Do we have any momentum with any recruits at all? When do basketball recruits normally start committing? I have heard ZERO buzz regarding recruiting since Smith lost Chandler (who would have been our highest rated recruit ever, and was a life long Ute fan) to BYU.
Smith either needs to get extremely lucky with a couple of no-name guys like our previous coach, or he needs to be let go, and we need to hire someone flashy in order to get recruits to commit.
So far his recruiting commits have all been guys who were or already had left Utah, but not the ones that we actually wanted to stay, transfers from his previous coaching stop, Dusan Mahorcic, and a handful of ineffective transfers from nowhere.
Here is how I rank his recruits so far:
Marco Anthony – a very good role player that would be in the NBA if he was a better shooter. Our best defender and rebounder. At 6 ft 5, that is not a good thing.
Dusan Mahorcic – A very tough big man, something we were sorely lacking the past few years. Plays angry, doesn’t make a lot of mistakes. Again, not a good offensive player at all, but at least not a turnover machine.
Rollie Worster – Essentially Rylan Jones in a bigger body. Not a terrible player, but not athletic enough to stand out in the Pac12.
Both Gach – Athletic enough to succeed in the pac-12, probably the only guard on the team that can claim this distinction, which is bad news for this team going forward. Can be great sometimes, and utterly useless sometimes.
David Jenkins – Looked to be the go to scorer we needed early on in the season, has all but completely disappeared lately. He’s gone from our best scorer to a guy who hasn’t scored a single point in his last two games, with over 30 minutes of playing time. Seems to be a good shooter, something we desperately need more of, yet he goes ages without even attempting shots. Not sure what is going on with him.
Lazar Stefanovic – A promising young player. Seems to be pretty solid all around but nothing special in any particular category. He looks like the future of this team, which is a sad sad thing.
_____________ That’s it for the good ones, onto the second tier Smith recruits
Riley Battin – The fact that a player like him gets significant minutes on a Pac12 basketball team is an embarrassment to our program. Terrible athlete, terrible defender, terrible ball handler and passer, streaky AF shooter, timid on offense. The proud owner of the ugliest shot on the team. Holy s**t… he’s 6 ft 9, has played significant minutes if not starter minutes every year since he’s been here, and he has a total of 8 blocket shots, EIGHT BLOCKED SHOTS! for his entire career at Utah. Oh yeah, and he’s shooting 27% from three this year. Honestly a 6 ft 9 inch cardboard box with arms would be roughly similar in production.
Bostyn Holt – demonstrated some amount of potential against bad teams early on in the season before his season ended early due to injury.
Gabe Madsen – Transferred here because he couldn’t get any PT on a mediocre Cincy squad. Seems like a decent shooter, but doesn’t have the athleticism or ball handling to create his own shot, much like all but one or two guys on this team.
Lahat Thioune – I like Lahat, but he isn’t a good basketball player. This many years of collegiate level coaching and he still looks lost half the time he’s on the court, and doesn’t seem comfortable with the ball in his hands.
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I will say this, Smith did an admirable job of putting together a basketball roster with some decent pieces in a very short amount of time. That being said, this team is deeeeeeeply flawed, devoid of athleticism and shot creation. Too slow and small on the defensive side of the ball. A team that has such a dearth of athleticism really needs to have an abundance of three point shooting prowess and/or size. Unfortunately, we are sorely lacking in athleticism, length, and shooting.
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