[UNCbasketballbumParticipant]

Recruiting is the backbone of college basketball.  Great recruiters such as John Calipari, Roy Williams, Jim Calhoun, Jim Boeheim and Bill Self don’t rebuild each year with 5 star recruits, they reload.  Class rankings are already out for the class of 2014 and many kids start getting recruited by the time they start middle school.  What makes guys like John Calipari and Roy Williams such great recruiters?

[Malik-UniversalParticipant]

 ive been wanting to know the same thing

[delfamParticipant]

 past success

[Tongue-Out-Like-23Participant]

Well UNC and Kentucky have all of the background, history, pride, and prestige.  Other than that, Calipari and Roy are just good pitchmen.  They know how to talk to people.  Hell, if they worked as salesmen, I’d think they would be pretty damn successful.

As for how exaclty they do it?  I’m sure there are hundreds of college coaches wondering the same thing.

[paradigmnParticipant]

Maybe……just maybe……it has to do with this…..

[joshinator1Participant]

 The women haha jk http://dimemag.com/2012/04/nerlens-noel-on-recruitment-a-fan-offered-me-his-wife/#more-116824

Tradition has one thing to do with it, schools with great traditions get great coaches, great coaches get great players. But we may never know there true secret to success.

[UNCbasketballbumParticipant]

Getting to play most of your games on national television has to be a big reason why many recruits go to the big-time schools.  If I was recruiting for a Butler, VCU or Wichita State I would tell the kid all the major programs that didn’t recruit them and that if you came to my school we could play in the NCAA tournament and kick all the mcdonald’s all-american’s asses.  Motivation.

[Wahoo757Participant]

I think the two main reasons why coaches like Calipari and Williams are able to consistently get top recruits is that they have a winning pedigree and their teams are perennial contenders, but perhaps more importantly, they prepare the recruits in getting to the NBA because of their sheer coaching ability and their styles of play.

[ivan138Participant]

they also dont mind one and dones unlike ben howland

[LawDeeZeeParticipant]

not to mention access to the players through favorable relationships with AAU coaches, known connections with some of the premier agents in the NBA, and having kids steered in your direction by prominent subjects in the basketball community (i.e. worldwide wes)

[M-EazyParticipant]

Coach Cal recruits by saying "Look at Derrick Rose, Tyreke Evans, DeMarcus Cousins, John Wall, Anthony Davis, etc." 

[surveParticipant]

there is no evidence that Roy is a "great" recruiter outside of UNC or KU.   pretty much any coach can get a top level of recruits at UNC after the legacy that Dean Smith created.  The first championship team Roy had were all Matt Doherty’s players.  Not saying Matt is great either, just further stating that kids want to play for UNC.  I dont agree that Roy is a great developer of NBA talent, but rather that was a true trademark of Dean….and some of that may have carried over…so he is still living off of some of that residue.

Cal was loading up at Memphis, I am skeptical of some of his tactics, but nevertheless, he moved from Memphis, a mid-major, to a major in UK and that really opened the flood gates.  Main reason being….Memphis doesnt get that much airtime on major networks, while UK is seen on a major network every week.  So going from Memphis to UK turned Cal, an already great recruiter into an astronomical one.  Now, Cal doesnt have to go to the talent (virtually), the talent comes to him because of him churning out successful NBA players year in/out.  

Calhoun is a really great coach who can usually get the most out of his players, likewise with Self.  When they are able to do that, they produce really good pros or at least get them to the position of where they will be a high pick.

As mentioned above, the AAU relationships between players and coaching staffs is another big reason in the past 10-15 years.

The biggest factor outside of politics and school history….is….STYLE OF PLAY.   Coaches sell guys on their style of play being suited for their games.   The map out the recruit’s future role with the team and sell them on thats what will get them to the next level…..and of course it always helps when you can point of examples of recent success.

Sometimes, current or past players from a program help with recruiting as well, particularly if a player has a similar style.  UCONN does this a lot I believe.   I remember when Ray Allen helped bring Rip Hamilton in, he told Rip he should come there because he would be the guy to replace him.  

We also know now that during these AAU and All-Star games, players build bonds with each other and that sways decisions as well as there is a lot of recruiting going on between teammates or guys who are considering the same schools.

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