Originally Posted by
CDu
I think it's a tad more complicated than this. There are several programs, for example, that have maintained a top-10 caliber team with consistency for more than once every few years. Those teams generally fall into one or more of a few categories:
1. Really heavy into the ex-US recruiting market (e.g., Gonzaga)
2. Really heavy into the grad transfer and regular transfer market (Louisville fits this, among others)
3. A "system" program, which recruits on a lower tier but identifies the right guys for the system (e.g., UVa, to a lesser degree MSU)
4. Keep landing top-tier recruiting classes every year (e.g., Duke).
5. Be the unicorn that manages to recruit top talent and keep them for 3-4 years fairly consistently (UNC prior to the last few years)
We don't have the recruiting network in place to make option 1 work. And option 5 is not realistic (even UNC is starting to lose their grasp on this option).
That leaves options 2-4.
Duke has embraced option 4, which means get the best players you can and figure it out once they're on campus. This has, by necessity, eliminated option 3. It's hard to be beholden to a system when the best recruits aren't cookie-cutter from year to year. So Coach K has had to make each team a project in chemistry and identity. There are some cons to this approach. First and foremost, it requires landing top talent year in and year out for it to work. We've seen the last two years what happens when you only get one guy at the top of the pyramid. The other issue is that, because the identity of the team changes from year to year, it's harder on the role players to really find a niche. At UVa, for example, they can groom players for VERY specific roles because they run the same system every year. So a lesser talent can develop over 2-3 years into a productive role player in a very specific niche. At Duke, if you aren't a stud, you will have to fill a role. But that role may change from year to year. Take Jack White for example. In 2019, he was in the near-perfect fit as a fifth man who simply had to do the dirty work because we had ball-dominant stars in Barrett and Williamson. But in 2020, we needed him to be a shooting threat, and he struggled. This is a bit less of an issue than the talent acquisition piece, but it's still relevant.
I am fully on board with the "get the best players you can every year" model. Mainly because, at Coach K's age, he only has so many years left. And to reprogram the process would likely take a few years. UNLESS the team started to implement option 2 for a few years. For whatever reason, Coach K has been loathe to bring in transfers of any kind, and especially so for grad transfers. But this would be an avenue to better navigate the recruiting challenges at the high school level. In fact, I feel like it should be a bigger part of the puzzle even WITH the heavy one-and-done model.
I think maintaining a top-tier program perennially can be done even without the heavy one-and-done model. But it would require a more comprehensive and/or creative recruiting approach involving more transfers. For whatever reason, that hasn't been Coach K's strategy. His first foray into the grad transfer market has appeared to be a bust, which makes me skeptical that he'll go back to the well again. But, really, that's the game that you need to be willing to play if you want to navigate the system in years when you don't have several top recruits.