Comments

Dan I was reading on bloggersodear that Eric katenda is supposed to visit wake forest.  Here is a 4star guy.  Have you heard any news about this??

WinstonMan78 on 03/24/2011 (10:43 am)

Re: Star ratings I give you VCU, Butler and Richmond.

I give you VCU led by 4 star prospect former NCHSAA player of the year 5th yr SR Jamie Skeen.

I give you Butler led by 4 star Sr former 1st All Stae Indiana HS (the other 4 Eric Gordon, Jeff Teague, JuJuan Johnson and Robbie Hummel) Matt Howard and 2 freshman top 150s.

Richmond gets an ‘any given night’ upset and Belmont to get to 16. They’ll get crushed by Kansas.

Now would you like to talk about all the 4s and 5s on the other 13 teams?

Believe whatever you want, stars matter. Duke, Carolina, Kansas, Kentucky, Ohio St: they win the most games because they have the most stars. Find a championship contending team (Butler and VCU are, Richmond is not) and you’ll find a talented 4 or 5 star player pulling the wagon.

Every team in the ACC has 5-7 top 150 recruits MINIMUM. If you expect to play with them every night you better be the same. VCU and Butler can certainly beat anyone in the country on a given night. If both play in the ACC, neither makes the tournament to have a given night.

It’s no different than Boise St and TCU in football. I’m a firm believer that both teams could have beaten Auburn more times than Auburn beat them. I’m equally convinced neither of them would do better than 5-3 in the SEC.

There’s a difference in being a winner and being a consistent winner. That difference is called talent

Joey D on 03/23/2011 (10:21 pm)

I wish Ari all the best and will cheer for him wherever he lands.  (And I have a horrible fear that at some point in the future, he’ll drop 30 points on us one night).  Last year, Ari had the benefit of all the attention given by the other teams to Aminu, but he took full advantage of that (as he should have) and had a great freshman year.  This year, we (rightly or wrongly) had high expectations for his sophomore year.  However, early on, it was clear that something wsn;t quite right.  I posted several times throughout the year, including when Ari was playing pretty well early in the season, that he just seemed to be lost (or ignored) in the offensive system.  We’ll never know whether Ari never bought into the coach’s system or the coach’s system never adjusted to take advatange of the skills he clearly has.  All we know is that halfway through the season, the relationship was over and now he is gone.  So, once again, best wishes Ari and I look forward to seeing you play again with the same joy, passion and emotion we saw from you last year.

Hugh on 03/23/2011 (5:50 pm)

This is how I believe, OK? I’m from the old school. I believe this: I would rather play with 10 people and get penalized all the way until we’ve got to do something else. Rather than play with 11 when I know that right now that person is not sold out to be a part of this team. It is more about them than it is about the team. Cannot play with them. Cannot win with them. Cannot coach with them. Can’t do it. I want winners. I want people that want to win.

- Mike Singletary

Casey on 03/23/2011 (4:32 pm)

Lord I thought this was over…..but it doesn’t look like you guys are ever going to bury this corpse. It’s been getting ripe since October!!!

A couple of thoughts regarding the need to have 4 and 5 star players to compete at the highest level. I give you VCU, Richmond and Butler. Granted they could get blown out over the next few days but the exhibition that VCU put on against Perdue was a thing of beauty…..I would actually pay good money to see Wake play that kind of basketball….4 and 5 stars aren’t going to play like that though cause it don’t highlight their skills (unless of course you have Coach K telling them they can go elsewhere unless they do it HIS way…..having respect and credibility coming from winning championships helps but we don’t have much of that either).

Jamie must feel like that Iraqi cab driver who got across the bridge right before the smart bomb put it in the river. It’s been fun to watch and I for one wish him the best…...he is playing his butt off and he deserves it.

Deacon23 on 03/23/2011 (4:30 pm)

Patrick,

I was very clear in my ratings.
rank 1-25 5 star (I used Rivals)
2008 #17 Ty Walker

rank 26-75 4 star
2009 #52 Ari Stewart
2010 #53 JT Terrell
2010 #57 Travis McKie

rank 76-150 3 star
2007 #147 Gary Clark
2010 #88 Melvin Tabb
2010 #91 Carson Desrosiers

Not Top 150, NOT 3 star
2009 CJ Harris
2010 Tony Chennault
2011 Chase Fischer
2011 Daniel Greene
2011 Anthony Fields

Others may go with 1-25 5star 25-100 4 star 101-250 as 3 star. Or they may rate by position Top 5, Top 20, Top 50. It makes coaches and fans feel better about themselves and their recruits. In that case CJ, Tony and this next year’s class are 3 star.

I’m not so generous.

Joey D on 03/23/2011 (3:41 pm)

The more I see of this, the sadder it gets. I assumed that maybe Ari was a bit of a problem kid with a bad attitude thus making him hard to coach. From what Dan said about his personality, that does not appear to be the case. I find it hard to believe that an intelligent kid with great ability cannot be coached to be productive. Granted, I do not know enough about the facts of this situation, but it appears to be a lack of either coaching ability or tolerance. As a coach, you have complete control of playing time. That along with the your position should give you plenty of leverage to be able to influence a player positively. It is one thing to have a player of modest ability seek greener pastures elsewhere, but Wake needs to retain and develope all of their talented players as I do not see any sign that Bzdelick can recruit this level of player himself.
It’s going to be a long walk out of the wilderness.

Ken Nowell on 03/23/2011 (11:32 am)

I am not a great believer in the geographic cure, but I hope Ari gets his stuff together and gets into a program where he can thrive just as Jamie Skeen has done at VCU.

I am among the legions who believe our BB program under Bzz with Wellman’s backing is in a shambles. However, I also believe that every coach has to have standards, and players must understand and meet those standards if they want to play.

Regarding star ratings for recruits: It appears that Wellman, Grobe and Bzz have all decided to sing from the “stars don’t matter” page.They will probably be singing that while Duke, UNC,Fl State, etc compete for championships with 4-5 star recruits while we are mired in the bottom 3rd of the league in BB and FB with 2-3 star players.

Jerry on 03/23/2011 (10:54 am)

Doug, sorry I missed you at the wall. I understand how those conversations go.
Keenon Rush is a redshirt freshman walk-on from Atlanta who had a really good career as a quarterback at McCallie School in Chattanooga.

Dan on 03/23/2011 (10:27 am)

Why is everyone acting like this is the first time we’ve had someone transfer or leave the program? Over the last 4 coaching administrations we’ve had dozens of kids who didn’t stay for one reason or another.

Ari, if you read this, thanks for some great moments last year and I wish you the best.

Oh, and to Joey: your rankings are off.CJ and Chennault were 3* and Carson was a 4*. Terrell and Tabb are both working hard and don’t have a problem with Buzz. Ty is just being Ty.

Patrick W. Crist '07 on 03/23/2011 (9:29 am)

Dan, I know this blog was about basketball but while this is fresh on my mind can you check in on something for us.  I went to football practice yesterday , saw you there working the crowd. I was going to try and ask you then but no lie some Notre Dame fan talked my head off for an hour and twenty minutes…Anyway who is this Keenon Rush? Number 7 , quarterback. He was out there, and listed on the spring roster they provide but this morning he is not listed on the spring roster on the Wake web-site.

Doug on 03/23/2011 (9:09 am)

You said, ” I would like to thank Ari Stewart for his efforts, but if he was not willing to put in enough effort to contribute to a winning team, then I think that leaving was the best thing he could have done for himself…”  The point is that he does want to “put in the effort to contribute to a winning team.”  He’s just got sense enough to know that Buzzball and winning don’t go together.

A lot of the Colorado players left when Bz arrived.  I guess the question now is how many more players Wake will lose over the next couple of months.  We were NOT a rebuilding project when Bz arrived, though he sure made it look that way.  But if we lose much more of our talent, we WILL be a rebuilding project next year. Thank you Mr. AD!

Ari, I too wish you the best and thank you for your contributions.  I also want to apologize, on behalf of those in Wake’s leadership who will not, for creating the situation that put you in this position.  Good Luck!  I will be following your career and cheering you on!

gt on 03/23/2011 (12:33 am)

Well it appears Ron and Bz have made their bed and now they have to lay in it.  This confirms Bz will be here for at least 3 year unless the higher up force him out.  Ron has bet the house on this guy and there is no turning back now.  Between Dino’s buyout, Bz buyout from CO, the impact to the players Bz have pushed out and or gave up on, and down turn in recruiting, Ron can only fire Bz if he fires himself also.  Since we were so bad last year, this will enable Ron and Bz to try to re-sell us the story about progress next year and I am sure they will lay it on thick.  I am pretty sure with increase player experience and and non conference scheduling adjustment, will see between 12 and 16 wins next year, we may even knock on 20’s door 2 years from now, but based on Ron’s justification for firing Dino, and the level of investment made, anything less than a sweet 16 appear in 2013 would be considered a failure, and should result in the firing of both Ron and Bz.  DC I get your points about Ari,  but if you look at his film at the beginning of the year and at the end of the year, he was two different people.  You saw him trying to work on his defense and improve his ball handling, by the end of the season he seemed not to know his place on the team.  For young talented kids this can be devasting.  The coach has to help them find their place and reassure them of their place and value to the team, either as a starter on as someone coming off the bench.  Based on how things appear to have gone down with Woods, Tabb and Ari this is not a strength of Bz’s.  It appears if a player does not fit Bz’s mode he has little tolerance for them.  Regarding Ari asking to be released, none of us probably know to full story, but sometimes asking to be released is a nice way of saying pushed out.  Sindey Lowe at NCST asked to be released this year too:-)

Frank II on 03/23/2011 (12:31 am)

Sorry to hear that Ari is leaving us.  He still has good potential.  We owe him thanks for his efforts here abd I know everyone wishes him well.  I hope he makes it big as a player somewhere.

DannyB on 03/22/2011 (8:53 pm)

Dan,

Thanks for the update on Ari.  I too would like to extend him the best in whatever direction he decides to proceed from here. 

I am not so sure it is ok to blame Coach Bzdelik for Ari Stewart’s lack of progress or his ultimate departure.  The fact of the matter is that Ari gave up more points than he scored during his freshman year.  But he still played quite a lot of minutes for a freshman.  And he got a lot of minutes at the beginning of this passed season too.  But still no progress.  When some of the other wing players like JT Terrell and Travis McKie are progressing, that is going to mean reduced minutes for Ari. 

As Coach Bzdelik said, coaches don’t decide minutes.  Players do.  I also remind everyone that Ari requested to be released from the program.  He could have sat down with the coach to set up an offseason plan geared towards improving his ball handling and lateral quickness for defense.  But he chose to leave.  I would like to thank Ari Stewart for his efforts, but if he was not willing to put in enough effort to contribute to a winning team, then I think that leaving was the best thing he could have done for himself and the rest of the guys who are committed to getting better.

DC on 03/22/2011 (8:18 pm)

Dan, I saw Ari Stewart play this season; he wasn’t very much, and I saw him as lazy.  He was ‘gone’ before he was gone.
I hope Coach Bzdelik is doing some bold recruiting about now.  We could end up next year with seven or eight players, including walk-ons.  Do you know anything?

Lee Anglin on 03/22/2011 (8:12 pm)

The ugly basketball picture at my alma mater keeps getting uglier and uglier. I believe it would do Bz and Wellman to come out and face the music, er, media and, more importantly, the students, alumni and fans. It seems those two are taking extreme pains to run the program into the toilet! Speak, Wellman, speak! We need to hear from you!

Ken Green on 03/22/2011 (7:25 pm)

Coach Bz has a problem with:
Ari Stewart 4star recruit
Ty Walker 5star recruit
JT Terrell 4star recruit
Melvin Tabb 4star recruit

Coach Bz is ok with:
CJ Harris 2star recruit
Tony Chennault 2star recruit
Nikita Mischeriakov 2star recruit
Carson Desrosiers 3star recruit

Bzdelik has recruited for next season
2 2star recruits.

For star rankings 5* top 25 4* top 75 3* top 150 2* everyone else.

Is there anyone who believes we can win ACC games with 2star talent???

Joey D on 03/22/2011 (6:30 pm)

Mixed reveiws here Dan - As a ticket holder I loved this guy as a freshman & saw no improvements as a soph & actually think he went backwards in many areas - espicially with the turnover’s - Dan what do you think is going on with Ari?? - I think he has to be more then academics no??..

Rich on 03/22/2011 (4:17 pm)

My opinion, unencumbered by a lot of facts, would be that BZ has mangled a great coaching opportunity with him, just as he did with the others who have left. I am all for giving people chances to succeed such as Wellman is doing with BZ, but what about BZ doing the same with Ari, Melvin, and Tony?
In essence, BZ is saying that he is not a good enough coach to get it done with them and mold them into better players. Alas, the evidence speaks for itself with the players that are left. Not much improvement with them this year.

Ray Nasser on 03/22/2011 (3:26 pm)