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The 2013 recruiting class has a lot of impact players, including Jabari Parker, Andrew Wiggins, and Julius Randle. The only problem is, none of them are going to the Big Ten. In fact, the Big Ten has just one top 25 recruit in either the Rivals or Maxpreps rankings.
What does this mean for the conference?
Right now the Big Ten is the best conference in the country in basketball. Big Ten football recruiting has been lackluster during much of the last decade, but in basketball, they have been able to keep up with anyone in the country. They currently have six ranked teams, yet Noah Vonleh, the no. 7 player in the class and an Indiana commitment, is the only top 25 player coming to the Big Ten. Indiana in fact, is the only Big Ten team in the top ten of the team rankings (third according to Rivals).
Now, that is not to say that no Big Ten teams have good recruiting classes. Illinois and Michigan both have multiple top 100 players on Rivals, ranking 13th and 14th respectively in the team rankings on Rivals. Zakarie Irvin, a Michigan commitment, is the next highest ranked Big Ten commitment (no. 29 on Maxpreps and no. 34 on Rivals), and highlights a very good Michigan class. Meanwhile, Illinois touts a pair of Simeon commits, most notably Kendrick Nunn, a very impressive shooting guard.
Michigan State came very close to having an elite class, but ended up losing out on Parker to Duke. However, they still sit at zero commitments for next year. To be fair, they have just one senior who they are losing for next year, Derrick Nix. Ohio State and Purdue both have two top 85 commits, according to the Rivals rankings, but none in the top 50. Teams are getting some good players, there just isn’t very much top tier talent entering the conference next season.
The talent that is coming in to the Big Ten is top heavy, mostly at Indiana and Michigan. Of the top six recruits coming in to the Big Ten next season, only Nunn is not going to Indiana or Michigan. It does make sense that after such a strong crop of freshmen this year in the Big Ten, the quality would go down a little bit the following year, and that is just what happened. The lone real positive factoid about the 2013 Big Ten class is that Vonleh is the first top 10 Rivals player to go a Big Ten team since Jared Sullinger in 2010.
Will one relatively poor class of recruits ruin Big Ten basketball? Of course not. But, it does continue a general trend of poor recruiting by the Big Ten in terms of the big names. Big Ten schools just are not grabbing the top guys, and that has been true for a while now. But if the Big Ten wants to stay at the top of the conference hierarchy, they are going to have to start getting those big names.
The good news is, Jahlil Okafor, Tyus Jones and Cliff Alexander, three of the top four 2014 recruits, are all from the Midwest and looking at Big Ten schools. I would expect one or two of them to end up in their local conference, with Minnesota chasing after the local Jones and Tom Izzo all over Alexander.
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