Mapping out the future

CHAMPAIGN – As he entered the Kiel Center in St. Louis for a high school basketball event, Bruce Weber had seating options.

He could sit in the lower level, alongside the other college coaches scouting the 1998 KMOX Shootout, a showcase of high-level prospects from around the country. Shoot, he could sit courtside if he wanted to. There he would be visible to fans and recruits.

Weber sought the opposite. He wanted to be invisible. In his first season as the head coach at SIU, Weber was 1-3 and coming off a 26-point loss at Creighton. Peace and quiet sounded more appealing than handshakes and stares.

"This is a true story," Weber says, pointing a finger for emphasis. "I still remember, during (player) introductions, I sat way up high in the gym. I sat real high because I was embarrassed to be there. We were struggling so bad."

And then came the recruit. The buzzworthy recruit, the type of talent that can overhaul an outlook, whether it's a coach's or a program's or a fan base's, with the swish of a jumper or the rattle of a rim. In this case it was Kent Williams, a star from Mount Vernon High School. He was committed to Weber and the Salukis.

"Kent started making shots, and I started to move down. I moved down and sat with the Mount Vernon crowd after he hit a bunch of threes," Weber says. "He kept making shots, and I kept moving closer to the court. By the end of the game I was sitting on press row."

And the Illinois coaching staff's disposition has shifted – as SIU's did when Kent Williams set a KMOX Shootout record with 48 points – from hesitant to hopeful.

"We've gone from 'Bruce Weber can't recruit' to now most likely having back-to-back top 10 recruiting classes nationally in 2009 and 2010," says Joe Henricksen, a veteran recruiting analyst with Chicago's City/Suburban Hoops Report. "That's awfully impressive."

***

This July evaluation period, as coaches crisscross the country scouting prospects, has allowed the Illinois staff to sleep better and dream big.

Last year the July evaluation period gave it nightmares. In 12 months – less than that, really – Illinois recruiting has gone from a ticket that wouldn't sell to a marquee screaming "(Almost) Sold Out."

On July 27, 2007, Illinois had one oral commitment, and then-rising sophomore Jereme Richmond wasn't scheduled to arrive on campus for almost three years. Since then, seven more players have committed to or signed with Illinois. Eight, if you count Kentucky transfer Alex Legion.

"I think you count him," Weber says. "He's probably the highest-rated guy we have in our program."

This time last year, Illinois recruiting targets were flying off the board, and not to Champaign-Urbana. Scott Suggs to Washington. Michael Dunigan to Oregon. DeAndre Liggins to Kentucky. Iman Shumpert to Georgia Tech.

Miss after miss, Weber searched for the right formula, shaking his head along the way. It's not like these were long-shot targets, guys the Illini were reaching to secure. These were in-state talents and prospects with clear ties to Illinois, and the Illini were whiffing like a blindfolded batter.

The first recruiting letter Suggs received was from Weber. Shumpert's high school coach was firmly in Illinois' corner. Dunigan visited an Illinois team camp even though his team wasn't in the field. And on, and on.

"You looked at what we did, with the guards, and it didn't make any sense why guys wouldn't go to Illinois," Utah Jazz star and future Olympian Deron Williams says. "Why wouldn't you want to have that freedom?"

"It was very disappointing," Weber says during a break from the July madness. "I thought last year and the years leading up to that, we worked very hard, putting the time and effort in. It didn't always come with production.

"Then we had some disappointing situations happen. It became a little frustrating. And I told the coaches – and this was something I learned on my own and with coach (Gene) Keady – you can't worry about the recruit you didn't get, you have to worry about the one you can get. That one, in the long haul, might end up being better than the one you didn't get. If you just sit there and cry about it, you'll just end up getting nobody."

If the results and the correct approach weren't there, their recruiting efforts still were. At one point last July, Weber hit four cities and four events in two days and two time zones, trying to salvage what gradually appeared to be a lost cause.

"Recruiting, in all my 30 years of doing this, it's a very frustrating thing. There's no logic to it," Weber says. "There's no exact science to it. It doesn't always make sense."

To ease the mood of a program spiraling backward, Weber began playing soothing music in the UI basketball offices. No one was dancing.

"They had reached the critical point," says Henricksen, the recruiting analyst. "The perception was that Illinois had missed on capturing recruiting glory following the magical Final Four season."

***

The Illinois staff's altered approach has been documented ad nauseam: extending early scholarship offers (Crandall Head) and believing in promise over achievement (Joseph Bertrand); securing suburban Chicago standouts (Brandon Paul) while improving relations in the Public League for later on (the celebrated 2011 class); maintaining a pipeline like Peoria (D.J. Richardson) and closing on an out-of-state prospect deal that might have slipped away in the past (Tyler Griffey).

"It's a good feeling to watch a game and have (other coaches) come up to you and say something nice about a kid (who is committed to your program)," assistant Jay Price says.

The hiring of Jerrance Howard, an enthusiastic and bleeding-orange Illini, jump-started or cemented the turnaround, depending on who you ask.

"Jerrance is as good as it gets," says Evan Daniels, a national recruiting analyst for Scout.com.

"July, to me, this is like a kid in a candy store," Howard says.

Two weeks ago Weber sat courtside as three Illinois recruits – Richmond, Paul and Richardson – combined for 64 points in one game at the Nike Peach Jam in Augusta, S.C.

Days later, he watched some of the nation's top eighth-graders hold court in a Louisville gymnasium, because he can. Such is the luxury of having six prospects committed during the next two recruiting classes. Energies that would have been focused on the next recruiting class are focused on two or three or even four classes into the future.

"Some writer up in Chicago joked with me, 'OK, so you're here for the fifth-grade game?' Weber says. "A couple of the kids weren't in fifth grade, but they looked like it. They were poking fun and teasing me. But if that's our niche in recruiting, we're OK with that."

One thing that hasn't changed: the Illinois staff's cautious, almost pessimistic, outlook toward the recruiting process.

"Who's ever happy? You don't have them until they come on campus," assistant Wayne McClain says. "That's why you've got to keep them happy. People think you've got them just because they've committed. But those kids want to be recruited just as hard as before they committed. That's the most important part of what we're doing."

Weber admitted to having his head on a swivel at AAU events, watching to see who else is watching, a tic known as the Eric Gordon Neck Ache.

"If you have a kid committed and they play well, it's pretty exciting to be there. But at the same time, with what we went through with a certain recruit, once you experience that, you're still leery," Weber says. "There's no doubt we're still gun shy. Every time you turn your head and you're looking around, is someone trying to pull a big one on us?

"Not that we didn't have that attitude when we recruited E.J., but until you experience it, it's like anything in life, you're always worried about it."

***

During the first leg of the July evaluation period, a 10-day stretch, Illinois staffers scouted events in Cincinnati, Indianapolis, Louisville, Rock Island, Philadelphia, Akron, Chicago, Memphis, Denton (Texas) and Augusta (S.C.). The second leg ends Thursday, wrapping the most gratifying of the six July swings the staff has experienced at Illinois.

"It's a good feeling to see them there all the time. But I'm used to it now," says Richardson, who, along with Bertrand, Griffey and Paul can sign national letters of intent in November. "They've been watching me since I was a freshman in high school. It's like they're coaching me. It's like I'm playing at U of I right now. I really know them well."

Still, Weber exercises caution.

"With some patience and perseverance, we've turned the corner. But there's still a long way to go," he says. "We've got to get them signed, they've got to get their grades, and they've got to be productive.

"Do you win the war in November, or do you win the war when it really matters? Do you win the signing day war, or do you win the war of W's and L's? That's the most important one when it comes down to it."

At the moment Illinois is faced with an unusual dilemma: Before it gets much better, it could get bumpy again. Memories of a root canal-ish 16-19 season linger, and the current roster is unproven. The upcoming season figures to be a bridge-the-gap campaign prior to the expected arrival of four heralded recruits for the 2009-10 season.

"I don't think there's ever any solace. This is a huge year for us," Weber says. "We've got some pretty good young kids, some good scoring weapons. Just for our mind-set, we need to win.

"For the big-picture mind-set, hey, the future looks pretty good. We've got some good players coming. But right now we're worried about being successful now."

In recruiting circles there's a buzz around the program's future that has been sorely vacant since the Final Four run in 2005. Remember when it seemed Illinois couldn't give away a scholarship?

"It's funny, there is now so much momentum on the side of the Illini and their recruiting efforts you almost wish they had more scholarships to work with," Henricksen says.

From this time last year to now, the recruiting swing is dramatic. But for Weber, the overhaul is not unheard of.

"At one stretch," he says, "Matt Painter and I got 17 players in an 18-month period that we recruited and signed. Now, we were starting over an entire program at SIU."

At Illinois, they've tried to overhaul a recruiting culture, and the July performances of their recruits have given Weber "a little pep in his step," Howard says. To close the first leg, Weber drove back to C-U instead of waiting for a delayed flight.

"It wasn't a bad drive," Weber says.

It's easy to figure out why.

"There's never really any solace until you get them on campus and you win. Win games, win championships," he says, pausing and then adding, "Now, when you're (1-3) at SIU, you're worried if you can ever win another game, and you go see Kent Williams score (48) points in the KMOX Shootout, it makes you feel pretty good. There's some solace."

Makes it easier to find a seat, too.

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