospects families.

And it was all school boosters. No shoe money like in basketball. Boosters/super fans of football programs in the SEC.
 
Russ,if the Gators are short on passionate basketball fans,I know of one new one from New Jersey who will be heading down only the 15th.Already has his football season tickets too.If he doesn't know where the library is by Thanksgiving,we might have a problem. lol They lucked out for orientation days in July.Temps didn't go past low nineties,although humidity was around 300 percent.
 
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Good point. Don't know how I forgot about them. Though I'm not too wild about those benches on the baseline.
Yeah baseline bench cost RU women a game many. Years ago in NCAAs. Called timeout, had to go to far end bench. Did not get back quick enough after time out, despite sprinting down the court and got called for a five second inbounding turnover without ever getting a chance to try to inbound.
 
Yeah baseline bench cost RU women a game many. Years ago in NCAAs. Called timeout, had to go to far end bench. Did not get back quick enough after time out, despite sprinting down the court and got called for a five second inbounding turnover without ever getting a chance to try to inbound.
Pitino used to politic every year at SEC Meetings to get them banned.
 
There seems to be a perception that LSU popped in without any advance work and we lost out despite our strong long term relationship with Hyatt. That perception is not accurate. Hyatt has had a long term relationship with Will Wade since Wade was at VCU. Wade also has a substantial amount of support and respect in the NYC area from his days at VCU.

Pikiell and our staff did an excellent job in the recruitment of Hyatt. You simply cannot win every time. The positive is that this staff is slowly changing the perception of RU. We are signing stronger recruiting classes than in the past. We are legitimately involved with a number of excellent recruits. Things are changing in a positive way. To me that is t
 
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I dunno about that. Having lived in both Knoxville and Gainesville there are some passionate basketball fans there. When Thompson-Boling Arena opened in Knoxville it was the largest facility ever built specifically for basketball in the United States, in terms of seating capacity. IIRC it was built to have one more seat than Rupp Arena. TBA has been renovated and has fewer seats now but the seating capacity is still slightly over 21k.

Gainesville has a smaller arena but just as passionate fans. Back-to-back national championships and five final fours since '94 will do that.

LSU has decent basketball history, most of it is just old history, and was in the final four in 2006. Their practice facility is pretty dope.

Let's just say those passionate fans don't really show it by attending games. Kentucky ranked #1 in attendance nationally last season. Tennessee was the next biggest SEC venue at #20 nationally. Florida checked in at #35 and Vandy at #45. The good fans of LSU were #73rd nationally.

I'm not saying not a single person in the southeast likes basketball. I live in the southeast and I love basketball. I'm just saying that overall it is a far distant 2nd to football outside Kentucky.
 
Let's just say those passionate fans don't really show it by attending games. Kentucky ranked #1 in attendance nationally last season. Tennessee was the next biggest SEC venue at #20 nationally. Florida checked in at #35 and Vandy at #45. The good fans of LSU were #73rd nationally.

I'm not saying not a single person in the southeast likes basketball. I live in the southeast and I love basketball. I'm just saying that overall it is a far distant 2nd to football outside Kentucky.

#1 Kentucky - 23,461
#12 Arkansas - 15,247
#20 Tennessee - 13,636
#21 South Carolina - 13,395
#27 Alabama - 11,947
#35 Florida - 10,690
#40 Missouri - 9,930
#45 Vanderbilt - 9,635
#60 Texas A&M - 8,161
#63 Auburn - 7,832
#68 Ole Miss - 7,396
#69 Miss St - 7,314
#71 Georgia - 7,218
#73 LSU - 7,019

You missed a few that were ahead of Florida (Arkansas, South Carolina, Alabama). LSU is at the very bottom of the SEC in attendance, and outdrew us by about 2.5K last year.

Definitely a distant 2nd behind Football - but Kentucky, Arkansas, Tennessee, South Carolina, and Alabama are all still very much in the attendance range of top-half Big Ten schools.
 
#1 Kentucky - 23,461
#12 Arkansas - 15,247
#20 Tennessee - 13,636
#21 South Carolina - 13,395
#27 Alabama - 11,947
#35 Florida - 10,690
#40 Missouri - 9,930
#45 Vanderbilt - 9,635
#60 Texas A&M - 8,161
#63 Auburn - 7,832
#68 Ole Miss - 7,396
#69 Miss St - 7,314
#71 Georgia - 7,218
#73 LSU - 7,019

You missed a few that were ahead of Florida (Arkansas, South Carolina, Alabama). LSU is at the very bottom of the SEC in attendance, and outdrew us by about 2.5K last year.

Definitely a distant 2nd behind Football - but Kentucky, Arkansas, Tennessee, South Carolina, and Alabama are all still very much in the attendance range of top-half Big Ten schools.

I wasn't listing them in order from most to least, just pointing out a few mentioned in this thread. I did forget Arkansas, though.
 
I wasn't listing them in order from most to least, just pointing out a few mentioned in this thread. I did forget Arkansas, though.

SEC does a pretty good job with basketball attendance, it seems. They were 3rd among conferences with 11,080 per game, just behind the ACC with 11,257 per game and ahead of the Big 12 (10,427) and Big East (10,014).

Higher than I was expecting, to be honest. I didn't think basketball was that big in the southeast.
 
Football, spring football, and in some cases, baseball, then basketball at many SEC schools[/Q

" We got 2 sports at Texas------Football and Spring Football "

" Baseball is too slow and the only thing more boring than Track is Field "

DeLoss Dodds AD University of Texas
 
Russ,do the Gators ever play any games(,not in season tournaments) in Jacksonville,Orlando,Tampa Bay,Miami,etc. I think I read somewhere Jacksonville is opening a new big arena.Some schools don't draw well during Christmas break and bring the team's to other parts of the states where alumni can see games easier.I believe Illinois plays some games at the United Center in Chicago .
 
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