Utah State and its recruiting

So how in the heck does Utah State Coach Stew Morrill do it? It being entering a new and tougher league, quickly rising to the top tier and staying there. There's probably much more than PTW is even aware of that contributes to this success but here's our best take:

Of all the schools in the WAC, USU employs a proscribed, move-by-move offensive system. Some players adjust and benefit, some don't and transfer -- the latter is especially true for backcourters arriving in Logan. This design, when operated proficiently, makes the whole better than the sum of its parts.

The USU offensive style appears as the antithesis of the in-vogue dribble-drive creation offense John Calipari and others have so prominently displayed of late -- the one in which it seems there are no 'plays' being run, more a creating offense by breaking down defenders off the dribble and going to the hoop or passing to the open teammate if then double-teamed.

Morrill typically cannot land the type of backcourters needed to run the 'Calipari' style. That's no judgment -- just a reality. Instead, he brings in high basketball IQ types who do well in running set plays, rarely commit unforced errors, play a physical game and sometimes have surprisingly good athletic ability.

The primary keys to Morrill's offense are patience, unselfishness and definitely the setting of screens. It would be interesting to view a before and after the game set of photos of an Aggie opponent because there would definitely be bruises and welts in the latter that weren't appearing in the former. It's a style that gets an opposing player thinking after a while -- pondering how to stay close to his man by maybe taking a shortcut here or there and hopefully bypassing another pounding absorbed by fighting through screen after screen. But taking these alternate routes more often than not lead to an open jumper or a defensive breakdown that allows a route to the basket.

The above is a prelude to digging into Utah State's recruiting. Morrill, as with every other WAC coach, cannot land the so-called blue-chippers. Guys like Luke Babbitt and Herb Pope are anomaly recruits -- exceedingly rare. So he pursues the hard workers, the blue collar guys, who will submerge their egos and work within a team framework for the common good.

He hits more than he misses.

But we also see the need for at least a bit of a caveat. Of late, the Aggie coaching staff has brought in a number of guards and wings who ended up departing over lack of playing time and/or difficulty in adjusting to their assigned role. Were these departees worthy of the gamble, not good fits for the system or simply a byproduct of the nowaday basketball mindset of "I want playing time now"? Who really knows?

Here's that lineage: Stavon Williams, Dominique Cooks, Richard Sirju, DeUndrae Spraggins, Desmond Stephens, Deremy Geiger (apparently) plus even Brandon Brown who eventually ended up at Idaho. We don't know what was behind the move north but Brown never played for the Aggies.

As for bigs, Morrill and Company have done a much better job at minimizing turnover. We could only locate Michael Earl and Brayden Bell as transfers. The Earl signing though was truly mystifying. Yes, he shared most valuable player honors in the California junior college ranks as a sophomore at Fullerton College but his style of play was an utmost finesse one and we're still not surer why Morrill and Company reached out.

However, Utah State has obviously managed to remain successful regardless of any comings-and-goings so they are certainly doing things right enough to prevent any sort of argument about roster changes.

One concern we do have is who will replace Jared Quayle a year from now? He is going to be in the running for WAC most valuable player (who in the world predicted this at the time of his signing?) and we don't see a replacement on the current roster.