Reid Travis Picks Stanford Over U

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Maximus said:
Haha....good one. How about this? Hey Reid, temps around 70 all week in Palo Alto....be sure to pack appropriately. Boom...roasted.
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If weather is all it takes to make some place better, why not go to Morton, Mississippi? It will be 76 there Sunday.
 


OSUfan said:
And BTW, I am still hoping someone will try to dig up an example of an ESPN top-50 prospect going 2,000 miles away to a program that had not made the NCAA tournament in five seasons at the point when the prospect signed with the school. Those are some very measurable and comparable criteria that I don't think will be met by anyone else, and that is even removing the kicker that the coach is on the hot seat.
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I have no idea if it's ever happened. But it's Stanford. It's an elite school in a great conference in a nice area of the country - that just so happens to have a badly over matched head coach. It's really not that hard to wrap your head around the idea.
 

OSUfan said:
And BTW, I am still hoping someone will try to dig up an example of an ESPN top-50 prospect going 2,000 miles away to a program that had not made the NCAA tournament in five seasons at the point when the prospect signed with the school. Those are some very measurable and comparable criteria that I don't think will be met by anyone else, and that is even removing the kicker that the coach is on the hot seat.
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This makes it even clearer that he chose Stanford based on academic reasons. If he was going to college purely based on the success of their basketball program or wanted the best combination of basketball/academics, he would have went to Duke.

Stanford is a top 5 university that students from all over the country/world want to attend. As I mentioned before, give any local high school kid the option of a full ride to Stanford or a full ride to Minnesota. Stanford wins 99 out of 100 if not 100 out of 100.

Sure Reid could make a lot of money playing overseas after college, but maybe he doesn't want to. Maybe he has other motivations in life. Many college players who fail to make the NBA choose to play overseas because they have very few options. It's either that or back to the streets.
 

GophersInIowa said:
If weather is all it takes to make some place better, why not go to Morton, Mississippi? It will be 76 there Sunday.
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Yep, you got me....that is exactly what I said. It's all about the weather. In the four years Stanford spent recruiting him, all they did was give him that day's temperature. Why else would anyone go to Stanford?

Psst.....Did you know? They lost to BYU last night. Guess that means the other two four-star Rival recruits that are committed are back on the market.
 


GopherWeatherGuy said:
This makes it even clearer that he chose Stanford based on academic reasons. If he was going to college purely based on the success of their basketball program or wanted the best combination of basketball/academics, he would have went to Duke.

Stanford is a top 5 university that students from all over the country/world want to attend. As I mentioned before, give any local high school kid the option of a full ride to Stanford or a full ride to Minnesota. Stanford wins 99 out of 100 if not 100 out of 100.

Sure Reid could make a lot of money playing overseas after college, but maybe he doesn't want to. Maybe he has other motivations in life. Many college players who fail to make the NBA choose to play overseas because they have very few options. It's either that or back to the streets.
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I'll never forgive Reid for passing up the chance to go to a TRULY elite academic institution. I know my alma mater, Carleton, would have GLADLY opened its arms to him. I think he would have had a chance to be a four-year contributor to a MIAC powerhouse, and I'm appalled that he opted for an inferior institution simply because of their D-1 status.
 

OMG

GopherWeatherGuy said:
This makes it even clearer that he chose Stanford based on academic reasons. If he was going to college purely based on the success of their basketball program or wanted the best combination of basketball/academics, he would have went to Duke.

Stanford is a top 5 university that students from all over the country/world want to attend. As I mentioned before, give any local high school kid the option of a full ride to Stanford or a full ride to Minnesota. Stanford wins 99 out of 100 if not 100 out of 100.

Sure Reid could make a lot of money playing overseas after college, but maybe he doesn't want to. Maybe he has other motivations in life. Many college players who fail to make the NBA choose to play overseas because they have very few options. It's either that or back to the streets.
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OMG, the voice of reason !

A tip of the hat to you GWG.
 


GopherWeatherGuy said:
This makes it even clearer that he chose Stanford based on academic reasons. If he was going to college purely based on the success of their basketball program or wanted the best combination of basketball/academics, he would have went to Duke.

Stanford is a top 5 university that students from all over the country/world want to attend. As I mentioned before, give any local high school kid the option of a full ride to Stanford or a full ride to Minnesota. Stanford wins 99 out of 100 if not 100 out of 100.

Sure Reid could make a lot of money playing overseas after college, but maybe he doesn't want to. Maybe he has other motivations in life. Many college players who fail to make the NBA choose to play overseas because they have very few options. It's either that or back to the streets.
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I am guessing you didn't play a varsity sport in college. You have no idea how much time is spent with your coach and academic support staff and how much that plays into most kid's decision and how much a change in the staff can impact everything...especially if the new Coach isn't a guy you like or want to work with. Reid took a huge risk in his decision and in the last 5 years, there is only two instance of ESPN Top 50 kids choosing a school that hadn't been to the NCAA in the previous 5 years and in both cases, the kids chose the hometown school. Why? Because you choose the coach as much as the school when you have a chance to make $10 mil per year after college playing a game and that's what being in the Top 50 means, you have a chance.
 




Maximus said:
Haha....good one. How about this? Hey Reid, temps around 70 all week in Palo Alto....be sure to pack appropriately. Boom...roasted.
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Good point. You wouldn't hear me complaining about the temperature.

Facts34 said:
I have no idea if it's ever happened. But it's Stanford. It's an elite school in a great conference in a nice area of the country - that just so happens to have a badly over matched head coach. It's really not that hard to wrap your head around the idea.
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Elite school? Check. Nice area of the country. No question. Great conference..........hahaha, no. Remind me how many teams they sent dancing this past year.
 


When I think of the two elite conferences in this great country of ours -- combining academics, athletics, prestige, tradition, the total package -- the Big Ten and Pac 12 by a significant margin are the first two that come to mind. ACC would be next. Big 12 and SEC not so much. There are exceptions in each conference, of course.
 



SelectionSunday said:
When I think of the two elite conferences in this great country of ours -- combining academics, athletics, prestige, tradition -- the Big Ten and Pac 12 by a significant margin are the first two that come to mind. ACC would be right up there. Big 12 and SEC not so much.
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Except basketball, at lease recently. The Pac-12 is closer to a good mid-major conference than a power conference. Maybe that changes with the new L.A. coaches, but it's pretty much Arizona and a bunch of mediocre programs.
 

I'm secretly hoping that Reid blows up his FR year and leads the Pac 12 in rebounding then gets suspended for not being able to make grades. Oops...guess it isn't a secret anymore.
 

Maximus said:
Yep, you got me....that is exactly what I said. It's all about the weather. In the four years Stanford spent recruiting him, all they did was give him that day's temperature. Why else would anyone go to Stanford?

Psst.....Did you know? They lost to BYU last night. Guess that means the other two four-star Rival recruits that are committed are back on the market.
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It was a tongue-in-cheek comment just like yours.

Facts34 said:
I have no idea if it's ever happened. But it's Stanford. It's an elite school in a great conference in a nice area of the country - that just so happens to have a badly over matched head coach. It's really not that hard to wrap your head around the idea.
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I think this last part about the coach is why so many people were a little confused by the decision. As others have said, the decision must have been based a lot on the academics side which is fine. It's just very rare for someone to do that when they are so highly recruited/rated.
 

GophersInIowa said:
I think this last part about the coach is why so many people were a little confused by the decision. As others have said, the decision must have been based a lot on the academics side which is fine. It's just very rare for someone to do that when they are so highly recruited/rated.
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Rare? Halley's Comet is rare. Finding a Top 50 player that committed a school with a HC that hasn't made the Tourny in the previous 5 years is non-existent. Even the instances where a Top 50 kid committed to a school that hadn't been to the dance in the previous 5 years...all schools had new coaches. Add in the distance (2 time zones) and this has never happened in the modern 64 team (68 now) era.
 

dpodoll68 said:
Five, which was tied for the 3rd-most bids of any conference. Are we quibbling over the semantics of "great" now?
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Good call. I misspoke. None of their teams really did much this past year however. I should have referenced the 2012 tournament.
 

OSUfan said:
That is correct. The academic differences in my opinion are marginal compared to the practical impact of attending a school and being a college hoops star there, considering that once he gets done playing pro basketball - and yes he is going to play pro basketball somewhere for several years first so basically kids who are top-50 recruits are choosing where to have their basketball apprenticeship - he's probably going to go back to the area where he went to college to try to find his first job after playing, and the notoriety he gets from playing college basketball is going to be the first and foremost reason he gets his second career with his academic credentials being only an underlying requirement as opposed to the factor that separates him and other candidates. So no I don't buy for a second that a top-50 recruit like Travis legitimately finds minor academic superiority to be a decisive factor, because I don't buy that any top-50 recruit who is going to play pro ball thinks like that. His brother obviously was not a top-50 recruit, and Harvard is a better basketball program than Northwestern anyway.
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I don't agree with the way that he announced his decision, but calling Stanford vs. Minnesota "minor academic superiority" is drinking way too much Kool-Aide. If his focus was entirely on academics, then he made the right choice
 

GopherWeatherGuy said:
This makes it even clearer that he chose Stanford based on academic reasons. If he was going to college purely based on the success of their basketball program or wanted the best combination of basketball/academics, he would have went to Duke.

Stanford is a top 5 university that students from all over the country/world want to attend. As I mentioned before, give any local high school kid the option of a full ride to Stanford or a full ride to Minnesota. Stanford wins 99 out of 100 if not 100 out of 100.

Sure Reid could make a lot of money playing overseas after college, but maybe he doesn't want to. Maybe he has other motivations in life. Many college players who fail to make the NBA choose to play overseas because they have very few options. It's either that or back to the streets.
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Yeah, right. You wake me up when Reid Travis goes on to graduate school at Stanford instead of overseas pro ball. I refuse to believe anything other than that the academic justification for picking Stanford is a minor part of his decision and not a decisive factor. It's not like Duke is a slouch academically, and they have a much better basketball program than Stanford. Even if you think Duke isn't better than Stanford academically, I'm sure there is some other university out there that is better academically than Stanford so if that was truly the basis for his decision then he picked the wrong school.
 

OSUfan said:
Yeah, right. You wake me up when Reid Travis goes on to graduate school at Stanford instead of overseas pro ball. I refuse to believe anything other than that the academic justification for picking Stanford is a minor part of his decision and not a decisive factor. It's not like Duke is a slouch academically, and they have a much better basketball program than Stanford. Even if you think Duke isn't better than Stanford academically, I'm sure there is some other university out there that is better academically than Stanford so if that was truly the basis for his decision then he picked the wrong school.
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Think stanford is better academic school than you think, I mean jeremy lin got turned down by stanford even tho he was being recruited there (his dream school) but was accepted by harvard (non-athletic scholarship school), think about that for a second...
 

OSUfan said:
Yeah, right. You wake me up when Reid Travis goes on to graduate school at Stanford instead of overseas pro ball. I refuse to believe anything other than that the academic justification for picking Stanford is a minor part of his decision and not a decisive factor. It's not like Duke is a slouch academically, and they have a much better basketball program than Stanford. Even if you think Duke isn't better than Stanford academically, I'm sure there is some other university out there that is better academically than Stanford so if that was truly the basis for his decision then he picked the wrong school.
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No, just no. He had said that academics were the 1st priority in his college decision, in his interview after the announcement. Since that is the case, Stanford was the right decision.
The only better academic schools: Harvard, Princeton, Yale, and Columbia. Stanford is a top 5 university.
 

OSUfan said:
Yeah, right. You wake me up when Reid Travis goes on to graduate school at Stanford instead of overseas pro ball. I refuse to believe anything other than that the academic justification for picking Stanford is a minor part of his decision and not a decisive factor. It's not like Duke is a slouch academically, and they have a much better basketball program than Stanford. Even if you think Duke isn't better than Stanford academically, I'm sure there is some other university out there that is better academically than Stanford so if that was truly the basis for his decision then he picked the wrong school.
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1. You don't get Stanford's place in the academic world.
2. I suspect Travis' decision was more nuanced than your scenario. More like a combination of academic + athletic prowess + area / weather + future networking.
 

Facts34 said:
1. You don't get Stanford's place in the academic world.
2. I suspect Travis' decision was more nuanced than your scenario. More like a combination of academic + athletic prowess + area / weather + future networking.
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I think you are giving him too much credit. He and his family fell in love with Stanford...or at least the idea of it. We will see if he made the right decision. I've looked and over the last 10 years, I couldn't find a single instance when a top 50 player chose a school and coach who hadn't made the ncaa in the last 5 years. There are only a couple of instances where a top 50 chose the school that hadn't made the ncaa in the last 5 years and in those instances, it was a different coach and it was the home town school.

From a history stand point, Reid went way outside the box. Now you can say that that proves the point about education or you can say it proves the point about falling in love with the school (or idea of the school) without really considering just how big an impact a coaching change can be and just how much might be lost if he doesn't develop and play pro ball at a high level.

We shall see.
 

GameDay said:
No, just no. He had said that academics were the 1st priority in his college decision, in his interview after the announcement. Since that is the case, Stanford was the right decision.
The only better academic schools: Harvard, Princeton, Yale, and Columbia. Stanford is a top 5 university.
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Well he made the correct choice then. Stanford is an excellent school. Their basketball team isn't too excellent.
 

stocker08 said:
Well he made the correct choice then. Stanford is an excellent school. Their basketball team isn't too excellent.
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A) Stanford has a far better recruiting class coming in. Should be able to attract a coach that can keep that class together. Their football success couldn't hurt either.

B) Only Duke's basketball team could be considered excellent while Minnesota/Stanford are at best middle of the road in their leagues. Both light years away from being invited to an event like last night's in Chicago. I don't know how any of the big three turn down any of the four from last night. Playing at the United Center in front of nearly every NBA GM on ESPN or playing Montana on the internet.

C) For someone who doesn't care about Reid Travis, you sure care a lot about Reid Travis.
 

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