Memphis doesn't have underclassmen. It has NBA prospects and future playground supervisors.
Class is something regular students attend.
Didn't the Suns draft a flop from there named William Bedford? He was a center, I think. Dumber than a bag of rocks. Stayed eligible for 4 years, though.
Nothing ever changes in Memphis.
Yup. Googled it. 1986, #6 pick of the whole draft. William Bedford.
Well I've been saying that for awhile but since Memphis beat UCLA people now think it's sour grapes. During the NCAA final Dorsey was shooting FT's and the announcer commented that he went to a particular prepschool in North Carolina and that many famous alums from there including ex ACC great Charlie Scott(North Carolina). He was clearly expecting Billy Packer to jump in and talk about Scott and instead Packer chuckled and said "yes John likes that prepschool in fact at one time he had SEVEN players on his roster from that one school."
The school is Laurinburg institute, I first heard about it years ago when the Warriors drafted their version of William Bedford, Chris Washburn who'd attended Laurinburg before NC State. When Chris was with the Warriors a guy wrote a book where he exposed Jim Valvano saying that Washburn had grades changed and work done for him his entire time at NC State and that Chris was "functionally illiterate" when he joined the Warriors(ie he couldn't read or write at a level that allowed him to function in society).
Washburn was asked about the story and asked how he got through 4 years at a prestigous prepschool and he responded same thing I never went to class or did any work it was all taken care of.
Was 20 years ago of course. Memphis had a recruiting class in 2005 that had 4 kids from the same Laurinburg, Dorsey had come the year before, 2005 featured Dozier, ANderson, Shawne Williams and one other kid. Williams played one year and went pro. All 5 kids signed with Memphis out of highschool, failed to qualify, and were sent to Laurinburg for one year magically qualified and enrolled in Memphis. After the 2005 season the coach at Laurinburg, Chris Chaney, left for the Patterson School in North carolina another prepschool. Chaney said he left because Patterson had a much nicer campus and facilities and it would be easier to recruit than it had been at Laurinburg. He also pointed out he'd had some resistance at laurinburg, that resistance was prior to his arrival it was a traditional HS with most of the players being 4 year players. He changed that to it being a school where most of the players were 5th year players (or 6th as many had been reclassified) and were there just for basketball, seems laurinburg alums were a bit unhappy that their school had turned into a diploma mill they didn't want the same bad press they got from Washburn, so Chaney left.
Since 2005 when Chaney left, Memphis hasn't signed a single player from Laurinburg but now has 3 guys on their roster from Patterson(assuming Matt Simpkins qualifies this year). The first recruiting class Chaney had at Patterson included 2 fairly well known Pac 10 players, Davon Jefferson who Chaney kicked out of school for cutting classes, and Jordan Hill. Hill was sort of guilt by association he was a late bloomer who didn't have lots of offers out of highschool so he went to prepschool for a year to get more exposure to college scouts, worked perfectly got to UA. Jefferson was the exact opposite went there hoping to get free grades and wound up getting booted.
With the new NCAA crackdown on prepschools it's going to be really interesting to see how Calipari recruits at Memphis. Year by year the ratio of preps to non preps on his roster is dropping since the rule change. One year 8, this year 6, next year less. He's able to get national recruits like Rose and now Tyreke Evans but with less prep guys he may have to actually start recruiting in the city of Memphis again. Longtime college fans will remember the days when Memphis was a power that often had virtually its entire roster from Memphis(Penny Hardaway, Keith Lee etc).
Memphis and Louisville were the 2 schools most taking advantage of the prepschool nonsense, Tim Floyd started doing it at USC but then the rules changed and he too has to look for a new method of recruiting.
