Stanford as a benchmark

[torque-cat]

Given that Duke is in its own universe of college basketball, I look at Stanford as a good benchmark comparator of a high academic requirement program. They have elite academics, arguably the most successful athletic dept in the country, have been solid in football another revenue sport, great weather, enormous wealth, high profile pro athlete alums (Elway, Woods, McEnroe, Luck..) and excellent in-state/local recruiting talent.

Somewhat remarkably, Stanford has only made the NCAA tournament once in the past 12 years. They have made the NIT a few times. So our post-season appearance are similar to Stanford's. Given the current state of AAU ball, corrupt recruiting and limited talent pool of academically eligible athletes this makes me wonder how difficult it is to maintain a successful basketball program in a tough academic private school like NU or Stanford.

 

[freewillie07]

Nice post. I agree, it's hard -- but that's why Collins is paid the big bucks.

NU, as far as I can tell, is always going to be something of a developmental program. Collins has struggled to hit consistently on his Plan A recruits, and when he did (Rapolas Ivanauskas and Barret Benson) they ended up not panning out. It has been a struggle, but I truly believe the program is headed in the right direction. There is not a single freshman or sophomore on the roster right now who I think is definitely out of their depth in Big Ten play. Greer is probably the most questionable but as others stated in a different thread, he seems like a capable guy to provide 5-7 "energy" minutes per game to spell Buie/Berry.

There are a lot of good pieces here. I think with Berry, Nicholson and Audige stepping in next year (losing just Spencer/Turner), plus maybe a grad transfer, this is a team that could make noise in the middle of the conference. But we have to get through this season, and I realize that's going to be tough.

 

[GatoLouco]

The other comparables could be Vanderbilt, USC, Georgetown and Notre Dame?

The next tier of academic prestige, in power conferences, is a bit murky, either lower ranked private schools or big state schools: UCLA, Michigan, wake Forest, Virginia, North Carolina, Florida, Boston College, Wisconsin or Villanova

 

[torque-cat]

The other comparables could be Vanderbilt, USC, Georgetown and Notre Dame?

The next tier of academic prestige, in power conferences, is a bit murky, either lower ranked private schools or big state schools: UCLA, Michigan, wake Forest, Virginia, North Carolina, Florida, Boston College, Wisconsin or Villanova

do vandy, usc, nd or gtown maintain the same academic standards for atheletes as we seem to. Unless a lot has changed at gtown I know they don’t. Also not USC. But perhaps the other two?

 

[GatoLouco]

I don’t know. Neither do I know about Stanford. Would bet they don’t.

 

[torque-cat]

I don’t know. Neither do I know about Stanford. Would bet they don’t.

I am only basing Stanford in articles I’ve read that they have had the highest average SAT scores and we were second among football players. Also a lot of cross-recruitment of players and APR scores. Nothing in stone but I suspect Stanford maintains at least as high standards as us for revenue sports.

 

[hdhntr1]

Nice post. I agree, it's hard -- but that's why Collins is paid the big bucks.

NU, as far as I can tell, is always going to be something of a developmental program. Collins has struggled to hit consistently on his Plan A recruits, and when he did (Rapolas Ivanauskas and Barret Benson) they ended up not panning out. It has been a struggle, but I truly believe the program is headed in the right direction. There is not a single freshman or sophomore on the roster right now who I think is definitely out of their depth in Big Ten play. Greer is probably the most questionable but as others stated in a different thread, he seems like a capable guy to provide 5-7 "energy" minutes per game to spell Buie/Berry.

There are a lot of good pieces here. I think with Berry, Nicholson and Audige stepping in next year (losing just Spencer/Turner), plus maybe a grad transfer, this is a team that could make noise in the middle of the conference. But we have to get through this season, and I realize that's going to be tough.[/QUOTE

 

[hdhntr1]

Nice post. I agree, it's hard -- but that's why Collins is paid the big bucks.

NU, as far as I can tell, is always going to be something of a developmental program. Collins has struggled to hit consistently on his Plan A recruits, and when he did (Rapolas Ivanauskas and Barret Benson) they ended up not panning out. It has been a struggle, but I truly believe the program is headed in the right direction. There is not a single freshman or sophomore on the roster right now who I think is definitely out of their depth in Big Ten play. Greer is probably the most questionable but as others stated in a different thread, he seems like a capable guy to provide 5-7 "energy" minutes per game to spell Buie/Berry.

There are a lot of good pieces here. I think with Berry, Nicholson and Audige stepping in next year (losing just Spencer/Turner), plus maybe a grad transfer, this is a team that could make noise in the middle of the conference. But we have to get through this season, and I realize that's going to be tough.

Collins has been successful at getting higher level recruits. But he has had the problem of putting together a complete team. He has had much of this difficulty at the guard position (especially the PG position). The program has been badly hurt by some bad luck as well with Lathon and Bamisle that has set the program back a couple years. In addition, the injury bug has hit us very hard (Rap, Falzone, Ash) it ended their careers before they even got started . Now Buie and because of the lack of depth it hurts us more. Perhaps the guard position (esp PG is more similar to the issues at WR, or DB in that a smaller % of top guys are qualified to get inas would be indicated with the lower average Wonderlick type scores

 

[torque-cat]

Collins has been successful at getting higher level recruits. But he has had the problem of putting together a complete team. He has had much of this difficulty at the guard position (especially the PG position). The program has been badly hurt by some bad luck as well with Lathon and Bamisle that has set the program back a couple years. In addition, the injury bug has hit us very hard (Rap, Falzone, Ash) it ended their careers before they even got started . Now Buie and because of the lack of depth it hurts us more

Agree, but not sure why we continue to mention Lathon. He has done very little in a much weaker conference. Seems also like we may not have gotten/offered Buie if we had Lathon.

 

[hdhntr1]

Agree, but not sure why we continue to mention Lathon. He has done very little in a much weaker conference. Seems also like we may not have gotten/offered Buie if we had Lathon.

Lathon is mentioned because it has led to us playing catchup for the last couple years. Had we not had Bamisle defect, we would have only lost a year but with the combo, we are still about two years behind where we would have been

 

[willycat]

Collins has been successful at getting higher level recruits. But he has had the problem of putting together a complete team. He has had much of this difficulty at the guard position (especially the PG position). The program has been badly hurt by some bad luck as well with Lathon and Bamisle that has set the program back a couple years. In addition, the injury bug has hit us very hard (Rap, Falzone, Ash) it ended their careers before they even got started . Now Buie and because of the lack of depth it hurts us more. Perhaps the guard position (esp PG is more similar to the issues at WR, or DB in that a smaller % of top guys are qualified to get inas would be indicated with the lower average Wonderlick type scores

Time, actually past time to have same standards as ND, Duke, Vandy and BC.

 

[Medill90]

do vandy, usc, nd or gtown maintain the same academic standards for atheletes as we seem to. Unless a lot has changed at gtown I know they don’t. Also not USC. But perhaps the other two?

Absolute no on Georgetown and ND....not even close

 

[torque-cat]

Time, actually past time to have same standards as ND, Duke, Vandy and BC.

What are their standards and what are ours?

 

[willycat]

Absolute no on Georgetown and ND....not even close

yet they along with Duke and Vandy are all in the conversation when elite schools are mentioned. If Admissions would loosen up their standards for one BB player and two or three FB players each year it would certainly help those programs and not hurt NU's high standards a bit.

 

[torque-cat]

yet they along with Duke and Vandy are all in the conversation when elite schools are mentioned. If Admissions would loosen up their standards for one BB player and two or three FB players each year it would certainly help those programs and not hurt NU's high standards a bit.

what are the differences in admissions for NU compared to Duke, ND, Vandy? Who would we have gotten in recent years who were rejected by admissions but would not have been at ND, for example. Just curious f anyone knows the admissions standards personally.