Re: Rotnei Clarke

[orumom]

Never prepared, never anything significant to say, always promotiong OU and himself.  As any form of serious journalist, the guy is simply a tool...

If I remember right, he's the one that refers to Caleb as "your guy" when he talks to Geoff , and never calls Geoff by his name. One day  said, "you guys have a good weekend." Geoff's response was something like, "uh, it's just me."  Best of luck to him .

[ORUTerry]

Nike Peach Jam Semifinals are Set

July 15, 2007

By Van Coleman

CSTV.com & Hoopmasters.com

The Nike Peach Jam moved into its final day with some competitive tournament action and big individual performances highlighting Saturday's action. Before we move on and look at Sunday's match-ups, let's highlight some of Saturday's top individual games.

Willie Warren continued his onslaught offensively, scoring 35 points against a strong Memphis YOMCA squad to wrap up his pool play. Then, Warren put in 25 against the Georgia Stars in quarterfinal loss last night. He has been stellar in North Augusta this week!  6-foot-9 big man Michael Dunigan from the Meanstreets squad showed he can score as well as block shots and dominate the boards, scoring 30 points against Houston Hoops in tourney action.

JaMychael Green, the 6-foot-9 power forward from the Alabama Challenge, was an animal inside, finishing with 29 points against Team Stat. It was his second huge outburst in North Augusta offensively and solidifies our thoughts that he is a definite Top 20 prospect in the Class of 2007. Rotnei Clarke joined his teammate Willie Warren in the 30-plus club, knocking down a bunch of threes to end up with 32 points against Friends of Hoop-Seattle.

[ORUTerry]

Interesting discussion of Clarke's recruitment as it pertains to ORU. Shows that there is a lot of misunderstanding about ORU.

Kentucky Scout.com message board link

[ORUTerry]

Interesting post on the message thread:

One of Clarke's AAU teammates (Steptoe) has just committed to ORU.  Chris Babb, a very good guard from Texas and another teammate of Clarke's is now an ORU lean.

[djenkins13]

Guys,

You will not find more extreme fans than Kent.. I had a nice exchange(not!!)with one from there and one from Kansas and they just talk down to everyone not on their bandwagon. Like Kansas has anything to say about it!

The Babb kid is very good! I am heading out to Vegas on Sunday and will get a chance to watch both Clarke and Babb on the Team Texas team. Should be a great time! Let you know about it next week!

[vcboy2000]

Yeah, a lot of those perceptions on their board are completely false or just outdated. It doesn't matter anyway. Rotnei Clarke knows the truth, and ORU is about to have its 2nd largest incoming class in the history of the university. No joke. 

[Ting]

Interesting post on the message thread:

One of Clarke's AAU teammates (Steptoe) has just committed to ORU.  Chris Babb, a very good guard from Texas and another teammate of Clarke's is now an ORU lean.

According to this article, Babb is going to New Mexico....

http://66.218.69.11/search/cache?ei=UTF ... 1&.intl=us

[Ting]

Yeah, a lot of those perceptions on their board are completely false or just outdated. It doesn't matter anyway. Rotnei Clarke knows the truth, and ORU is about to have its 2nd largest incoming class in the history of the university. No joke. 

Which is the 1st Largest?

[ORUTerry]

The first class...... 

[Ting]

oh, i thought it was meaning stature not numbers.

[dchief42]

He commited on Jun 10 to New Mexico, but reopened his recruitment on July 18th....On Scout.com...ORU, New Mexico, & TCU is on his list, and on Rivals.com it is only TCU & New Mexico

http://newmexico.scout.com/a.z?s=203&p= ... id=3139833

http://basketballrecruiting.rivals.com/ ... 32&sport=2

[ORUTerry]

He commited on Jun 10 to New Mexico, but reopened his recruitment on July 18th....

very interesting

New Mexico Message Board Link

[djenkins13]

Anyone want to take a guess who was his lead recruiter at TCU? Yep!

The kid is still wide open. We will see how it plays out.

[ORUTerry]

Read toward the end of this thread:

Greg Swaim - Preps Message Board Link

[ORUJason]

I'm not sure that I would agree with the consolation prize comment from the message board link on the previous post.

I would think that it would be reasonable to suggest that Daremy Steptoe gave an oral commitment to ORU because he believes that Rotnei Clarke will also commit to ORU (since they have probably developed a good friendship with Rotnei on the Team Texas AAU circuit).

It would also be reasonable to suggest that Chris Babb also has reopened his recruiting and included ORU in his top 3, because if Rotnei does sign with ORU, Chris would like to have positioned himself to join Daremy and Rotnei at ORU.

But it does not seem reasonable to suggest that Steptoe and/or Babb could be "consolation prizes" for ORU if Rotnei decides to go elsewhere.  It may be that if Rotnei signs with ORU, then Babb and Steptoe may likely follow suit.  Whereas, if Rotnei goes to Kansas/OU/Kentucky etc., then it might be a lot tougher to reel in Babb and Steptoe.

I would think that a lot rides on whether Rotnei commits to ORU or not, and I would hope that Rotnei signs with a school during the early signing period, so the ORU staff knows one way or the other what direction to head in recruiting.

The thought of getting a recruiting class of the quality of highly regarded players such as Rotnei, Steptoe, and Babb is certainly exciting. 

But I also look at OU, who thought they had 3 very highly touted recruits (before Kelvin Sampson left), and then ended up losing them all (they were released from their scolarships in a surprisingly classy move).  In a way, they were a package deal that went south.  And OU's recruiting suffered greatly after that, because most of the other high quality players were gone.

I could be wrong here, but I assume that the coaching staff may have a "Plan A -- if Rotnei signs", and a "Plan B -- if Rotnei doesn't sign."

[vcboy2000]

Which is the 1st Largest?

The freshman class that started in 2005

[Toby]

Which is the 1st Largest?

The freshman class that started in 2005

Interesting how these two classes occurred right after multiple appearances by our athletic programs on national TV (may not be a direct correlation but still interesting). As fortunate as we were to keep Scott we might have been even more fortunate to keep Mike Carter from leaving to go to KU... his vision sure is playing out nicely.

[ORU_Ed]

I love all the hype with the potential of Rotnei.  I love seeing his name in a CBS sportsline article and that he's currently the 62overall rated recruit.  I love that Swain thinks we're definitely in the mix.  

However, I also know how the recruitment process works and that any "decision" at this point is a non-decision because of the 250+ letters a week that they are STILL getting.  Nearly 2000 letters from schools.  Can any of us fathom that?

My thoughts are with Swain on the idea that Scott wouldn't be at the Lebron camp where Rotnei was if he knew we were totally out of it, but with all the letters coming in from major programs all over the country it will definitely have to be him following God's direction because based on feelings alone I would think he'd be drawn to the idea of stardom on a "big name" program.

He's got to know that he'd have ALL the pub if he came here and that we as a school could get a lot more recognition because of him.

Well, long and not put together well but just saying that My heart says you go boy, come on to ORU but my head (which I try not to listen to) says he's headed out of state.

I hope I can tell my head to shut it.