Ash Yacoubou Commits to SLU

[SluSignGuy]

Thought I would start a new thread for those who missed this in the Recruiting thread.....like I did for 2 days.

[BACKHANDtheRICAN]

Thank you! I actually missed it.

[brianstl]

He deserves his own thread. I look forward to a productive and successful career as a Billiken for Ash.

[b.hayes]

I had our Ash inside source RiseAndGrind fill me in when I got back from a trip last night, but I would have missed this too after skimming the 30 pages of the recruiting thread that I missed. Welcome Ash!

[RUBillsFan]

Its going to be a long wait while he sits out the year, but I'm really looking forward to seeing what he can do with more minutes and more consistent playing time. His rate stats are all very good, but his overall numbers don't pop because he only got 12 mins/game.

I don't have much to base it on it, but he sort of looks like a Danny Brown type of player (perhaps a much better version) as a bigger guard who shoots the 3 very well.

[Pistol]

Yacoubou has a very, very high ceiling. He's a very solid 6-4, 210. His percentages jumped significantly from his freshman to sophomore season (FG: 32.8% to 41.8%, 3FG: 26.2% to 39.6%) even though his minutes did not (10.6 to 12.0). He spent a lot of time frustrated in Wright's (seemingly irrational) doghouse.

Out of high school, he was rated the 12th-best shooting guard in the nation. He chose Villanova early, committing his junior year. He had plenty of offers, choosing Nova over his other finalists, UConn and Kentucky. He was the New York player of the year his senior season.

The talent is there. I can't wait to see what he does with the opportunity. With 5 seniors departing after the 2013-2014 season, he has two years to do his thing. I would guess he'll start and have a chance to lead us in scoring when 2014-2015 rolls around.

By the way, I love this quote:

"I averaged the highest 3-point percentage and field goal efficiency and was the best defensive player on the team, and I also played well against Louisville and Syracuse, and when I played 25 minutes I led the team in points and rebounds. But after the last Syracuse game I ended up averaging 12 minutes and I wanted to play more, but I wasn’t."

Just calling it as he sees it. Welcome to St. Louis, Ash.

[MB73]

AY makes it "complete": great late spring recruiting, especially under the circumstances.

Two 3 star rated high potential BIGS and a highly rated high potential transfer guard from a top notch program.

Outstanding job by JC and the staff!

[Westy03]

AY makes it "complete": great late spring recruiting, especially under the circumstances.

Two 3 star rated high potential BIGS and a highly rated high potential transfer guard from a top notch program.

Outstanding job by JC and the staff!

I agree great job by Crews but this class isn't complete. Hopefully they get another transfer to fill all the scholarships.

[Billiken Rich]

I really was worried about JC's recruiting more than his in game coaching. This very nice class makes this doubter feel relieved and extremely pumped for the future.....

[Pistol]

I was also thinking about how less worried I am about the future of the program than a couple months ago. Even after we signed Crews, I wasn't sure what that meant. My number one concern with him was recruiting. Looking ahead at the roster, we had: Glaze, Manning, McBroom, Drew, Crawford, and a lot of question marks.

Then came this spring. Agbeko was starting to blow up. Lancona had his choice of 10 nice programs when he was released from WSU. Yacoubou is, based on HS rankings, the highest-level recruit on the roster now. And I suspect Crawford would have seen a lot more offers roll in had he waited until the spring; he did more his senior year than anyone anticipated. This final spot will be very, very interesting.

If this class is as talented as I think it is, the program isn't going to fall off a cliff after this excellent senior class graduates, as I had originally feared.

The only question mark now is the conference. Otherwise, we're going to be a top 25 program for a while now.

[RUBillsFan]

Getting Yacoubou is also nice because it helps to even out the classes:

Year eligibility is expected to be used up:

2013-14 - 5 (Jordair Jett, Mike McCall, Jake Barnett, Dwayne Evans, Rob Loe)

2014-15 - 2 (Grandy Glaze, John Manning)

2015-16 - 2 (Austin McBroom, Ash Yacoubou)

2016-17 - 3 (Mike Crawford, Reggie Agbeko, Tanner Lancona)

[slufanskip]

I'd also like to see us add a pg. I'd prefer a transfer to even out the classes a bit, but we don't need to sit on it. We already have 5 places to fill next year, there is no need to add a 6th.

[NH]

I've said all along the 2014 class will be the most important and it seems Crews is doing a good job there. I expect a commit in the next two months.

[billikenfan05]

I've said all along the 2014 class will be the most important and it seems Crews is doing a good job there. I expect a commit in the next two months.

I doubt we'll know much about it until it happens.

[AnkielBreakers]

This has really been impressive. Each of these recruits have been at a higher level of physical talent than the guys we have from the RM years (with some exceptions and WR not withstanding). These guys are generally not as tall down low, but they jump higher and are stronger. It will be interesting to see if they are as coachable. This could be an exciting group in 2 years.

[bauman]

Getting Yacoubou is also nice because it helps to even out the classes:

Year eligibility is expected to be used up:

2013-14 - 5 (Jordair Jett, Mike McCall, Jake Barnett, Dwayne Evans, Rob Loe)

2014-15 - 2 (Grandy Glaze, John Manning)

2015-16 - 2 (Austin McBroom, Ash Yacoubou)

2016-17 - 3 (Mike Crawford, Reggie Agbeko, Tanner Lancona)

Looking at this list makes me wonder if RM knew he wasn't coming back as HC when his contract expired. Two years of recruiting produced GG, JM and AM. Seriously, that is not a group that would be leading us to the Dance. Even if you add KC and JD to the list you have only added two Horizon-league quality players. Thank heavens for JC quickly making the roster over with some real top quality (potential) recruits.

[Franchise_08]

I would like another ball handler just in case we play VCU in the OOC schedule in '14.

[billikenfan05]

Looking at this list makes me wonder if RM knew he wasn't coming back as HC when his contract expired. Two years of recruiting produced GG, JM and AM. Seriously, that is not a group that would be leading us to the Dance. Even if you add KC and JD to the list you have only added two Horizon-league quality players. Thank heavens for JC quickly making the roster over with some real top quality (potential) recruits.

Are you saying that Rick mailed in his last class? Even if he knew he wasn't coming back, Rick wasn't the type of person to mail anything in when it came to ball.

[RUBillsFan]

Looking at this list makes me wonder if RM knew he wasn't coming back as HC when his contract expired. Two years of recruiting produced GG, JM and AM. Seriously, that is not a group that would be leading us to the Dance. Even if you add KC and JD to the list you have only added two Horizon-league quality players. Thank heavens for JC quickly making the roster over with some real top quality (potential) recruits.

I don't think that is fair to say. As you noted, with RM we may have still had KC and JD plus who is to say RM wouldn't have put together a great 2013 class as well. RM put together some big classes when he first arrived. Therefore, we did not have much balance between classes and that is the reason the Junior & Soph classes next year will be smaller.

I will say that I think opposing coaches probably used RM's health concerns against SLU in recruiting battles. You would think that a big name like RM could draw recruits, but I wonder if the health concerns and stories about his personality basically negated that advantage.

[RiseAndGrind]

I don't think that is fair to say. As you noted, with RM we may have still had KC and JD plus who is to say RM wouldn't have put together a great 2013 class as well. RM put together some big classes when he first arrived. Therefore, we did not have much balance between classes and that is the reason the Junior & Soph classes next year will be smaller.

I will say that I think opposing coaches probably used RM's health concerns against SLU in recruiting battles. You would think that a big name like RM could draw recruits, but I wonder if the health concerns and stories about his personality basically negated that advantage.

Keith Carter finished 2nd to Jabari Parker in Illinois Mr. Basketball. He was, by most accounts, a really good signing for SLU. The reason he didn't have better, more high major offers after transferring probably had something to do with the fact that he left his team a quarter of the way through the season.

[bauman]

Are you saying that Rick mailed in his last class? Even if he knew he wasn't coming back, Rick wasn't the type of person to mail anything in when it came to ball.

I just wonder if subconsciously he settled for less. You have to admit that that group of 3 (or 5) does not approach the quality of this year's senior class or of the recruits JC has brought in under difficult circumstances and in a short period of time.

[bauman]

Keith Carter finished 2nd to Jabari Parker in Illinois Mr. Basketball. He was, by most accounts, a really good signing for SLU. The reason he didn't have better, more high major offers after transferring probably had something to do with the fact that he left his team a quarter of the way through the season.

He looked to me like a guy who was probably a higher ranked HS player than he would ever be in college. He was very short and thin. Sure he might have developed but I think your excuse for why he wound up with a Horizon league team is just your personal speculation-I'll speculate (based on having seen him play a few times) that his HS ranking would not have resulted in a high quality career in the A-10 or hopefully Big East. With all the interest we see in players tranferring, if he was really good he would have had a few major conference schools after him. By the way, didn't JD come out of Indiana as one of the top players in that state? So much for basing college success on HS honors. I'm hopeful that MC's Ind HS rankings prove more correct than Drew's.

[jbizzle09]

He looked to me like a guy who was probably a higher ranked HS player than he would ever be in college. He was very short and thin. Sure he might have developed but I think your excuse for why he wound up with a Horizon league team is just your personal speculation-I'll speculate (based on having seen him play a few times) that his HS ranking would not have resulted in a high quality career in the A-10 or hopefully Big East. With all the interest we see in players tranferring, if he was really good he would have had a few major conference schools after him. By the way, didn't JD come out of Indiana as one of the top players in that state? So much for basing college success on HS honors. I'm hopeful that MC's Ind HS rankings prove more correct than Drew's.

So, basically, if a guy does well in HS and gets honors on a statewide level, we should expect him to not be very good in college??? Maybe that is not what you are trying to convey, but that is how it is coming across in your posts.

Also, RAG is correct in saying that his options were going to be somewhat limited by him leaving in the middle of a season. There are only so many schools that are going to have open scholarships during the season so that a player can transfer there in December/January.

[Box and Won]

So you're already writing off Jared Drew - who yet to log a second of game time - and Keith Carter - who played in, what, four games last year? Jeez.

[NH]

We would kill for a player who was similar to Keith Carter in terms of basketball right now. I can't speak for the kids academics, attitude, work ethic so I'm not going to assume anything either way there. But Carter will be a good player for them and would fill a big void on our team. We move on either way. Hopefully we can reel in another PG soon to replace him.