[NU Sports] The basketball team

[Jeff Beamsley]

IMHO, the basketball program has to do the same thing that the football
program did.

There has to be a investment in facilities, but more importantly, there has
to be an investment in recruiting both locally and nationally.  As our
football coaches have shown, having high academic standards can be an
advantage if you find the right kid.  If we aspire to be competitive with
Duke and Stanford academically, we have to be competitive with them in
recruiting academically gifted basketball players.

For example Stanford has a kid (Dildy) from MLK in Chicago.  If that kid can
get into Stanford, he can certainly get into Northwestern.

Duke has three kids from the Chicago area on their roster.  If they could
get into Duke, they can certainly get into Northwestern.  More importantly,
Duke has no kids from NC on its roster, so clearly they have a national
view.

OK maybe comparing ourselves to Duke and Stanford is too tough.  How about
Vandy?

They've got a kid from Indianapolis on their roster.  He could certainly get
into Northwestern too.  They've only got one kid on the roster from TN, so
they have a national focus. 

By comparison, most of the NU roster is either from the Chicago area or
Europe.

BTW, I don't think that it is the style of BB either. According to
Wikipedia, four NBA teams run some version of the Princeton offense. There
are also other college teams who play the Princeton style of basketball, are
very successful, and send kids to the NBA (e.g. Georgetown and NC State).
It may not look like Carmody's version of the offense, but this offense can
look a lot different with athletic players and a big center.

Jeff


-----Original Message-----
From: nwu-sports-bounces at tssi.com [mailto:nwu-sports-bounces at tssi.com] On
Behalf Of Dennis W. Brandt
Sent: Tuesday, January 16, 2007 11:32 AM
To: nwu-sports at tssi.com
Subject: Re: [NU Sports] The basketball team

Sorry, but it IS past time - WAY past time - to pay attention to the
basketball team's won-loss record.  A few years back when we were .500 in
the Big 10, that was great, but not only did we not swim forward, we sailed
backward to Doormatville.  Carmody is not the problem except in his
inability to recruit quality basketball players to Northwestern.  Yet, we
cannot isolate him as the sole recruiting concern.  Our eternal losing
credentials and demanding academic requirements are also major issues, as
are our small, relatively unimpressive facilities.  Nonetheless, somehow,
someway, tiny Wake Forest convinced Tim Duncan to go there.

I hope you are right about the youth and the incoming class, but my gut
reaction to that is to quit promising to kiss me and PLANT A BIG BUSS ON MY
CHOPS ONCE! 

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