The top player in the 2013 class will not be headed to Chapel Hill
Julius Randle narrows to 6: Kentucky, NC State, Florida, Texas, Kansas, OU.
— PCAAthletics (@PCAAthletics) October 2, 2012
As well as Carolina, Duke did not make the last cut for who many consider the best player in next season’s class. However, Randle did so by using some advice given to him by coach Williams. While that might not be the news that the Heels fan base wanted to hear, in the world of recruiting “it is what it is”.
North Carolina coach Roy Williams told Randle, a forward at Prestonwood Christian (Plano, Texas), “to be upfront with the schools” that he’s not considering as strongly “so they can move on.”
From the looks of that final group I would say that half of the programs are more for show than anything else, while the front runner should be Kentucky, with maybe Kansas as the second in that list. A far second in my opinion. Like it or not, whether you believe the man is cheating or getting luck or whatever else, coach John Calipari has gotten a hold on how to bring in the top guns each class, tell them they will all get their shot at playing time and move on to the next level. And he has done this each year since he has been in Lexington. And while other schools, including North Carolina, are getting their fair share of players, it seems that of late the fight is always for the second best recruiting class.
I also think that the fact that Calipari has delivered a lot of these young men to the NBA is what is making them go to UK. Add to that that in this technological era probably most of the recruits know one another and speak among themselves and you can see how easy it can be for a school to have become so dominant in recruiting. However, unlike some have stated on blogs and web boards, I do not believe that the “presumed” wrong doings in Chapel Hill have had anything to do with the way recruiting has gone. The football squad has not missed a beat on their trail to bring in players, why would the basketball suffer?
Frankly, while I know that Carolina will be just fine in the end as far the 2013 class, the hold that the Kentucky staff has on “one and done’s” isn’t going to change until either the National Basketball Association makes a rule that you can enter the league only after two years out of high school or one (or more) top notch class does not pan out as well on the court as it did on paper. Until then it’s going to be dog fights that some top programs, including Carolina, might not have expected a few years back to bring in the best of the best.
Going around the web boards most of the Carolina fans are not happy about the loss of Randle, of course coming out with the old “Calipari cheats” theory, which whether I believe that or not, until proven it’s just words that makes the fan base look like whiners needing an excuse on why they lost a recruit to UK. On the other hand, over at the Kentucky’s boards it’s all about what a class they will have and mocking coach Williams’ showing up with 30 rings to show to the power forward. In my mind Randle was Kentucky bound from the get go and the fact that coach Williams told him what he did during the in house visit just makes me believe that more and more. Now for the UNC basketball coaching staff it’s about getting the players that they been focusing on and having the best class they can have come next season.
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