What exactly does the “hill” do to hurt our recruiting? Honest question... I just don’t see how we get out recruited by Duke every year
It goes to number of "exceptions" per year. Guys that don't have 1,000 on their SAT or 4 units of math in HS. We are graduating players and not getting hit on academic progress so conceptually a couple or 5 really great FB players who don't meet the minimums we have but want to work wouldn't break the bank so to speak.
When you look at Duke there are 2 things going on. First, Duke doesn't have the same focus on math that we do so they have a broader pool of kids who didn't take 4 solid units of math. And once they get in they have more places to "hide" them. I haven't seen a comparison in a couple of years but I expect we are higher than they are in SAT right now - though they are than 90% of the schools in the country as well.
But secondly - and more importantly - Duke has started to attract a lot more players than it used to. Essentially they are tied with us in recruiting but seem to have a playmaker or two more than we do - and do a better job of putting those playmakers in position to succeed - especially on D.
Summary - there are a lot of kids we can't recruit for academics. I would like to see that off limits pool reduced to some degree. But having said that part it is also a reality that this staff isn't the best at recruiting and that needs to improve to get kids we could recruit - we lose too many kids we do offer especially in the state of GA with a ton of talent.