IF ONLY BILL SELF WOULD'VE STAYED WE'D BE.....

Exactly. The last of Self's guys are gone (Randle). We'll see what happens next season.

And my only point was that people like to say Weber won here with Self's recruits, well Self did the exact same thing. His best team, the Elite 8 team weren't his guys at all. He still gets credit from most people without mentioning Kruger. But a ton of folks ALWAYS bring up Weber winning with Self's guys. Which is it? And Self's team after that E8 was good, but not great. They performed about like everyone thought as freshmen. Dee was supposed to be a stud from day one. Luther didn't start making consistent contributions until his junior season. DWill was good.

I usually just talk about star ratings because that is the scorecard most on here and other sites go by. I've said for a long long time, it's more telling what other schools have offered a kid, combined with scouting reports from people who have actually seen the kid play.

And like I've said, when you read interviews with Auggie, Dee, Deron and Luther they credit Weber for the bulk of their development. But those guys all had killer attitudes and HATED to lose. Especially DWill.

Meacham has improved. Brock has improved. McCamey improved. Davis improved.  Warren Carter improved.

We'll see what Weber can get done with improving talent. We've seen that Self can win the big one with a stacked roster (we've also seen he can flame out with a stacked roster). It would've been interesting to see what he could've got done at Illinois but he didn't want it that way; looks like he indeed made the right decision for him and his family...twice. It would be nice just like the ending to the Gordon thing, to finally put a rest to the Self comparisons.

Those ships have sailed, time to turn the page.

I do the same thing with ratings I take them for what they are, but if a guy is rated high they have a better chance of being a good D1 player then a 3 star guy. Of course there are always exceptions but I'm talking on average. Now if you read my post you will see that I clearly made a list of schools that we have competed with for some of these guys. The list is terrible we are going after guys that mid major schools want. Also just as an example Tyler Griffey, read his report from ESPN Insider. Here is a sample: not a good rebounder, hard time running the floor, but he can shoot. I'm not sure that sounds like a big man I want on my BIG TEN team. Look I know nothing about these kids they may be great they may not so I refuse to argue about or get excited about the future (2009 and 2010), which is what most Illini fans are doing. I love McCamey he is a hell of a player and I was not mad at Weber for getting this guy seeing as how he was highly rated coming out of HS and he was one of the few bright spots this year. Davis looks OK, Meacham is marginal at best he's nothing more then an average shooter.

Of course those guys are gonna praise Weber he told them to a Final 4! Plus Self left them out to dry when he bolted to Kansas. I'm not trying to defend Self's character he was f***ed up for leaving Illinois like that, but he can coach and recruit. Why in the world would you expect them to praise a guy left them.

We sure will see what Weber can do but I don't want to have to wait til 2009. Let see what 2008 holds. The only person at fault for the lack of talent we had here in the past couple of years is Weber. I hope he can get it done but I'm not going to be shocked if by this time next year we are all waiting for the 2009 and 2010 class to come save the day.

First of who said anything about McCamey, Tisdale, and Davis being senoirs??? Not sure if your talking to me or not but did I write that somewhere??? No I don't think so.

2nd, my point exactly we have no go to players (except McCamey), is this suppose to make it better???

3rd If the illini basketball team has to go through a dry spell like the football team then its an equal shame for them. Zook turned that program around in 3 years from GOOD RECRUITING and good coaching. I don't see how this compares b/c anyone who noticed the recruits he was getting were not that surprised about the football team being good (maybe not rose bowl good but bowl game good). I'm no bandwagon jumper my friend I've been a life long Chicago/Illini fan my whole life good and bad times. AGAIN I am by know mean abandoning my squad, but I have the right as a fan to voice my displeasure.

I have a suggestion for you. Go back and look at the last say 4 recruiting classes. Weber didn't do a good job in the recruiting department. There's a reason why they barely made the tournament in 2007 and there's a reason why we missed it all together this year. Yes we had no business making the tourney b/c we weren't that good and we couldn't make FTs.

Consider the way this years team got to the Big Ten title game. Penn ST (terrible team), Purdue (decent team we barely beat, and overrated getting nocked out the big dance), Minnesota (another team we should have beat, but up and coming), then get absoluty waxed by Wisconsin. Again the guys lost confidence in themselves??? Isn't that Weber fault as a coach or no lets blame that on Self to MANNNNNNNN!

I'll say it again for those of you that didn't hear me before GO ILLINI I ope they have much success in 08, but as fans we need to stop being such homers and admit when or squad makes mistakes. I hope Weber gets it together for 08 but if not I'll be an Illini fan til I die.