Zeroed Out 1948 On: The High School Recruit Edition

[Izulde]

So the conference edition looked to be too much work. Instead, we'll be doing a Zeroed Out dynasty focusing on recruits from the following cities:

Racine, WI
La Crosse, WI
Las Vegas, NV
Laramie, WY

I've lived in other cities, such as Fayetteville, AR and Minneapolis, MN, but those were very unhappy places for me and did not end well, to put it mildly. Another city/region may be added in a year or two's time.

1948
No recruits to follow this year.

#1 seeds: Dartmouth, Wisconsin, Penn State, Boston University
The Ivy League sends 4 schools - Dartmouth, Columbia, Princeton, Yale

Princeton ironically loses 64-63 to 3 seed Arkansas in the first round. The Hogs get to the Sweet 16 before bowing out to 7 seed Arizona, who in turn upsets 1 seed Boston U in the Elite 8.

Penn State loses in the second round to 9 seed Georgetown, the Hoyas advancing to the Elite 8 before 2 seed Oregon drops them.

Wisconsin loses by a single bucket, 75-73 to 8 seed Oklahoma State, and it's 5 seed Valparaiso that ends up in the Final Four.

The typical early year craziness happens with 16 seed Utah State knocking off top seed Dartmouth in the first round, but 9 seed Clemson beats the Aggies in the second round before falling to 2 seed Cincinnati in the Elite 8.

Oregon beats Cincinnati in the matchup many call the real title game, while Arizona knocks out Valpo. The championship turns into a hell of a game, with the Ducks edging the Wildcats 68-64 for the country's first national title.

Year 2
Schools Entering
Miami (FL)
Providence

In this new timeline, the Southern Stars accept Miami's application to join the league, because the aristocratic academic powerhouse league of the South wants to expand the footprint into talent-rich Florida. In the other timeline, you may remember, the Hurricanes had to wait a year before getting in.

Providence joins the Yankee, where they form a natural in-state rivalry with Rhode Island, or so the conference hopes.

Independents Bucknell, Creighton, La Salle, and Loyola-Maryland all raised objections to the new schools automatically getting into a conference, when they were forced to fend for themselves.

In response, the NCAA strongly encouraged other conferences to take on the independents. Creighton quickly found a home in the Missouri Valley and Loyola-Maryland joined the Atlantic Six. La Salle and Bucknell also found a natural conference, joining the other Pennsylvania schools in the Steel.

Creighton
Independent (1948)
Missouri Valley (1949-

Loyola-Maryland
Independent (1948)
Atlantic Six (1949-

La Salle
Independent (1948)
Steel (1949-

Bucknell
Independent (1948)
Steel (1949-

Two players from Las Vegas, NV to follow:

PF Lonnie Walczak - Palo Verde High - Las Vegas, NV
6'7, 242 lbs. 1* prospect GPA: 2.21 SAT: 780
Rank: #424 overall, #70 position, #63 region, #7 region position
Initial Top 5 Schools:
San Francisco - 6 prestige
Santa Clara - 3 prestige
Nevada - 1 prestige
Washington State - 4 prestige
Utah State - 13 prestige

SF Raul Pendergrass - College of Southern Nevada - Las Vegas, NV
6'8, 215 lbs. 1* prospect GPA: 2.12 SAT: 830
Rank: #613 overall, #125 position, #100 region, #23 region position
Initial Top 5 Schools:
San Francisco - 6 prestige
Utah State - 13 prestige
St. Mary's - 10 prestige
California - 13 prestige
Colorado - 15 prestige

Neither player looks to have a major impact on the college level, with suspect academics and shallow talent. With a full four, maybe five years Walczak should have a more successful college career than Pendergrass, who will only have two seasons after his juco years at CSN.

One month later
Lonnie Walczak appears to already have average defensive rebounding, post defense, and shotblocking talents. He could develop into a top-flight defensive rebounder, with average post defense, perimeter defense, steals and blocking. Unfortunately, he looks awful everywhere else.

Idaho State, 4 prestige, is now the only interested schools in Lonnie.

Raul Pendergrass looks to have good potential as an inside shooter, although he's below average there right now. He's already a good perimeter defender and above average shotblocker according to scouts and has good potential in both areas. Also an average free throw shooter and offensive rebounder, although he's pretty well maxed out in those categories.

Utah State, 13 prestige and Utah, 7 prestige, are chasing after the juco transfer, with the Aggies, who had the upset of a top seed in last year's tournament, having the inside track.

One month later
Lonnie Walczak may not be playing anywhere. He has yet to qualify academically and it's not certain if he'll be able to finally get academically eligible. Idaho State is still maintaining lukewarm interest.

Utah State and Utah are still calling Raul Pendergrass, but there's no scholarship offers for him, either. Fortunately, as a junior college player, he doesn't need to worry about academic eligibility.

One month later
Still no changes for Lonnie Walczak or Raul Pendergrass.

November 1st
Players are making their commitments across the country, but poor Lonnie Walczak still only has Idaho State calling every now and then, but at least he's getting attention.

Raul Pendergrass isn't even getting the chance to talk to anyone, as both Utah State and Utah have pulled their interest.

December 1st
It's a holding pattern for Lonnie Walczak as he tries to get academically eligible. But Idaho State still is considering him as a walk-on possibility.

Still silence for Raul Pendergrass, who is actually an overall more talented player than Walczak, but it appears he'll never get the chance to earn a scholarship.

January 1st
Gloomy news in the Walczak household, because Lonnie Walczak just received a letter from the NCAA informing that he has officially failed to academically qualify. Tough luck for the kid, who also got walk-on interest from California.

Maybe Idaho State and Cal will now turn to Raul Pendergrass, who is just sadly sitting by his phone, waiting for a call.

February 1st
As you might expect, all interest in Lonnie Walczak disappeared after he failed to qualify. I don't remember if academic non-qualifiers come back as juco players or not. We'll have to see in two years.

It's looking like we'll have to see if Raul Pendergrass walks on somewhere. Nary a sniff.

March 1st
How disappointing for Raul Pendergrass. Not much chance left for him to get a scholarship...

#1 Seeds
Harvard, St. Louis, Boston University, Georgetown
-Another 5 Ivy League schools make it, incredibly enough. BU also earns its second straight #1 seed.

Harvard got to the Sweet 16 before losing to 5 seed St. Joseph's 63-61. Arizona made its second straight Final Four, the 2 seed Wildcats topping St. Joe's in the regional final.

Siena, in an eerie echo, knocked off St. Louis as a 16 seed, before Oregon beat them in the second round. The regional final saw 5 seed Kentucky beating 7 seed Indiana 82-73.

Boston University again failed to live up to their billing, losing in the second round to Alabama. Another 5 seed, the newly conferenced La Salle, went to the Final Four by beating 6 seed Maryland.

Georgetown also lost in te second round, to Lafayette. 6 seed Davidson ended up the South's Final Four entrant, topping 4 seed Penn State and preventing the Steel Conference from two Final Four teams.

As of April 1st, Raul Pendergrass had no schools interested.

Arizona made it back to the NCAA championship, going up against Kentucky. This time the Wildcats were able to cut down the nets and very quickly started talk of establishing themselves as an early NCAA dynasty.

Year 3
No new schools, of course, and no chatter about conference movement yet. This will be a much slower changeup of conferences than the original Zeroed Out.

Raul Pendergrass did not walk on anywhere and his college basketball career is at an end.

Las Vegas continues to be our only source of Division I talent and it's an interesting scenario this time.

PF Josiah Gustafson - El Dorado High School - Las Vegas, NV
6'9, 222 lbs. 1* prospect GPA: 2.44 SAT: 1060
Ranks: #339 overall, #55 position, #68 region, #14 region position
Nevada All-State and Mr. Basketball Nevada
Top 5 Schools:
San Francisco - 18 prestige
Utah State - 26 prestige
UCLA - 17 prestige
St. Mary's - 22 prestige
Montana State - 2 prestige

He's academically eligible to boot. But don't get too excited about his Mr. Basketball Nevada status. He's a 1* prospect and there's only two prospects in the entire Silver State this 1950 season.

One Month Later
Scouts are already raving about Josiah Gustafson's defensive rebounding ability and although he's very raw in every area but that, word is that he has excellent potential as an inside scorer and defensive rebounder and very good potential at ball-handling, post defense, and shot-blocking, even though he's *extremely* raw at post D and blocking.

In terms of the Color Rating Index (CRI), he's listed as a red current/green potential player.

He already has calling interest from Utah State, BYU, and USC, who have 26, 19, and 11 prestige respectively.

One Month Later
No scholarship offers, but 13 prestige Idaho State joins the ranks of calling Josiah Gustafson. The order is now Utah State, BYU, USC, Idaho State in terms of believed preference.

One Month Later
The number of interested schools is the same, the perceived order is the same, and still no scholarship offers. In other words, it's holding pattern for Josiah Gustafson.

November 1st
Nobody has a scholarship offer for Josiah Gustafson, but appealing to his Mormon faith has moved BYU to the top of the list over Utah State. USC and Idaho State are third and fourth, and there's now enough schools inquiring to have a fifth name, and that's Nevada of the lowly 2 prestige.

December 1st
Still no scholarship and the top four schools remain the same, but Colorado State, 11 prestige, has surged into the last top five spot past Nevada. Lot of fighting for Josiah Gustafson's walk-on services.

January 1st
Major, major changes for Josiah Gustafson. The first and most important is that he has not one, but *two* scholarship offers, one from 2 prestige Montana State and 5 prestige Wichita State. BYU, Utah State, and a new fifth school, 11 prestige Idaho, round out the top five. Prediction: He goes to the Bobcats of Montana State.

February 1st
All of the schools who considered Josiah Gustafson walk-on material cease all contact, leaving only Montana State and Wichita State's scholarship offers. The Shockers have now surpassed the Bobcats as Gustafson's top school.

March 1st
Josiah Gustafson has decided!!!! He will be playing his college ball for...

















The Wichita State University Shockers!!!

Wichita State plays in the Missouri Valley and haven't made it to the NCAA tournament in their first two seasons. They're a good bet to make it this year, though, which may have helped influence Gustafson.

1948: 16-15 (6-4)
1949: 11-18 (5-13)
1950 (so far): 19-9 (14-4), tied with Saint Louis for the conference lead

The Shockers' head coach, Danial Parks, is a 37 year old California native and Stanford graduate who has been Wichita State's head coach all three seasons. His job security is average.

More on Wichita State before next season. For now, we'll keep an eye on the Shockers as they go for Win #20 and play out the rest of their best season in the tournament era.