Adam Zagoria covers basketball at all levels. He is the author of two books and an award-winning journalist whose articles have appeared in ESPN The Magazine, SLAM, Sheridan Hoops, Sports Illustrated, Basketball Times and in newspapers nationwide.
McDermott, New League, TV Deal Transform Creighton’s Recruiting Profile
A few years back, a young man like Asante Gist likely wouldn’t have known much, if anything, about Creighton University.
After all, Gist attends school at Roselle (N.J.) Catholic and Creighton is in, well, Omaha, Nebraska
But several forces have come together in the past year or two to help Creighton enhance it’s recruiting profile with players like Gist, a talented 2016 point guard who also competes with USA Basketball.
First, Creighton has a player you may have heard of by the name of Doug McDermott who is a favorite for National Player of the Year honors and is a projected NBA Draft lottery pick.
Second, Creighton is now a part of the new-look Big East Conference that added the Bluejays, Butler and Xavier to help offset the losses of traditional heavyweights Syracuse, Pittsburgh and Notre Dame.
And finally, as a member of the Big East, Creighton is now showcased nationally on a regular basis on Fox Sports 1.
“I just learned about them this year, to be honest,” Gist told SNY.tv. “From TV, I just started to see them play this year.”
As far as head coach Greg McDermott and his staff are concerned, there couldn’t be a better time for recruits to start tuning in.
Creighton is 16-3 and 6-1 in the Big East, having just hammered No. 4 Villanova, 96-68, in a nationally televised game at the Wells Fargo Center.
ESPN’s Joe Lunardi currently has Creighton projected as the No. 4 seed in the NCAA Tournament’s South Region.
“The relationship with Fox Sports 1 has impacted our recruiting in a huge way, simply because our story’s being told to national TV audience virtually every time we play,” McDermott said.
“We only had a few opportunities during the year in the Missouri Valley to have that story told and now recruits are getting the opportunity to watch most every one of our games and they’re able to see our arena [CenturyLink Center] and the unbelievable following we have here on national television. And being able to watch our style of play and to decide for themselves whether that’s a fit for them.
“So in that regard, without question in talking with recruits many more are getting an opportunity to watch us play than have in the past and in the end that will be a huge positive for us.”
While Creighton is riding high this year and could make a run during March Madness, they will need to bring in recruits to replace McDermott, who is averaging 24.8 points per game, and senior forward Ethan Wragge, who hit nine 3-pointers en route to 27 points in the beatdown of Villanova.
Creighton currently has two players signed for 2014 in Texas small forward Leon Gilmore and Colorado small forward Ronnie Harrell.
Creighton is looking to add one or two more players in the spring, and will then need to add players for 2015 and beyond.
Among the East Coast players they are targeting are 2014 St. Anthony guard Tarin Smith, 2015 Brewster (N.H.) guard Donovan Mitchell, 2015 Northfield Mount Hermon center Josh Sharma and 2015 Mount Hermon power forward Aaron Falzon.
They are also looking at several youngers players in New Jersey, including Gist, 2016 St. Peter’s Prep forward Veer Singh and 2017 St. Peter’s Prep point guard Nate Pierre-Louis, among others.
John Carroll, the Mount Hermon coach whose team won the National Prep Championship in 2013, believes Creighton has made inroads in the Northeast.
“With realignment, a school like Creighton jumps into a new market for players when they can allow a player from outside their previous region to get to play in front of family a few times a year, at least in conference play,” he told SNY.tv. “Additionally, a larger TV slate will allow kids to be seen by friends and family across the country. Plus, hiring an assistant coach with strong ties to the area should help reap rewards.”
That assistant is Patrick Sellers, the former UConn and Hofstra assistant whom McDermott hired specifically to focus on the East Coast.
“We’ve attempted to spread our wings to the East Coast with the hiring of Patrick Sellers last year,” McDermott said. “It’s going to take a while for us to develop the relationships there. For me in particular it’s going to take some time and I understand that.
“But we had really no reason to recruit that part of the country before. We were in a mid-major league, very similar to the Atlantic 10, not that much different from the Colonial [Athletic Association]. Why would kids come to the Midwest to play in a league that they’ve got right there at home when the TV exposure really wasn’t much different?
“Now I think we’re in a situation where I think there are some kids that want to get away from home to go play basketball but would like the opportunity to come back and play in front of their family and friends and, obviously, the Big East is a huge draw in that regard.”
The last relatively big-time East Coast player to choose Creighton was Gregory Echenique, who transferred there from Rutgers after he was initially recruited by Dana Altman’s staff while playing for Dan Hurley at St. Benedict’s Prep.
Hurley and Echenique’s mentor, Scott Smith, raved about Altman and Creighton, and when it came time for Echenique to transfer, he ended up there and helped the Bluejays make the NCAA Tournament last year, where he and McDermott helped the team beat Cincinnati before falling to Duke.
Now the staff, which includes not only Sellers but Steve Lutz, Steve Merfield and Darian DeVries, are trying to woo some other East Coast players to head out to Nebraska.
Lutz, for example, was recently at New Jersey power Roselle Catholic to watch Gist, as well as 2015 forwards Chris Silva and Pierre Sarr.
“They were at practice the other day,” RC coach Dave Boff said. “I think our kids are starting to learn about them, their style of play and quality of their program.”
Asked if a Jersey kid would consider heading out to Nebraska, to Creighton, for college, Gist said, “Yeah, I think so. It’s a good school and the team is good so kids will go there.”
Adam Zagoria is a Basketball Insider who covers basketball at all levels. A contributor to The New York Times and SportsNet New York (SNY), he is also the author of two books and is an award-winning journalist and filmmaker. His articles have appeared in ESPN The Magazine, SLAM, Sheridan Hoops, Basketball Times and in newspapers nationwide. He also won an Emmy award for his work on the SNY mini-documentary on Syracuse guard Tyus Battle.
A veteran Ultimate Frisbee player, he has competed in numerous National and World Championships and, perhaps more importantly, his teams won the Westchester Summer League (WSL) championships in 2011 and 2013.
He lives in Manhattan with his wife and children.
A few years back, a young man like Asante Gist likely wouldn’t have known much, if anything, about Creighton University.
After all, Gist attends school at Roselle (N.J.) Catholic and Creighton is in, well, Omaha, Nebraska
But several forces have come together in the past year or two to help Creighton enhance it’s recruiting profile with players like Gist, a talented 2016 point guard who also competes with USA Basketball.
First, Creighton has a player you may have heard of by the name of Doug McDermott who is a favorite for National Player of the Year honors and is a projected NBA Draft lottery pick.
Second, Creighton is now a part of the new-look Big East Conference that added the Bluejays, Butler and Xavier to help offset the losses of traditional heavyweights Syracuse, Pittsburgh and Notre Dame.
And finally, as a member of the Big East, Creighton is now showcased nationally on a regular basis on Fox Sports 1.
“I just learned about them this year, to be honest,” Gist told SNY.tv. “From TV, I just started to see them play this year.”
As far as head coach Greg McDermott and his staff are concerned, there couldn’t be a better time for recruits to start tuning in.
Creighton is 16-3 and 6-1 in the Big East, having just hammered No. 4 Villanova, 96-68, in a nationally televised game at the Wells Fargo Center.
ESPN’s Joe Lunardi currently has Creighton projected as the No. 4 seed in the NCAA Tournament’s South Region.
“The relationship with Fox Sports 1 has impacted our recruiting in a huge way, simply because our story’s being told to national TV audience virtually every time we play,” McDermott said.
“We only had a few opportunities during the year in the Missouri Valley to have that story told and now recruits are getting the opportunity to watch most every one of our games and they’re able to see our arena [CenturyLink Center] and the unbelievable following we have here on national television. And being able to watch our style of play and to decide for themselves whether that’s a fit for them.
“So in that regard, without question in talking with recruits many more are getting an opportunity to watch us play than have in the past and in the end that will be a huge positive for us.”
While Creighton is riding high this year and could make a run during March Madness, they will need to bring in recruits to replace McDermott, who is averaging 24.8 points per game, and senior forward Ethan Wragge, who hit nine 3-pointers en route to 27 points in the beatdown of Villanova.
Creighton currently has two players signed for 2014 in Texas small forward Leon Gilmore and Colorado small forward Ronnie Harrell.
Creighton is looking to add one or two more players in the spring, and will then need to add players for 2015 and beyond.
Among the East Coast players they are targeting are 2014 St. Anthony guard Tarin Smith, 2015 Brewster (N.H.) guard Donovan Mitchell, 2015 Northfield Mount Hermon center Josh Sharma and 2015 Mount Hermon power forward Aaron Falzon.
They are also looking at several youngers players in New Jersey, including Gist, 2016 St. Peter’s Prep forward Veer Singh and 2017 St. Peter’s Prep point guard Nate Pierre-Louis, among others.
John Carroll, the Mount Hermon coach whose team won the National Prep Championship in 2013, believes Creighton has made inroads in the Northeast.
“With realignment, a school like Creighton jumps into a new market for players when they can allow a player from outside their previous region to get to play in front of family a few times a year, at least in conference play,” he told SNY.tv. “Additionally, a larger TV slate will allow kids to be seen by friends and family across the country. Plus, hiring an assistant coach with strong ties to the area should help reap rewards.”
That assistant is Patrick Sellers, the former UConn and Hofstra assistant whom McDermott hired specifically to focus on the East Coast.
“We’ve attempted to spread our wings to the East Coast with the hiring of Patrick Sellers last year,” McDermott said. “It’s going to take a while for us to develop the relationships there. For me in particular it’s going to take some time and I understand that.
“But we had really no reason to recruit that part of the country before. We were in a mid-major league, very similar to the Atlantic 10, not that much different from the Colonial [Athletic Association]. Why would kids come to the Midwest to play in a league that they’ve got right there at home when the TV exposure really wasn’t much different?
“Now I think we’re in a situation where I think there are some kids that want to get away from home to go play basketball but would like the opportunity to come back and play in front of their family and friends and, obviously, the Big East is a huge draw in that regard.”
The last relatively big-time East Coast player to choose Creighton was Gregory Echenique, who transferred there from Rutgers after he was initially recruited by Dana Altman’s staff while playing for Dan Hurley at St. Benedict’s Prep.
Hurley and Echenique’s mentor, Scott Smith, raved about Altman and Creighton, and when it came time for Echenique to transfer, he ended up there and helped the Bluejays make the NCAA Tournament last year, where he and McDermott helped the team beat Cincinnati before falling to Duke.
Now the staff, which includes not only Sellers but Steve Lutz, Steve Merfield and Darian DeVries, are trying to woo some other East Coast players to head out to Nebraska.
Lutz, for example, was recently at New Jersey power Roselle Catholic to watch Gist, as well as 2015 forwards Chris Silva and Pierre Sarr.
“They were at practice the other day,” RC coach Dave Boff said. “I think our kids are starting to learn about them, their style of play and quality of their program.”
Asked if a Jersey kid would consider heading out to Nebraska, to Creighton, for college, Gist said, “Yeah, I think so. It’s a good school and the team is good so kids will go there.”
