GLENDALE, Ariz. – The truth in recruiting is often a moving target.
“Nobody says, ‘Hey man, I hope I can come to your place and play 10 minutes and set screens and rebound, that would be cool,” Purdue coach Matt Painter said ahead of Monday’s national championship game against top-ranked UConn.
Doyel: In Indiana, ‘banners’ ends the banter. If Purdue wins one, it’s time for a new conversation.
Purdue’s blueprint? Win your in-state recruiting wars. Just look at Boilers’ roster.
That is not the role often (ever?) pitched in recruiting from college coaches, either. And to be fair, coaches might not necessarily be lying when they talk to prospects and their parents about their future role in college — it is the player’s upside that is projected. On that point, Painter and his staff might not be much different from any other coaching staff. It would be difficult to win any recruiting battle without looking for the upside. Why else would you recruit that player?
But one of the Painter’s biggest strengths in recruiting — and which saves him headaches down the road (just ask around the Purdue locker room for confirmation) — is honesty. It is also a trait that his assistants 10 or 12 years ago said he might need to dial back a bit if he wanted to get any players.
“I would break down things (to recruits) and my assistants would be like, ‘If you keep going this route, we’ll have nobody on our team,’” Painter said Sunday. “’Your honesty is, like, killing us.’ … I just said, ‘Yeah but when we get ’em, it’s easier to coach ’em. Just be a truth teller.”
If there is a secret sauce to Purdue’s ability to retain players in the transfer portal era, it might be as simple as that. Our columnist Gregg Doyel did an excellent job of laying all of that out in a column prior to Purdue’s Sweet 16 game…
Source link : https://sports.yahoo.com/just-truth-teller-matt-painters-173850617.html
Author : IndyStar | The Indianapolis Star
Publish date : 2024-04-08 17:38:50
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