Walter Lemon, John Wilkins, and more...

Don't forget to check the latest on some recruit news...
http://bubravesblogger.blogspot.com/2010/04/some-late-news-on-recruitingtransfers.html


We are getting close -- less than 48 hours and we'll see some action on LOI signing day. Walter Lemon was the Player of the Game in the High School All Star game in St. Louis Saturday night...
read about it here...
http://www.bradleyfans.com/vb/showthread.php?t=15453


John Wilkins will probably take more than a week or so into the signing period to decide...I think he is still being strung along by a certain Big Ten program and is still waiting to see if a scholarship will be there for him.
He should make his decision based on what HE WANTS...by waiting and being at the total mercy of the recruiters and the schools that are offering, he is willing to be used as a fall back plan and allows everyone but himself to actually make the choice.
Bradley is clearly the best place for him...ten thousand great, supportive fans...and we can see they already want John way, way more then the fans at the other schools who aren't even interested in John Wilkins or who have stated openly that they don't want to even offer him!


Some talk on message boards of who should be DePaul's assistants....and one main emphasis is that they have to be well connected in Chicago...
and one name that has come up over and over is Lance Irvin - who of course is the well travelled assistant who is connected well to the AAU scene in Chicago (Mac Irvin).

But here is a summary of Lance Irvin's background....some might say he never stays long enough at any one place to help them and his recruits are often troubled kids who actually cause a program to go downhill.

Currently Lance Irvin is assistant at SIU, but in the

You want Lance Irvin as the head coach of DePaul? What has he done besides wreck every program or get the coach fired at whatever school he's worked at?

DePaul (92-97)- ended with Joey Meyer getting fired
Loyola (98-01)- ended with Larry Farmer getting fired
Iowa State (01-02)- ended with Larry Eustachy getting fired
Illinois State (02-03) - Tom Richardson got fired
Texas A&M (03-04) - ended with Melvin Watkins getting fired
Missouri (05-06) - ended with sleazy Quin Snyder getting fired
SMU (06-08) - The SMU teams have gone 14-17, 10-20, and 9-21 in that interval
and now SIU who hasn't made the tourney in 3 years after being dominant for the better part of the 2000's.

Not one of those Lance Irvin assisted team has ever made the NCAA tournament...and the very players he is associated with landing (numerous at Iowa State & Missouri) and especially the Chicago kids at SIU (Dillard, Hare) have been disasters.....in fact way worse than disasters, they have been the very reason the coaches have gotten fired in many cases.
So I guess it's up to Oliver Purnell, but I am gonna guess that Purnell is NOT going to be duped by the Chicago AAU connection and will not look past the terrible track record of Lance Irvin over all those years.
I am going to predict Irvin is NOT hired as assistant at DePaul.
BTW - the name of Chicago Julian head coach, Loren Jackson has also come up...


John Wilkins was supposedly at ISU this past weekend - and again nobody on their boards seems even interested. Is this new??...nope....this is the way a lot of schools treat recruits - with disinterest. That's what we saw when John visited Indiana...but John is the son of an ISU legend...so shouldn't he have been treated with a little more respect and honor there??
(BTW- Bradley is quite different with guys like John Wilkins the topic of constant buzz & fan interest!!)

John's father Jeff Wilkins is one of the all-time greats at ISU.
Everyone agrees Jeff Wilkins was a great player at ISU and is still arguably one of their TWO BEST EVER!!
That begs the question why in thirty years the folks at ISU have never seen fit to reward Jeff with a plaque, a banner, the retirement of his jersey or his number, or even a simple ceremony pointing to his great accomplishments...
Flash Flanagan has a tremendous knowledge about ISU basketball -- after all he coached there and landed Jeff Wilkins for them...but even Flash also has been totally forgotten by the ISU -- his memory thrown by the Redbirds into the trash heap...
They don't celebrate anyone over there except one person...
...and they would have changed the entire city's name to Collinsville had that name not already been taken, but the rest of their greats have never gotten a peep from anyone...
They treat their old-timers very poorly there - unlike the way they get treated at BU. Bradley has had the old timers - as many as can come - back for at least some every every single year!!

Hopefully nobody needs to remind the Wilkinses of those facts.....


Just a couple months ago - Iowa State's Craig Brackins was being talked about like the 2nd coming of Kevin Durant.....a sure lottery pick!!
So he has left school and declared for the NBA Draft...but suddenly for no clear reason - his stock is dropping.....
Nobody's really sure why, maybe Craig has been staying too far under the radar...not getting out and getting seen??
He has dropped enough that some projections don't even have him in the 1st round...maybe the emergence of many other big men like Patterson, Orton, and Cousins from Kentucky and Hassan Whiteside, Al Farouq Aminu have also helped push Brackins down?
NBADraft.net now has Brackins going well into the 2nd round at the #42 spot to the Bulls...(projection only)..

Likewise DraftExpress also has dropped Brackins well into the 2nd round...
did Craig Brackins wait one year too long?? He might have been mid-1st round last year when there weren't so many good big men in the draft as there are this year.
Time will tell......but again, just maybe John Wilkins will note that he was promised the playing time and the roster spot Craig Brackins was vacating at Iowa State.
Will the terrible coaching there and bad records/poor performance there year after year hurt the next round of top players at Iowa State, even though it looks like they might already be out of the running for John Wilkins.
BTW - the other Iowa State guy that declared, Marquis Gilstrap, is also plummeting - -so what's happening? Now almost NOBODY has Gilstrap even being drafted and just a month ago people were saying he was a 1st rounder...
did folks finally take their BCS-blinders off and realize that players like Udoh, Whiteside, and Hayward are better players?
Also - note how FEW Euro guys are projected....a break in tradition of everyone drooling for the next Dirk Nowitzki.


Talk of talented Chris Colvin bolting at Iowa State...announcement shortly...
http://www.cyclonefanatic.com/forum/mens-basketball/87375-chris-colvin.html

Also - some rumors starting that Iowa State is trying to buy out and get rid of Greg McDermott...too many losses, both games and talented players...
Generally where there's smoke there's fire, and some are hearing rumors that something's already cooking there.
People basically just seem to want to end it and not cost the athletic department too much $$.
http://www.bit.ly/cL8lNX