madtownvol
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I made a decision to mostly stay out of this discussion. I am neutral. I can speak from a perspective of working in the field of education and coaching for several years as a now licensed administrator. There is a high possibility of a thorough end of the year evaluation of the WBB program being conducted. A formal meeting either has taken place or will at any moment. The AD will address the season performance in house and present a list of recommendations if no change is coming. I will admit the silence is uncommon territory since I have watched Tennessee. It could be the TN athletic administration not being completely pleased with the perception of NIL or the lack thereof for women’s basketball. I do not buy that NIL is the main factor to signing portal or high school players. Rickea, Jewel, Talaysia Cooper, Kaniya Boyd, Tamari and future commits Finley and Nyla had offers from other universities that would have just outbid Tennessee if that is the case. I also think recruiting is not the main issue to people with knowledge of the program from the inside. Being in the field of education I know that a program like Tennessee recruits itself and we have to be honest with ourselves to get past this assumption that NIL now or in the future is why a program like Tennessee fell short of winning another championship.
You may be in the field of education but your perspective is at odds with just about everyone else in college athletics who emphasize that NIL is the driving factor in recruiting. In his introductory press conference, Kenny Brooks said the first step to getting KY to an elite level is catching up in the NIL game.
And, you really don;'t know that a program like Tennessee "recruits itself" and since recruiting has been a struggle, the evidence in fact points to the contrary. The problem is not that the LVs can't compete on selected targets; the problem is that they can't sign enough elite recruits to compete with elite schools who bring in 3 or 4 elite players each season.
I am excited about Boyd but she was not a top 15 ranked recruit (she was #34) so the NIL bidding wars were probably not that intense.