Jared Guest Signs with VCU: Why Wasn't Carolina a Player?
by Gamecock Man on May 11, 2011 11:31 PM EDT
in South Carolina Gamecocks Basketball
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PrintTip of the hat to typtic67, who has been helping us follow this story in the comments sections.
6'8 PF Jared Guest has signed with the VCU to play his college ball for Shaka Smart and the Rams. If you haven't heard of Guest, don't be surprised. He hasn't been a priority for our basketball program.
The problem is that he should have been. Guest is a Columbia native who is playing prep ball in North Carolina. He's a homegrown talent. He's pretty good--he averaged 15 ppg last season. In addition to VCU, he got attention from several major programs, including Oklahoma St., Minnesota, Georgia, and Maryland. Notice that each of those programs--even once lowly Georgia--has recently enjoyed success that should make Carolina fans drool. Guest plays at a position of need for Carolina. Moreover, he seems to be exactly the kind of player who Darrin Horn has repeatedly said he's in the market for, a guy who's big enough to effectively play the post, but who's versatile enough to play full-court defense and spread the court on offense. He's the kind of player who could have had a place in Horn's system.
It doesn't bother me so much that we didn't sign Guest. After all, one could hardly blame him for choosing VCU over Carolina. (Yes--while that statement is absolutely true, is is shameful that we've now fallen so far behind a mid-major.) What really bothers me is that we apparently weren't really interested in this guy. Horn should have absolutely done everything in his power to get this kid on campus and to show him what we have to offer. There's nothing I can see that suggests it would was rational for him to do otherwise.
Unfortunately, after this recruiting omission, Carolina fans are left wondering if Horn has this program even remotely headed in the right direction. The evidence lately isn't encouraging.
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Thanks GM
Its sad to see the wheels come off the hoops program. There is so much upside to Carolina – a competitive league, above-average instate h.s. talent, proximity to Atlanta, Charlotte, excellent facilities – yet our program is in the ditch.
We have precisely two upper-classmen returning next season and seem to be content to finish this recruiting season with only one new recruit (a PG) and just ten scholarship players returning for 2011-2012.
If Coach Horn is recruiting a replacement for Holloway, it’s not being reported that any recruit of that caliber is visiting/considering us. We know Darrin Horn can recruit, but I fear he’s run out of things to say.
I am very pessimistic for next season – while at the same time I’m hoping we improve. No one wants a third back-to-back sub .500 season.
They wore garnet helmets.
I agree with you both...
As I wrote back in April – http://www.leftoverhotdog.com/articles/recruiting/gamecocks-should-be-targeting-jared-guest.html
This is a kid Horn should have been going after. Yeah he may not have a stellar academic record but that never has been a problem. I would love to know why Horn did not even offer the kid.
USC Gamecocks Sports Analysis and Insight
www.leftoverhotdog.com
As usual, Flounder
your recruiting mojo is second to none! Great article – and your point only buttresed by the fact that Tubby Smith offered him to play for the Gophers.
Maybe there is a back-story. Maybe he was totally disinterested in playing for the home town team. But IIRC, Guest was highly interested in Georgia – which would mean he was at least thinking about playing in the SEC. Who knows.
I’m not asking Horn to be clairvoyant. Nor do I think we’ll get every in-state kid. But I can’t see from any reports that we even tried to make a run for Guest – and there was every reason to do so when Murphy Holloway decided he wanted to return to Oxford.
Speaking of Holloway, do either of you guys have any update/info on him? The last reports are pretty stale, and it was up in the air whether he could return immediately to the Rebels or if he had to sit out yet again. If Horn could pull a Dabo-CJ Spiller move (if you will forgive both the CU reference!) and get Murphy to stick with Carolina, I would feel a WHOLE lot better. Maybe its pollyannish of me, but the fact we’ve heard zip from Holloway maybe gives me a little hope its not totally a done deal? Or maybe he’s already back in Oxford and so I’m being naive.
They wore garnet helmets.
I am glad I dont stress myself out over the basketball team
seems every year it drops farther down the list of important programs in the Athletic Department, I wonder if we will see a vote to drop basketball from the Department… as that has been a popular happening around the nation here recently (dropping sports of little interest to the Department that is). Maybe you passionate basketball followers should follow the Womens BBall team? at least they seem to be improving every year.
Incredible
According to the other comments, the USC basketball program is as bad as it can be, Coach Horn doesn’t care whether or not he succeeds and gets to keep his job, and the university should consider dropping men’s basketball!
Assuming Guest would have been interested in USC, and since, as of now, we only have five scholarships to use over the next two years, If Coach Horn did not recruit Mr. Guest, I’m sure Horn thinks he has a chance to get someone he thinks is a better player next year, or the year after. Or, there is some other reason he did not want Guest. Since Guest is a local kid, I would assume that we had scouted him while he was in high school.
I am not saying they should
especially since basketball is (unfortunately) one of the major sports. I am saying that it could become a question the board reviews and greatly considers (if they havnt already). With Football on the rise, and Baseball having been the Heavyweight of the Department’s entire history, one would think it would be beneficial to split the basketballs expenses among those 2 sports and improve those already great programs even more.
Obviously its not a popular thought with many fans, but in terms of the Athletic Departments interests, it is a topic that might be headed towards happening (or at least reviewed).
by Gamecockrock on May 12, 2011 1:17 PM EDT up reply actions
I don't think that's a possibility.
As maligned as our basketball program has been, it is still one of just two sports that turns a profit (the other being football). In fact, in 2010 the men’s team still pulled in over $5,000,000 in profit. Last I checked, baseball still wasn’t even in the black, although last year’s championship squad may have changed that. If the athletic department got rid of basketball, which I’m actually surprised to see someone bring up, they would basically be shooting themselves in the foot from a financial perspective. Not to mention the other ramifications, like recruiting.
Source: Equity in Athletics Cutting Tool
Dum spiro spero - "While I breathe, I hope"
State motto of South Carolina
by The Feathered Warrior on May 12, 2011 1:37 PM EDT up reply actions
I dont see where you figure recruiting revolves around basketball teams so much
I have followed recruiting for football and baseball for 5+ years now, and have no recollection of a player saying he signed with the football or baseball team because of our basketball program… I havnt heard that from any team in the nation as a matter of fact.
by Gamecockrock on May 12, 2011 1:42 PM EDT up reply actions
I'm not saying recruiting revolves around the basketball program,
but it helps. And there are other ancillary positives of having a strong basketball program. Given the choice, I’d rather have a strong basketball program than not.
Dum spiro spero - "While I breathe, I hope"
State motto of South Carolina
by The Feathered Warrior on May 12, 2011 2:59 PM EDT up reply actions
But is having a Basketball program that is headed down the wrong path
better than not having one? There is no doubting they are weighing down the Athletic Department as a whole
by Gamecockrock on May 12, 2011 5:58 PM EDT up reply actions
In a word, yes.
1) I’m sure there is a stipulation somewhere in our SEC contract that we must maintain a men’s basketball program.
2.) How is the basketball program weighing down the Athletic Department as a whole? MBB cleared $5 million of profit last year – in a bad season. That number would balloon upward significantly if we even sniffed the NCAA every year. Plus, they were only slightly under .500 this season, hardly the worst record of the entire AD. If they were looking for sports to cut – which they aren’t – why not look at our atrocious softball team?
3) USC has never been prone to cutting sports for any reason. That’s why we’re one of two SEC schools with a men’s soccer team. Our AD has made a commitment to keeping all the sports we currently support for the foreseeable future. I really don’t understand where this talk of canning MBB is even coming from. Is this something going around the message boards these days? Just curious.
Dum spiro spero - "While I breathe, I hope"
State motto of South Carolina
by The Feathered Warrior on May 12, 2011 6:11 PM EDT up reply actions
I dont like to judge the worth of a team
by their $$$, I like to judge a teams worth from their success. I know thats not how it works, but its how i judge a teams worth… and our softball team actually greatly improved over this past season (with a 1st year head coach, they won as many SEC games in the first week of conference play than they did the entire season before).
I havnt heard anyone talking about it, it is just something I brought up to signify how atrocious they have been… its the one sport I cant bare to watch on TV, let alone go to a game… very embarrassing.
by Gamecockrock on May 12, 2011 6:16 PM EDT up reply actions
...
1) I’m sure there is a stipulation somewhere in our SEC contract that we must maintain a men’s basketball program.
This should end this discussion. We’d be out of the SEC in minutes if we cut our basketball program.
And Grock, if you don’t care about the $$$, why do you keep stating that basketball is a financial drain on our AD? Basketball is one of the few sports that makes money for us.
Garnet and Black Attack: A Blog By and For Gamecocks Fans.
by Gamecock Man on May 12, 2011 7:48 PM EDT up reply actions
Im not saying its a financial drain
its a drain on the other programs for far more than money.
by Gamecockrock on May 14, 2011 11:32 AM EDT up reply actions
I hate to be so categorical about this...
But there’s absolutely no chance that we’re going to shut down basketball. College basketball is by far the nation’s second-most-popular college sport. It’s not popular at Carolina right now, but it’s still making more money than baseball. As much as we Carolina fans love baseball, college baseball will never have the potential college basketball has. Trust me, if Carolina started fielding top-10 basketball teams, the CLA would make Carolina Stadium look like a night at bingo. That’s not a blow against baseball; it’s just the reality of where fan interest lies. Hyman knows this. Unfortunately, he’s currently not making the right decisions to get us there.
Garnet and Black Attack: A Blog By and For Gamecocks Fans.
by Gamecock Man on May 12, 2011 5:10 PM EDT up reply actions
And its a shame thats the truth
if we had a 15 or 20,000 capacity baseball field, they would sell out. Im not so sure Basketball is above Baseball in the SEC (outside of the obvious UK). And the difference in the programs that have Basketball above Baseball are getting closer and closer to swapping the two.
I feel pretty confident in saying South Carolina, LSU and Arkansas all have more interest in baseball than basketball (as a whole)… and as a result they have the biggest and best baseball stadiums in the SEC as well as the nation.
If the Schools down here give Baseball a fighting chance, it would be just as much of a money maker.
by Gamecockrock on May 12, 2011 6:02 PM EDT up reply actions
Carolina Stadium actually holds fewer people than The Sarge did.
That is not a coincidence. That was a conscious decision on the part of the Athletic Department. We had trouble selling out The Sarge before the new stadium was built and we are still having trouble selling out Carolina stadium. Even in the year after the Gamecocks won their first ever CWS, there were still empty seats for the one lone home game against Clemson this year. A 15K or 20K capacity stadium would not only be an unmitigated financial disaster, it would be an embarrassment every time our team was on TV. We would have trouble selling half the tickets for most games in such an enormous stadium.
The schools you listed (USC, LSU, and Arkansas) aren’t just great supporters of baseball, they’re great supporters of all athletics. It was not too long ago that LSU and Arkansas were both in contention for National Championships in men’s basketball, so I doubt either of them would be willing to even considering casting away their program as you are.
The argument your trotting out here is very similar to the one we had over Bruce Ellington – namely, sacrifice basketball for any chance to, however minute, to improve a sport that is enjoying more success right now. Only, more money doesn’t always mean more success. We could afford to pay Ray Tanner the same salary as Nick Saban, but it wouldn’t get us any more wins.
Dum spiro spero - "While I breathe, I hope"
State motto of South Carolina
by The Feathered Warrior on May 12, 2011 6:25 PM EDT up reply actions
Gamecockrock...
Don’t take this the wrong way, but you’re both overestimating the degree of fan interest in baseball and underestimating the degree of fan interest in basketball, both for USC and the SEC as a whole. As FW said, building such a huge baseball stadium would have been an absolute disaster. We’re not consistently selling out Carolina Stadium, even with all our success; why expect to sell out an even bigger stadium?
I honestly don’t even know why I’m arguing this point. I guess it’s because that what this blog is here for, to give us a place to talk about things like this. But there’s no chance on earth that we’re going to nix our basketball program. Honestly, I think the SEC would kick us out if we did it. We’d be the laughing stock of the nation. Not a chance, like I said.
Again, don’t take this the wrong way, but just because baseball is our best sport doesn’t mean that we can pretend that it’s more important than basketball. That may be comforting to us right now because our basketball program sucks, but it’s a denial of reality.
Garnet and Black Attack: A Blog By and For Gamecocks Fans.
by Gamecock Man on May 12, 2011 7:41 PM EDT up reply actions
Re: Incredible
The basketball program isnt as had as it could be. That’s because we’re not in the Steve Netwon era (when I was at Carolina). That was the worst. The basketball program is in the worst shape its been in since the Newton era, however. I don’t think that’s really debatable.
I think Coach Horn cares very much about succeeding and keeping his job. I have repeatedly agreed with GM, FW and the others that one of Horn’s strengths is his passion and (at least previously) ability to recruit. However, we needed another PF for 2011-2012 besides Anthony Gill. And we’re not going to get one. That is a problem.
Everything about Guest, however, looks like he’d be a good fit – and we didn’t appear to make a run at him at all. I see that as a problem. I see the defections of Ellington, Galloway and Hollway as a problem. I see the dismissal of Spinella as a problem.
As far as holding future scholarships – that’s all fine and dandy. Except we really need post players. And we have just a handful. We need help now. Otherwise I feel there is very good chance that we’ll have another losing season, like 2009-2010 and 2010-2011. Not going after Guest – or anyone – to replace Holloway is a huge question-mark / red-flag. Keep in mind that at the end of the season, Horn repeatedly said that next year (2011-2012) we’d be relying on Bruce Ellington, Murphy Holloway and Damien Leonard. Only one of them will be playing the non-conference part of the schedule.
They wore garnet helmets.
Your points are all debatable.
I’ve been closely following the USC basketball program for over 40 years. In my opinion, the program is not in the worst condition since the Newton era. You have your opinion, I have mine.
I don’t see the departures of Galloway and Spinella(and I like both of them) as a problem. They were not as productive as we needed them to be.
I would have preferred to have Holloway next year, but I was assuming he wanted to be here, and obviously he does not. He prefers Ole Miss. I wish now he had never enrolled at USC, then we wouldn’t be wishing he was still here.
Coach Horn made a mistake in recruiting Ellington and trying to build that program around him. He knew when he was recruiting him that there was a possibility that Ellington would eventually play football. And Horn should have known that if that happened, it would prevent Ellington from being a key part of Horn’s program, and would prevent Ellington from reaching his potential as a basketball player. Hopefully, Coach Horn will never again recruit a football player.
I am not as pessimistic about next season as many are. I think we have some good talent returning, and if the freshmen are good, we can have a better year than last year.
And, I don’t fault Coach Horn for year before last(his second year). We were going to have a pretty good team until Archie got hurt and Holmes was dismissed. We just did not have anyone as good to take their place. I can’t blame Horn for Archie’s injury, or for Holmes stupidity.
OK ...
You’re right its debtable that we’re at a low point since Steve Netwon, because Eddie Fogler’s last three years were pretty dismal.
Spinella wasn’t super productive, true. But he was Horn’s recruit. I guess he could have stuck around another year – or been given a chance to see more p.t. at a lower level. So yourre right that’s debatable.
I can’t go with you on Galloway or Holloway. Galloway was a player who needed more coaching in my humble opinion – not to be shown the door. He would be a junior and our third leading returning scorer. That is a huge hole to fill. Sam Muldrow wasn’t very productive until he became an upperclassman. Now it will be the LaSalle Explorers who will be getting that experience. That hurts. A lot. Vis-a-vis Holloway, we don’t know the full story. But we needed him. We’re not going to get him. I can agree with you that I wish he’d stayed in Oxford. But that doesn’t fill the big shoes Coach Horn was expecting him to fill. Right now no one is filling those shoes.
I agree with you about Ellington. And you’re gith about Archie. I wish somehow, someway we could have figured a way to salvage Holmes.
I’m still pessimistic about next year. But – and I mean this with all sincerity – I hope you’re right.
They wore garnet helmets.
I agree with you both to an extent...
Although I’m mostly inclined to agree with tryptic. I think Galloway is a major loss. True, he wasn’t perfect, but he was our second-leading scorer. Considering that I don’t see any Brandon Knights coming in with our recruiting class, you have to think we could use Galloway’s scoring ability. And he showed enough promise to make me think that he could, with good coaching become a strong player for us with more experience.
I unequivocally think we should have gone for Guest. I get that we probably evaluated him and decided that we didn’t need him. I think we made the wrong decision there. If Tubby Smith and a host of other successful coaches think he’s good enough, he’s good enough.
That said, I do think Horn has suffered some tough breaks. He gambled on Ellington and it didn’t work out. The injuries and attrition in 2009-2010 killed what should have been an NCAA berth. He gets some credit for that.
But I still think we should be in a better position right now.
Garnet and Black Attack: A Blog By and For Gamecocks Fans.
by Gamecock Man on May 12, 2011 5:06 PM EDT up reply actions
Part of what makes Spurrier so successful...
is that he is a great evaluator of talent. With Horn, we all thought we were getting a guy that could identify great talent, and not only that, but identify the best talent for his system. That’s what makes all these departures so troubling. We’re not a program that can expect to pull down Top 50 recruits every year, so we need to identify and develop guys that might be under the radar. So when Horns tells us it’s not working out with other guys who leave the team, he’s essentially telling us it’s not working out with him.
The misses on seemingly good prospects in our own backyard aren’t helping his situation either.
Dum spiro spero - "While I breathe, I hope"
State motto of South Carolina
by The Feathered Warrior on May 12, 2011 6:04 PM EDT up reply actions
Counterpoint
If Leonard, Richardson, and Williams are any good next season, Galloway will not be missed. I am not convinced Galloway is capable of being what we need him to be. I am also not convinced that Horn told him he had to leave the program.
I do not agree with you about Guest. If Horn thought that it was a good idea to recruit Guest, I’m sure they would have gone after him.
Horn’s biggest mistake to date has been Ellington. But Horn is a smart guy, and I expect he will learn from it.
We would be in a better position now if Holloway had not chosen to leave. He could have stayed, but chose not to. I would guess that had Horn not been counting on Holloway, he probably would have tried to recruit another post player for next year. By the time Holloway left, there weren’t many post players left that we could get involved with, and that Horn wanted.
I think you raise good points
but to counter your counterpoint … Horn went out and hustled up a JUCO PG (Brenton Williams) to replace Ellington … but as far as can be seen from the outside, Coach Horn doesn’t appear to be interested in finding a post player to replace Holloway during this signing period. I think that bothers a lot of us – since we not only lost Holloway (who had already played well in the SEC) but also graduating Muldrow – and we were still out-rebounded and pushed around in the paint.
Guest looked like a pretty solid prospect who probably developed late at his prep program … VCU, Minnesota and OK State are all programs on more solid footing than us …. and GM and Flounder point out that he looks like the kind of guy who’d do well in Coach Horn’s system. Tubby is still in my mind one of the best coaches in college hoops … you remember how badly we wanted Tubby when Eddie retired … so its still a mystery why we didnt even get involved. And why we haven’t gotten involved with any F beside Gill. We need to win now, not hold schollies for 2012-2013. Just my .02.
They wore garnet helmets.
Horn found a point guard he wanted
and who wanted to come to USC. It might be that by the time Holloway announced his departure, there wasn’t a post player still left who Horn wanted, AND who he had a chance to get.
Maybe Guest did not want to come to USC. I don’t know. Maybe we contacted him and he said he wanted to leave Columbia. I have no inside info on this so I don’t know what the real story is.
But, if we stay healthy, we will have enough post players to compete next year. The question is, will what we have be good enough? We’ll have to wait and see.
Just because...
Horn didn’t want to go after Guest doesn’t mean that he shouldn’t have. My argument is that regardless of what Horn and his crew think about Guest, they missed the boat on him.
Garnet and Black Attack: A Blog By and For Gamecocks Fans.
by Gamecock Man on May 12, 2011 7:43 PM EDT up reply actions
Maybe
Maybe Slawson and/or Gill will be pretty good next year. I expect they will be. And if they are, it would make losing Holloway less painful. You and I are both hoping for the best. Go Cocks!
Dont take what Im saying about dropping basketball as a bash on the sport
but in USC’s case, dumping the money that we dump on Basketball is weighing down the success of the other programs that actually want to succeed. It is obvious at this point that the players and coaches in the Basketball program do not care about success. Therefore the money we throw into the program could be split up between the programs that actually wanna perform (and are performing).
If the Basketball program starts winning and giving an effort, then I would be a fan of it and love to see them succeed… but I am not about to cheer on a team that doesnt care when other teams are suffering because of it.
Across the SEC, by every measure,
college basketball is a more popular sport than college baseball. Revenue, TV deals, fan attendance, coaches salaries, venue size – basketball trumps baseball in every category.
I don’t know how you can say that the players and coaches don’t care about success with a straight faces. No one signs a D-1 LOI and says to themselves, “Now I’ll just coast for four years.” Likewise with Horn. This is his chance. You can be sure he is doing everything in his power to ensure that Gamecock basketball succeeds. The only real question is whether he actually knows what he is doing. Increasingly, the answer appears to be “He doesn’t.”
And you say:
If the Basketball program starts winning and giving an effort, then I would be a fan of it and love to see them succeed… but I am not about to cheer on a team that doesnt care when other teams are suffering because of it.
which is fine. No one should have to subject themselves to the rail-splitting headache that was out basketball program last year. But when a team is struggling, you can the coach. You don’t ax the entire program. Just because basketball is struggling doesn’t mean those funds would be better spent on baseball or any other program. Throwing money hand over fist at something has never solved anything.
But for a moment, let’s consider that it does. If you cut basketball you save roughly $4 million in expenses. Of course, then you lose $9 million in revenue. So really, if you cut basketball, you are taking away $5 million that could be used on other teams to make them better. If we keep basketball 1) we get to have a basketball program and 2) there is an extra $1 million to spread around the athletic department. So really, there is no conceivable scenario in which butting basketball makes sense.
Dum spiro spero - "While I breathe, I hope"
State motto of South Carolina
by The Feathered Warrior on May 12, 2011 6:37 PM EDT up reply actions
I think its safe to say
that the basketball program is safe from the chopping block!
I think its very cool that so many Carolina fans like Gamecockrock are huge college baseball fans … and very cool that with Fox Sports South, Comcast Sports and the bevy of ESPN chanels that more collegiate baseball is on tv more … but FW is dead-on that college baseball is a distant third in popularity and attention in the SEC.
I would go to games when June Raines was Carolina’s coach. In those days, unless you lived in Columbia, you mostly just followed Carolina baseball in the local paper and not even that closely… sometimes you’d just catch up on it in “Spurs and Feathers.” It wasn’t so long along that baseball would play doubleheaders on Saturday, and not got over-worried about rain-outs. I had some great times at Sarge Frye – even today I have a soft spot in my heart for that little patch of dirt by the Roost. But even die-hard Carolina fans in the 80s and 90s rarely talked about baseball unless we were in the NCAA/s. I can’t even remember hearing Carolina baseball on the radio.
I first started posting on what is now called Gamecock Central in the 90s (under a different handle!) and it was all football, basketball and recruiting. Baseball was sort of like USC soccer back then – you really followed it only if we were in the NCAAs. It is night-and-day different now.
They wore garnet helmets.
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