sPitt getting their it together....maybe not
- Thread starter dunkej01
- Start date
Either Santoro or Strittmatter would be good choices.
I totally agree. I wonder if Strittmatter wants the challenge of a college head coaching position. A plus is he is in the area and would have a recruiting pipeline. I also think it would take a lot to pull Santoro away from Lehigh, although 10+ years of not winning EIWAs makes you think it might be time.
Don't wonder too much -- Strittmatter has publicly said he doesn't want the job.
maybe not. read an article last week that all is not well at lehigh. natives are restless.
Santoro will do OK at Pitt and with a facilities upgrade could become a more attractive choice for the WPIAL kids. However as Mr CSauertiegPSU put it this is not a slam dunk or game changing type of hire.
At Lehigh Santoro has been sitting smack dab in the middle of pretty fertile recruiting territory and every year at best plays second fiddle to Cornell. This will be an upgrade over Peters, but as a team they will still learn to wrestle in reverse always hoping to squeeze out a 1 point victory and hardly ever will Pitt see the inside of the top 10.
They need to do better.
At Lehigh Santoro has been sitting smack dab in the middle of pretty fertile recruiting territory and every year at best plays second fiddle to Cornell. This will be an upgrade over Peters, but as a team they will still learn to wrestle in reverse always hoping to squeeze out a 1 point victory and hardly ever will Pitt see the inside of the top 10.
They need to do better.
Do not know. It could be he is the best to put his hat in the ring, but hiring Pat doesn't make me believe Pitt is all of a sudden going to crash any of the upper tier parties.
A parent of a kid that trains with young guns told me Strittmatter now has 500+ kids with young guns! I didn't know 500 kids wrestled in western Pa. That's a pile of kids and cash. Can anyone confirm these numbers? What does it cost to train with young guns?
Your opinion. What is your definition of a game changer, lets start there.
If they upgrade facilities as he wants, its a game changer.
If Pitt gets an RTC, its a game changer.
If Pitt starts recruiting the P4P in PA, OH, NJ, NY its a game changer.
Santoro can coach with the best of them and will bring assistants that do as well. That in and of itself brings them into the top of the ACC. The other things I mention are indeed game changers because they go from top of ACC to top 10/5 nationally.
If sPitt can get 1 or 2 guys a year that normally would go to OH st and us, that levels the field and changes the game.
So maybe your opinion of what a game changer is and what mine is different.
EDIT: Lehighs admissions and class offerings are a moon shot compared to pitts. Santoro at Pitt is open to whole different kind of kid/wrestler with this move.
So what you're saying is that they'll be Oklahoma State, but in a far better recruiting territory.
And what you're downplaying is that Pitt will not impose Lehigh's more stringent admissions standards than (if you ask Lehigh fans, neither does Cornell between the state school college and the first year at the community college).
Should he be offered and accept the Pitt job, who do you think are some possibilities for Lehigh?
Considering the empire they've built -- 4 or 5 locations spanning Pittsburgh to Altoona -- 500 kids seems almost low.
Hughes and Buxton are both already there and familiar with the program.
Depends on your definition of "gamechanger"
I could see a Santoro-led Pitt program challenging and winning in the ACC. How good is the best of the ACC? NC State in 2016 was a national power, and Va Tech has had some good teams. Could an ACC team take it all? -- don't see it.
I could see a Santoro-led Pitt program challenging and winning in the ACC. How good is the best of the ACC? NC State in 2016 was a national power, and Va Tech has had some good teams. Could an ACC team take it all? -- don't see it.
I agree with most of what you wrote except for the bolded. To a degree you are correct about facilities, but they aren't a game changer per se in the way that a RTC would be a game changer. A nice extra perk to discuss with recruits is all it is.
Here is Cael on what facilities brings to the table:
http://www.centredaily.com/sports/college/penn-state-university/psu-wrestling/article120981558.html
However, Sanderson knows that facilities aren’t everything.
“Facilities don’t win national championships. It’s your attitude,” he said. “As grateful as we are, kids don’t come here if we have a hot and cold tub. If they do, they probably aren’t the right kids.
“We want kids to come here because they see the way our guys compete and see our kids love to wrestle. It’s just a little thing that helps out and makes things nicer.”
Ignoring the fantasies of Cael, Smith, Ryan, and Brands ...
What Pitt needs is someone who has built a program that's already better than Pitt, with less resources than what Pitt could offer, and has PA recruiting connections. With Dresser off the table, that's a pretty short list: Santoro, Flynn, Stutzman, Pop. That's about it, unless they wanted to bet on Moore's potential. (And I don't know if any of these guys even would want the job.)
If you then factor in RTC development, Santoro is the clear front-runner.
... and yet, in a weird way, I don't think facilities are near the top of the recruiting list talking points. They are on the list, but probably gets mentioned as a means to an end. When Cael says you don't come to PSU for the facilities, I think he means that literally. If you come to PSU to win a championship (individual or team), then the facilities help get the wrestler there, but isn't a key ingredient. It doesn't win the day like great coaching, RTC partners, and room partners, but it is a necessary ingredient for success.
Looking at the website, it is $100 a month for the first kid in a family, there are multi-kid discounts for a family. If they are all 500 kids paying for a full year, revenue is $600K a year, probably a little lower with multi kid discounts. Throw in camps and other stuff, revenue is probably close to a million a year. Obviously there are expenses, looks like taking the PITT HC job would probably be a pay cut for Strittmatter.
If ASU can win a NC from the Pac10, you can win in the ACC. Its pretty clear that you only need 4-6 studs. sPitts location alone can get them that and if they do they drag us and tO$U down leveling the field.
If American, Edinboro, etc can finish top 5 on the strength of 2-3 guys, why cant sPitt do that? But because of re-commitment to the sport now do it annually. They could.
True, though I think the Lehigh Valley RTC is a biigger differentiator.
Santoro's ties to the program are nice, and will help with glad handing alumni donors, but Cael, Ryan, Dresser, Pop, and Flynn among many others aren't alumni of their current programs.
I believe whatever Cael tells me to believe...So you dont believe in coach speak......And. Here. We. Go.
I believe whatever Cael tells me to believe...
I only believe what Cael tells Spyker in the room or over email.
- Spyker Jr.
Yeh I'm torn on Pitt. If they get the right coach they could theoretically pull in some top recruits ie those National WPIAL Young Gunner stars. But I just can't see them bringing it home. Also, everyone brings up how they're in this hotbed - how much do Ohio kids really care about Pitt? I honestly don't know, but the only recent ones I can think of crossing over are the Thomusseits, Bright, Rahmani, Siepel and Bentley. Maybe you get some St. Paris and St. Ed's kids, some WPIAL kids and go for it but idk if that'll be enough. Will they have enough draw further east. Will be interesting if Santoro goes there and I think they COULD be a force, just like Arizona State COULD be or NC State or Missouri or VaTech or insert today's rising program.
"Threats" like these make me appreciate the national recruiting strategy as well.
"Threats" like these make me appreciate the national recruiting strategy as well.
Santoro would still have his recruiting connections throughout PA, NJ, and NY, and he's gotten some kids from Blair (though some of that may be Buxton) and Seminary.
He's been a national recruiter for a while. Hamlin is from Vermont, Hatchett and Vollaro from Florida, Wessell from Colorado ...
Plus Pitt draws kids from outside WPIAL regularly.
Perhaps you're right. He's obviously an awesome coach. We'll see, I'm just mildly skeptical
What you're saying is that if he completely changes the game then it's a game changer?
I don't disagree with your skepticism because Pitt. But only because Pitt.
If Santoro gets his conditions, especially the RTC, then he should make Pitt an annual top 10 team, pushing top 5, within 5 yrs.
That's not necessarily a game changer to me, unless he draws enough from the big boys to alter courses, which is feasible.
The real game changer potential is longer term. Based solely upon recruiting base, the top 5 teams should be PSU, anOSU, Pitt, Rutgers, and They Be Illin'. That would disrupt the Midwest mafia to say the least.
Santoro is in his 50s, so he probably has around 10 yrs left. (Coincidentally so is Smith.) Not sure if that's enough time to put Pitt at that level. Getting there might require 2 consecutive good hires by Pitt, insert punchline here. And that's Santoro's vision which Pitt lacked until he became a candidate, again insert punchline here.
I hope Flynn stays, but with the uncertainty surrounding 'Boro I certainly couldn't blame him for accepting something somewhere else.
Just a comment about the Cornell. Like the other Ivies and Service academies, the first year at community college has little to do with academics unless the kid does not qualify for the academic stardards of the private portion of the school. it is a method to redshirt. In either case the kid is not admitted to Cornell until they do qualify and perhaps a community college helps that. That's a good thing, it would seem.
The advantage they do have in a way is the State ag school within the private school. The tuition is less and academic requirements for entry a little less. That lowered tuition can be valuable, but as far as academics at some early point a wrestler would have to transfer into a major outside the school if he doesn't want an ag and life sciences degree. Yes it can be an advantage in some ways.
But also note that any wrestler going to Community college first has not signed an NLI and is perfectly free to leave for Lehigh if they so choose. Lehigh could offer a community college year to their kids if they wanted, I suppose.
Make no mistake, these "advantages" pale in comparison to actually having 9.9 scholarships and ability to redshirt. The ivies do have it tougher, even though there is some aid available.
Lehigh could quit whining on this issue and just start winning on the mat.
Lehigh is the classic case of a ship with too many captains. The head coach wants to beat Cornell but is more concerned with the national tournament. The fans pay lip service to NCAAs but really only care about Cornell and EIWA.
Kinda like when Cael early on said he had bigger goals than beating Lehigh. That both satisfied and shut up the fans. But one big difference is that he's Cael Freaking Sanderson.
http://www.nfhs.org/ParticipationStatics/ParticipationStatics.aspx/
About 10,000 boys wrestle in high school in PA each year. Safe to say well more than 500 of them live in western PA. Maybe I didn't understand your question.
