If I can beat vandydave's Dallas team I'll be happy

Maybe if I do a win dance or suddenly receive gameplan enlightenment, I'll get a win in conference play...

In all seriousness, though, I like the 3 freshmen I've got. With a passing fiend of a point guard and a few more recruits next season, I'm excited what this team is going to look like next year and farther down the road. This year is definitely the year of the bumps and bruises, but it'll pay off down the road.

Oh, btw Kevb, Johnson was a walk on who I offered a scholarship last year. I wouldn't recruit such a crappy rebounder. I just figured maybe with a 100 WE and a redshirt he could be somewhat respectable by the end of his career. I needed the 3 freshmen to step in and start, and Johnson was the next best choice for the redshirt.

oops... that should be "oh, btw polo, Johnson was..."

Sooo...do we get to count sigsoho's team into the "# of teams making post-season"???

my opinion is to gamble. you wont get those teams by going elsewhere for 2-3 seasons. the only way you get to AU or Kansas is with a deep NT run again next season. Your only chance at that is ISU. I'd roll the dice and hope everything comes into place come tourney time next season.

that said, even if you make the final four next season, is a jump from ISU to Kansas possible? or must you make a pitstop?

I don't know 'polo...my guess is that kind of jump is very doable, but my current resume may not allow it (I lose my Sweet 16 from Wichita St.), since from what I hear you need multiple runs in NT to make an elite...

Quick glance at the 2 "elites" occupied in Crum, neither has 4 consecutive deep NT runs prior to landing there (Urdanick at Stanford, bluespruce at UNC). What they DO have in common is a championship.

Maybe the question is, can a championship be won from Iowa State? I think it can, at least until the elites are filled. Losing Hamm hurt and you can't predict future runs, but I gotta think my ISU squad will be able to play with anyone next season. I am still strongly leaning toward staying put...I think a higher profile program will enable better recruits to be landed and better chance of success, but all of them look like they are rebuilds right now, so that time has to be factored in as well.

i'd wait and see if anything opens up. if not stay. like i said, your best chance at a deep run next season is with ISU. if nothing great opens up, roll the dice and hope ISU can make it deep in the NT again.

I tend to agree with Polo, I have applied for Pitt as it is my hometown team, and if I get rejected for that, the only other school that is a no brainer for me to leave Southern Miss this year is Penn St (my alma mater). Other than that, it is going to have to clearly be a better situation than I have returning next year.

l-e, I'm not sure if you wanted to to respond on this thread or the one in Crum, so I'll just respond here.

First I'd qualm you're fears about being able to get to the final 4 or win a NT from ISU. SHS just did, so obviously you can as well. Heck in in more established worlds (like Wooden) it wasn't all that long ago that Marshall won the NT. Now as Iowa, Kansas, Wisconsin, etc... get filled up, it will get tougher to recruit at ISU, but it even if all of the surrounding schools fill up this season they'll have so much rebuilding to do that they'll have to avoid any significant battle.

2nd, you've got a good returning team coming back. Hamm would have helped, but I think you're a safe bet to make it back to the NT again, so what is available now, should be available next year. Once you get to the NT, its all about matchups, solid game plans and a little bit of luck. I don't think that you'll have to win the NT to get to Kansas, but getting to another final 4 in the next couple of years will most likely be a must.

Other than Kentucky, I don't think there is a single sim team out there that could be built into a final 4 team in under 2 seasons (of course SHS might have proved that wrong). I think you stand a much better shot staying at ISU than taking over a sim team. Now if there is a human coached school that opened up that wouldn't knock your loyalty rating too much, that's a difference story perhaps.

I don't know how this new update will effect recruiting for sims in D1. The issue that they seem to address has never been a problem for D1 sims like it is for D3 sims. I could be completely wrong, but I think there are now enough near elite human controlled teams that the sim elites will continue to struggle to get solid recruits. I don't think staying at ISU will enable you to land a sim school next year w/ a better roster. Of course I could be wrong on that, perhaps there is something that I'm not seeing that will help a sim coached Kentucky land top talent.

To wrap it all up, if you the only schools other than ISU that you'd want to stay at long term are Arizona, Kansas or UCLA, then I'd stay at ISU until you can get there. The only way I'd move to improve my chances would be under a situation similar to what might happen to Stanford this year where a really solid program controlled by a human opens up that won't kill your loyalty too much.

I guess the other exception would be if you think you can land ISU in another world, and think that a place like wake forest would be a nice step up and a place you could be happy at in crum should you never be able to land your kansas.

Hope that helps.

taz21, you summed up my feelings pretty well. I'm gonna look a little closer at a few schools (GA Tech, Florida, Wake), but given other schools in conference / area I think they'd be tough to make NT in 1st season...I also looked at state sort on recruits and don't see any real "hotbeds" of top rated recruits. I think I'll have 1-2 graduate and be drafted next season, and Wheaton is a probable to leave early, so if that helps recruiting may be nice to grab those feathers for my cap.

Regarding Evansville: Sounds like Providence and Stanford are likely to remain occupied, and I'm reading same with Notre Dame. VTech will be open I'm sure, as will Auburn. Depending on where you want to go, I personally don't think you can quite make an elite from Evansville short of possibly a NC (JMHO). I think you may want to bite the bullet and start the rebuild now, or move up to another team a human had.

Not sure what is open to you, but I'd think Auburn would be rock-solid, a team that you could make a NT run next season, could certainly contend for any recruit, and possibly leapfrog to a top school after only 1-2 seasons. Providence obviously if it opens might be an even better choice.

Looks to me like a lot of coaches who thought they might be able to move up are being disappointed by various factors, so you might be best served to jump at an Auburn or Providence and try to push into the same pack where everyone seems to be logjammed. Good luck in any case.