Mistachill
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"VCU (Virginia Commonwealth) is in the lead right now and Coach (Shaka) Smart visited the school yesterday morning for a brief meeting," Payne noted. "I have an official visit to VCU scheduled on the weekend of September twenty-sixth."
July, 2009: Payne is a lefty who can affect the game on both ends of the floor. He was swift with the basketball on drives going left, but when forced right could only compose one or two dribbles in straight line. In the open court, Payne moved across the floor with the ball at a high-speed. He showed a light touch on left hand finishes in the lane and was able to get the ball off at different angles. However, he needs to work on finishing with his right hand. Payne did a good job of keeping his pivots long in the lane so he could step by defenders when cut off. There were occasions foreshadowing that he could become a decent rebounder at the college level, but he lacks assertiveness. Defensively, he took two on ball charges and was able to guard
Wolfpack Ram said:One question I have for people more familiar with state and local H.S. ball: when Coach Smart arrived he mentioned focusing on local recruits but most of his prospects have been outside of the area. Is the talent level in the state lacking right now or is coach pretty much doing what Grant did and working the areas he's most familiar with and has the most contacts?
Two out of our three recruits that are freshmen this year are from Virginia. That's 50% of Coach Smart's recruits since taking the VCU job if you throw in Brandenberg. So how are we missing the boat on in state recruits? Also Davis, Raines and McKie all went to ACC schools.
bighorn said:VCU remains a relative unknown, in terms of regular media attention and bombardment of word-of-mouth conversation - in the more distant outposts of the Commonwealth.
Mistachill said:I totally disagree with that statement. Maybe once upon a time, but not anymore, especially in the b-ball world.
bighorn said:VCU remains a relative unknown, in terms of regular media attention and bombardment of word-of-mouth conversation - in the more distant outposts of the Commonwealth.
bighorn said:Mistachill said:I totally disagree with that statement. Maybe once upon a time, but not anymore, especially in the b-ball world.
bighorn said:VCU remains a relative unknown, in terms of regular media attention and bombardment of word-of-mouth conversation - in the more distant outposts of the Commonwealth.
Chill - let me explain further.
Let's take JM's Travis McKie, for example. We can all agree VCU would love to have him.
The 4-star Richmonder grew going to VCU's summer camp, mainly because it's about two miles from his house; going to Rams' games at the Siegel Center; actually getting to know the Rams' players in pickup games and summer leagues; attending the CAA tournament; reading about VCU and hearing/seeing VCU on electonic media, continuously from November to March; and being able to talk about VCU basketball with all his high-school friends and teammates, who were as up on the subject as he.
Consider: do you think the Greg Burton of Martinsville would be radio broadcasting live from the Rams' NCAA tournament game site, two full days ahead of tipoff, as was the case this past winter?
Do you think the CAA tournament finals would be the lead story on the Front Page of the Staunton newspaper? Would he have gotten to know Eric Maynor personally, if he'd resided in Gloucester?
Now, if McKie had grown up as far as away as - let's say - Suffolk, Manassas or Lynchburg - it is unlikely any of those critical factors would have worked so strongly in VCU's favor.
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