I am horrible at recruiting. I do okay at game planning and using role players to fit my systems, but I have always been a poor recruiter. How do some coaches have solid recruits considering them after the first cycle? How can "C-" schools low mid-majors land recruits rateed in the top 50 at their position? I go after a top 150 player and all I am is out 15k. What is the process?

At that level its all about evaluating battles. You need to be familiar with how prestige affects the value of your recruiting efforts so that you can know if you have a legitimate shot of winning a battle. Between prestige, distance, and available scholarships for each team you should be able to tell with fairly good certainty if you can win a battle. If you can't win based on that then you are just wasting your money by going after the guy.

Its really not that hard to get a guy considering you after the first cycle. Just throw a campus visit or a few home visits at them and that should do the trick. But that is generally a poor strategy with a lower prestige school because you can easily have that guy taken by a higher prestige team and your money is wasted. With anything below about a B+ you are much better served to wait a few cycles to see where the chips fall, and then finding guys who aren't considering anyone, or are considering a team that you know you can beat (based on the analysis mentioned above).

It's also important to develop a sense for what players will be targets of the higher prestige schools (and which ones they'll be willing to fight over), and which ones might slip through the cracks. If you try for a 580-rated recruit that has high potentials across the board, you're probably asking to get poached. You're probably wasting your money on that guy, unless he's hidden in Montana or something. Overreaching is a common error. Try to identify guys that are solid for your team's situation that might not be attractive to or might go unnoticed by the bigger schools.

(All that said, you can't hit a homerun if you don't swing for the fences and be agressive sometimes; but there's a fine line that can be hard to distinguish until you get a good feel for it).

Thanks for the info. I took over my Morehead team four seasons ago. I have a destination school in mind and like to rebuild programs along the way. My 1st season there I brought in 5 freshman who were all ranked around 180-200 at their position and 1 international. The int'l exploded and the 5 frosh developed well and we were winning by our 3rd season. But along the way, I have noticed a ledgendary coach in my conference who consistently pulls down top 30 players in the 1st cycle while having a "C" prestige. Now granted, I'm a C-, and I know that hurts, but usually anyone higher than say 90, tells me to buzz off. I'll figure it out at some point. Thanks for the help.

I have noticed that there are guys ranked that high as recruits, that will in no way become that level of a player. Still however, they are far better than guys in the 180-200 range you talked about. Some people are really good at recognizing those highly ranked guys that the high ranked schools really don't want. I still have no idea where "cut-offs" are of what prestige can target certain ranked guys, but there definitely aren't exact boundaries.

I do wonder if once you get a few of those guys and have a winning history at your school if that helps, even as a C prestige. I'm talking out of my *** because I obviously can't be sure, but I would be willing to bet that a whole lot more goes into it than meets the eye.

I'd say you should go for synergy. Not everybody on your team needs to be able to score, so I'd bring in maybe 2 or 3 guys who can defend well (and rebound well if they're bigs), and then a couple scorers. I like to have 2 scorers starting and one coming off the bench (this guy doesn't need to defend well). Just try to recruit players who complement each other well, is what I'm saying. I look at one of your players (Rhoton) and he can't defend or even score very well, so that guy is kind of useless, try to stay away from the guys who don't do either well.

I'd say you should go for synergy. Not everybody on your team needs to be able to score, so I'd bring in maybe 2 or 3 guys who can defend well (and rebound well if they're bigs), and then a couple scorers. I like to have 2 scorers starting and one coming off the bench (this guy doesn't need to defend well). Just try to recruit players who complement each other well, is what I'm saying. I look at one of your players (Rhoton) and he can't defend or even score very well, so that guy is kind of useless, try to stay away from the guys who don't do either well.

One of the best players I ever recruited was a 6-5 SG ranked #132. We ran triangle/press at UT Chattanooga & he started his final two seasons at PF. He was a beast. We lost in the 2nd round to the eventual NC. There are diamonds out there & I never recruit by stars. Ive had plenty of 3 stars that never panned out.