Sorry that's it been so long between posts. Yes, I know I owe you all a comparison post of the CAA seasons of 2007-08 vs 2005-06. Coming soon, I promise.
In other stories, wanted to give a public "Get Better" to my friend Tony Bozzella, coach of the Iona Lady Gaels, who is recovering from abdominal surgery. No truth to the rumor that this was caused by years of being in our Baseball Rotisserie League together. :-)
I also wanted to say welcome aboard to the folks at Big Fly Sports in Hoboken NJ. You'll see them as one of my links. They have a lot of NCAA items I think I'll be getting my Hofstra basketball floormat from you guys shortly. Looks very cool! :-)
Speaking of Hofstra, for those of you paying attention to offseason CAA transactions, Hofstra's highly touted incoming freshman Yves Jules won't be coming to Hofstra in 2008 as planned. There had been a question about his SAT scores and I guess we know now they weren't good enough. He will be attending the prep school Winchendon in Winchendon Massachusetts. Though his letter of intent is no longer binding, Jules will still come to Hofstra in 2009 along with guard Chaz Williams. Hofstra had probably seen this coming, The Pride signed another JUCO recruit back in early May, Cornelius Vines. At Iowa Lakes CC Vines averaged about 18 points, 3 assists, 4 rebounds and 2 steals per game.
This gives Hofstra five JUCO players; Vines, seniors Dane Johnson and Darren Townes, and incoming juniors Tony Dennison and Miklos Szabo. The addition of three JUCO players implies that Pecora has not been happy with his 2005-06 and 2006-07 recruits. Of those recruiting years, probably the best player by far is sophomore Charles Jenkins who was redshirted a year. The other players have been disappointments.
From the 05-06 recruits, senior Arminas Urbutis is for the most part, a very smart, fundamentally sound player. But he is often injured and at other times is seemingly in coach Tom Pecora's doghouse. Senior Zygis Sestokas has a very inconsistent shooting stroke, has not once driven to the basket in the three years I have watched him play, and just might be the worst defensive player I have seen at Hofstra. Mike Davis Sabb at times gives energy and good rebounding and at other times is a foul machine. Finally, his supposedly best recruit, senior point guard Greg "Playstation" Johnson, who had shown so much potential as a freshman on the 26-7 team from 2005-06, has been a major disappointment with his careless ball handling and inability to shoot from the outside.
And from his 2006-07 recruits, other than Jenkins, sophomore center Greg Washington, who was redshirted for that season due to NCAA regulations, shows some potential but is very thin and needs to add weight, along with a better shooting touch. Forward Mantas Leonavicius has barely played in two years and seems to be destined as the 13th man on the team. The jury is still out on 2007-08 recruit sophomore Nathaniel Lester, who at times played well and at other times was very lost on the court.
Its one thing to bring in a JUCO here or there to round off your team. But when you have five JUCO players out of 13 scholarship players, its making a statement about your four year recruits. And that statement is "Maybe they weren't as good as we thought they were".
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