Reusse: If Pitino had taken Wright from Champlin Park & not “Jelly Fam,” he wouldn’t be getting fired.

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UpAndUnder43 said:
If Wright could have got into the U he might have done that. Eligibility issues so he went to Colorado.
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Were there academic problems with Wright? I don't remember that but maybe I've forgotten. I thought he was just unsure about where he wanted to go, and Washington chose to commit and take one of the two scholarships we had available at the time. I think there's also a decent chance we never get Marcus Carr if we take Wright in 2017, which some might say would have been well worth it anyway.

And maybe I'm being overly sensitive, but it feels like Reusse is taking an unnecessary shot at Isaiah Washington as a means of further dumping on Pitino.
 


Just a slight overstatement there. Doubtful a single player would make enough of a difference this year.
 



We might not have taken Carr though if we had Wright.

They were all 3 in the same HS class and Carr ended up the best of the 3.
 





The 2018-19 team would have won a few more games and gotten a higher seed having a real PG and playing Coffey at his proper position. But still probably not made it past the 2nd round without Murphy.

For the last two seasons, we wouldn't have Carr, so I don't see how the last two years would have been better, as they're close to a wash IMO.
 

die hard gopher said:
We might not have taken Carr though if we had Wright.

They were all 3 in the same HS class and Carr ended up the best of the 3.
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We would have taken him, but I doubt he would have come here.
 

It's hard to say...both gach was a solid player last year in that conference and we see what he's doing here this year. Wright is clearly better than gach but he might not be the Wright we see at CO.
 




die hard gopher said:
We might not have taken Carr though if we had Wright.

They were all 3 in the same HS class and Carr ended up the best of the 3.
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I can’t agree with you, Wright was a 4 year starter with career stats that we would die to have on our team. I think involves his teammates better than Carr. Don’t get me wrong, Carr has been great but Wright would have been just as good.
 

tjgopher said:
That's quite a claim to make.
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It isn’t a claim. I was told this by a high school coach of his directly. We were at a game @ Hopkins I believe. Talked to the coach. Asked about Wright. This was said. I don’t know what else to go off of. No reason for him to lie to me.

I should say I know the coach. Friend of a friend. Again—no idea why he’d lie. Maybe I’m wrong. If I am I apologize to everyone on here.
 

UpAndUnder43 said:
It isn’t a claim. I was told this by a high school coach of his directly. We were at a game @ Hopkins I believe. Talked to the coach. Asked about Wright. This was said. I don’t know what else to go off of. No reason for him to lie to me.

I should say I know the coach. Friend of a friend. Again—no idea why he’d lie. Maybe I’m wrong. If I am I apologize to everyone on here.
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this is pure unadulterated bullshit. These are the facts. Wright had given a verbal to the Gophers, but Kamini convinced little Richard that Washington was a better option. They gave Washington and ultimatum we’re taking Wright if you don’t commit, and Washington caved. Wright was understandably upset....and re opened his recruiting. there was no way of knowing for sure at the time, but, Reusse is correct, if Wright had come, Pitino would not be leaving.
 


Huge fan of Wright, and been following CU for a while as I think in general Tad Boyle has done beyond a great job, in what's a mildy interested fan base/env in Boulder. And maybe being too particular, but prob have to draw the line at calling it a 'fact' that if Wright was with Gophers, Pitino would be fine. Maybe so, but sheesh Pitino's had a bad combination of choices, luck, depth, injuries, certainly coaching/tactics etc. Even David Roddy at 6'5" might look good in a Gophers uni right now, as he'd be a serviceable/reliable player whether a starter maybe not based on size. This gets to depth. So IMO it's not necessarily about singular misses on talent, but developing a top to bottom roster. And then coaching them up.
 

dlnavra said:
Huge fan of Wright, and been following CU for a while as I think in general Tad Boyle has done beyond a great job, in what's a mildy interested fan base/env in Boulder. And maybe being too particular, but prob have to draw the line at calling it a 'fact' that if Wright was with Gophers, Pitino would be fine. Maybe so, but sheesh Pitino's had a bad combination of choices, luck, depth, injuries, certainly coaching/tactics etc. Even David Roddy at 6'5" might look good in a Gophers uni right now, as he'd be a serviceable/reliable player whether a starter maybe not based on size. This gets to depth. So IMO it's not necessarily about singular misses on talent, but developing a top to bottom roster. And then coaching them up.
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Exactly. Some on here see no use for ihnen, tre, Freeman. I disagree.
 

leftyslefty said:
this is pure unadulterated bullshit. These are the facts. Wright had given a verbal to the Gophers, but Kamini convinced little Richard that Washington was a better option. They gave Washington and ultimatum we’re taking Wright if you don’t commit, and Washington caved. Wright was understandably upset....and re opened his recruiting. there was no way of knowing for sure at the time, but, Reusse is correct, if Wright had come, Pitino would not be leaving.
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Cool. I was repeating what I was told by a high school coach of his so I’ll stick with that. I’m glad you are very emotionally invested in this. Wright isn’t as good as Carr so I don’t think he’d have saved Pitino’s job—assuming he loses it.
 

This is a pretty bad take and hindsight is 20/20. If it was for youtube then Pintio and everyone would have taken off those jelly colored lenses and noticed that Wright was clearly the better player then and now. Wright had swagger, confidence, and was clutch. Jelly had flair? Both the same size, take Wright and hope to snag more MN recruits. Seems like Pintio needs to go to recruiting university, he has no patience..
 

Carr is a good player, but not a good point guard. Wright leaves Colorado as the all time assist leader. You don’t think he would have had a bigger impact here than Carr? Plus...the whole scenario alienated the D1 organization that produced Garcia, kerwin walton, ben Carlson and Steve Crowl.
 

Spottedmuskie said:
This is a pretty bad take and hindsight is 20/20. If it was for youtube then Pintio and everyone would have taken off those jelly colored lenses and noticed that Wright was clearly the better player then and now. Wright had swagger, confidence, and was clutch. Jelly had flair? Both the same size, take Wright and hope to snag more MN recruits. Seems like Pintio needs to go to recruiting university, he has no patience..
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Right?

It's really quite the pointless take by Reusse. If, if, if...well yeah, so what? If any number of things had been done differently, things would be different now. Duh. That's how life works.

I'm not sure why our staff overlooked or undersold Wright, but you have to remember that Isiah Washington was quite the high school sensation himself. He was a consensus 4 star recruit, Mr. Basketball in the state of NY and pursued by the likes of Indiana, UConn, St. Johns, VCU, Georgia Tech, Texas A&M, Seton Hall, and etc. etc. etc. So, it wasn't exactly like he was chopped liver himself. He was highly talented, super quick and athletic and just flashier than all get-out, but I would say not really all that skilled a basketball player, for example, he's just a terrible shooter, I mean really bad (and in that tragic sense at least, he fit right in with many of Pitino's recruits).

He and the Jelly Fam crew were internet phenoms and I think it was just way too easy to get dazzled by all the flash and all the 'ooooh, ahhhh' moments that Isiah was able to provide while playing high school (and playground) ball in the Bronx, but when it came right down to it, he was just far more sizzle than steak, whereas McKinley Wright is just straight, Grade-A steak all the way.

That was just an error, one of many, and not a fatal one such that saying that had that gone differently, Pitino would be fine now. No. I believe his issues would still remain.
 

"Jelly" needed to be in a wide-open up-tempo style of play to really make an impact.

hate to be a broken record, but good programs have a system, and they recruit players who fit that system.

Pitino just goes out and grabs anyone he can, and then he tries to make them fit his system. Which is why he has the record he does.
 


Wright was so unbelievably good he committed to Dayton, and later Colorado. Two blue chip programs.

Everyone wants to Monday morning quarterback his recruitment (or lack thereof). At the time Jelly Fam was the better projected recruit. In the end Wright excelled. 🤷🏻‍♂️
 

Carr looked well on his way to being Pitino's second first team all conference PG halfway through the season so it's hard to know how much more of an impact McKinley would have had as an individual. I doubt Pat is making this point but if he's talking about the bigger picture and referencing to Wright's status among local recruits then yes, Pitino's probably sitting pretty right now. McKinley was loved by everyone in that D1MN program and he would have helped pull Race Thompson instead of Omersa considering the relationship those guys have. If you don't land Matthew Hurt who also has a strong relationship with Wright and Race, I would wager that Dawson Garcia stays home.

I remember talking to a Sparty fan earlier this season and went into the importance of Trejuan Holloman for our 2022 class. I've always felt Tre could be that Wright like figure that's not only a quality 4 year player but someone who brings locals with him. So he was telling me about how Izzo landing Antonio Smith from Flint Northern started the Flint pipeline that led to Morris Peterson, Charlie Bell and Mateen Cleaves (they were known as the Flintstones) and once you got Cleaves on board, Izzo was able to hit the ground running on the court and on the trail locally. We all remember how the historic 2016 eMpire class was led by Carter Coughlin. Musselman last year at Arkansas pulled Davonte Davis from Jacksonville, AR first then the following month pulled the three best recruits from the state (two were at prep schools). That figure may not always be the best player in the state but if you land him, it could change the trajectory of the program.

As I said in another thread, Pitino spent the first few years of his tenure desperate to establish an East Coast tri-state pipeline and Washington was suppose to be that prospect that opened the floodgates for him but it cost Pitino the key to the gold mine in his backyard.
 
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We should stop bringing up Carr in this discussion.

4 years of Wright would've been more valuable than 2 years of Carr.
 

Imagine if Wright had followed Archie Miller to IU! They’d have hung some banners no doubt.
 

Zeppelin Gopher said:
We should stop bringing up Carr in this discussion.

4 years of Wright would've been more valuable than 2 years of Carr.
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The point is that if Pitino can’t do it with Carr, then Wright wasn’t going to do shit for this team anyways. Even if they are on the same roster we have massive holes on the wings and in the post.
 

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