Catching up with Mark Vershaw and recruiting ...

I happened to bump into Mark Vershaw this morning -- his kids and my kids go the the same school...and we chatted.
Most know he grew up in East Peoria leading Robein Junior Hi to the IESA (8th grade) Championship game, and also leading his EPCHS high school team to prominence back in the mid '90's.
He then went on to a nice college career at Wisconin - playing for then coach Dick Bennett (who Mark still frequently keeps in touch with).
Mark has since been in the assistant coaching ranks with a couple years at ICC then Washington State (he was wearing a Washington State sweatshirt this morning), then Cornell, then four years as HEAD COACH at Monmouth College.

Now he keeps busy with his family, his wife Natalie (an avid runner and a teacher in District 150) and his daughter & preschool son. BUT -- he does supposedly have a new job in the works....

As we talked and discussed who's gonna win the Big Ten, how silly it is for the teams in the Big Ten to be in the "Legends" and "Leaders" divisions, and how the Valley will fare this year....
And he also talked about when he played off season/AAU ball back when there really weren't a lot of AAU teams...
He played for Coach Terry Knapp -- who many I am sure know, and whose son Nick Knapp was also on the team.
Others on that mid-90's AAU team included Richwoods' Mike Robinson (who averaged 30 ppg & 10 rpg his senior year and went to Purdue) & Ryan Schmidgall...
BTW -- Robinson also seriously considered Bradley -

http://is.gd/XhXzWT

Anyway -- then Mark revealed his new job that's in the works is on staff at Illinois State University as an administrative assistant.
Rules will prevent Mark from doing any recruiting, scouting, or on floor coaching but he and his new "bosses" hope that he can have some valuable input -- and leadership.
His name should soon appear on the ISU web site but currently it lists ten administrative assistants but Mark's name is not on the list as it exists now.

I also asked Mark how his brother Jim Vershaw is doing - Jim played two years for Bradley.
Ex-Brave Jim is doing just fine in the insurance business...
http://www.countryfinancial.com/jim.vershaw

In time Mark might even help a little in coaching some basketball at his son's school - but he figures that may be a way off....he also says he still rarely sees and keeps in touch with Coach Mo...who recruited him vigorously in high school - Link -
http://articles.chicagotribune.com/1996-11-14/sports/9611140205_1_recruits-prospects-guard

Since he now lives here in Central Illinois and will be looking to get back into coaching, I suspect we will hear more on Mark. He's a great guy and I enjoyed chatting with him.



I saw some comments where people think Bradley has done a terrible job recruiting Chicago lately as compared to other area schools.
Well -- as usual people just don't do their homework and say silly things...
Bradley definitely isn't and hasn't been ignoring Chicago -- but as every other school in Illinois has experienced - it isn't easy for the downstate schools to land kids from Chicago for many reasons..
BTW - Of the recruits BU has landed since last spring - Shayok never played in Chicago - he's a Canadian kid and Hodges & Bell are suburban kids - not really Chicago kids....so I guess one issue is where you draw the line...

Actually, Bradley had 2 Chicago kids last year, which is more than a number of other D1 schools in Illinois.
And it's more than Coach Mo generally had on the roster as well.

Sure, I'd love to get the top Chicago kids - but wake me up when that starts happening regularly. I know Bradley hasn't had a lot of Chicago kids, but other area schools haven't fared much better....

Illinois did not have a single Chicago kid on the roster last year but they did have a couple suburban kids- and they notoriously until recently had big time trouble getting those Chicago recruits.

Loyola, which sits right in the middle of the fertile Chicago recruiting area, had only one Chicago kid, and it was a player named Jon Gac, a kid who certainly hasn't turned their program around and I suspect if he were at BU - we'd be hearing complaints about that as well.

UIC has several Chicago kids, but not a single one of them would have been on Bradley's radar screen - and if you differ, let me know which of the kids on their roster we'd have benefited from.

Northwestern has several Cook County and surrounding area kids, but not a single Chicago kid!-

Northern Illinois has only 3 kids on their roster that are even from Illinois, and only 1 from Chicago, an obscure kid who won't likely be getting any playing time anyway.

And the same is true for all the rest of the D1 schools in Illinois.

ISU has a couple and might actually be said among all Illinois schools they are one of the ones to have had the most success but only one was recruited right out of high school, and he is not a key player for the Redbirds.

WIU, EIU, and even SIU have flirted with a little success but all their Chicago kids stay maybe a year then bolt or get booted...so in the end really no success at all...
In fact I recall all the whining a couple years ago when SIU landed Hare, Dillard, etc...
People raged with "hey, why can't we get those kids and be as successful as SIU is gonna be..."
Hmmmm...look what it got them -- the three worst years of bad play and turmoil in their D-I history!
sorry -- can't use them as an example of someone doing a better job landing the Chicago talent.

Chicago State has a lot of Chicago kids, but I wouldn't particularly want a single one of them as a Bradley recruit, would you?

So instead of just criticizing Bradley and our coaches for not getting kids from some certain area - it would be nice to see folks throw their support UNCONDITIONALLY behind the coach and the team NO MATTER where they hail from.
I'd like to hear an example of who we've missed on from Chicago that ended up going elsewhere and causing us woes...
If we get a whole team of Chicago kids we'd hear complaints that we are not getting the downstate kids. If we get the downstate or Peoria kids, then some complain that we aren't recruiting nationally or that we're ignoring Chicago.
No wonder it takes $ a million to get a guy to want to come here and coach ....geez...

PS - there is one Chicago kid that did get away, DJ Cooper - a great point guard that Geno knows well....and oddly - Ka'Darryl Bell is described by some as a bigger version of DJ Cooper -- so then I guess we all ought to be happy we got KB!!