Buckeye Basketball
As Ohio State remains in the news due to the past transgressions of former coach Jim OBrien, the current Buckeyes under Thad Matta continue to make huge strides to rebuild the program. A 20 win season this year and now this. If this holds true OSU will have landed four 5-star blue chip recruits in one class, which is just amazing.
Edit: Just so you don't think I'm homering this, here' s a blurb from CBS Sportsline:
Ohio State or Wake Forest: Oden is expected to choose between the Buckeyes and Deacons, and while we here at SportsLine.com like and respect the coaches from both schools, our guess is Oden (and his best friend and teammate, highly rated point guard Mike Conley) will choose Ohio State. If that happens, the Buckeyes would join Duke's 1997 haul (Elton Brand, Shane Battier, William Avery, Chris Burgess) as the best recruiting classes of all time. Ohio State already has commitments from two top 25 recruits from the class of 2006, Daequan Cook and David Lighty. The 6-5 Cook would have been a potential NBA first rounder in 2006.
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Dan:
June 24th, 2005 - 12:04
Perhaps I’m just naive, but why would so many “great” high school players all of sudden go to Ohio State. It’s not like OSU or Thad has been known for creating a pipeline of NBA prospects.
It doesn’t really matter to me though, Bo Ryan has done a very impressive job with the Wisconsin program and it’s not looking to fall off anytime soon.
June 24th, 2005 - 12:51
Ohio State’s facilities first and foremost are amongst the nation’s best, and then to add the academic possibilities (if you believe they go for that) – we’re more than competent in that department.
Thad did a great job at Xavier in nearly leading them into the Final 4 – and is now being given a bigger program to run. Great coach + Great program = Great recruits.
Besides, it’s not like we sucked ass in the past anyway (least not always).
June 24th, 2005 - 13:09
There are several reasons why OSU would be attractive to any high school kid, and it’s not like OSU has never recruited great basketball players or had great basketball teams. Ohio State is a 2nd tier basketball program, but they are far from being off the radar for local talent.
That said, a big reason why OSU’s 2007 class is so stunning is Thad Matta and Daequan Cook. Matta is an insanely good recruiter. Cook is also the #2 PG prospect in the country who happens to be an Ohio kid that loves the Bucks. Cook is also Conley and Oden’s AAU teammate and they have said they wanted to play college ball together so when Cook pulled the trigger for OSU it started the dominoes to fall. The other 5 star kid (David Lighty) is from Cleveland so you have 2 Ohio kids and 2 Indiana kids. It’s not that implausible.
June 24th, 2005 - 14:55
I still remember…
PG Mark Baker
SG Jammal Brown
SF Jimmy Jackson
PF Chris Jent (or Funderburke after xmas)
C Perry Carter
I still have a poster of Jackson on my wall in his Mavericks jersey, right beside my tribute to Eric Davis, the greatest baseball player of all time.
June 24th, 2005 - 16:35
OSU is a bunch of cheaters… I wonder how much Oden is gettin??