10 – Texas Longhorns
Record over last six years – 155-55
Top Recruits - LaMarcus Alridge (#16 – 2004), Daniel Gibson (#29 – 2004), Mike Wiliams (#20 – 2004), Kevin Durant (#2 – 2006), Avery Bradley (#4 – 2009), Jordan Hamilton (#6 – 2009)
Recruiting Flops - Mike Williams
Best Below-the-Radar Recruits - AJ Abrams, DJ Augustine, Damien James, PJ Tucker
Program Killing One-and-Done Players - Durant

Other than Durant, they’ve done a pretty good job of keeping their players around for at least two years. Their success, 155-55, is impressive. In fact, they’ve got more wins in the past 6 years than any team on this list so far other than Memphis (who’s aided by an easy schedule). Plus, they’ve had some NCAA success. Just a side note – the one year of Kevin Durant at Texas was easily my favorite non-Minnesota college basketball team to watch. I don’t know that I missed a game that was on tv.

9 – Arizona Wildcats
Record over last six years – 130-70
Top Recruits - Ndubi Ebi (#4 – 2003), Mustafa Shakur (#12 – 2003), Jawann McClellan (#18 – 2004), JP Prince (#21 – 2005), Chase Budinger (#4 – 2006), Jerryd Bayless (#13 – 2007), Jamelle Horne (#21 – 2007)
Recruiting Flops - JP Prince
Best Below-the-Radar Recruits - Jordan Hill, Nic Wise
Program Killing One-and-Done Players - Ndubi Ebi & Brandon Jennings (never made it to school), Jerryd Bayless

They’ve had a lot of decent recruits, but most of them have been slightly disappointing. We all expected Chase Budinger to do the things that Larry Bird did in college, and even though he’s started off a nice career with the Rockets, it just didn’t quite click in college. He was always good, but not first team All-American great. After the great run they had in the late 90s and early 2000s, it’ll be interesting to see what the post-Lute Olson era looks like at Arizona.

8 –North Carolina Tarheels
Record over last six years – 176-37
Top Recruits - Marvin Williams (#11 – 2004), J.R. Smith (#8 – 2004), Tyler Hansbrough (#10 – 2005), Wayne Ellington (#8 – 2006), Ty Lawson (#9 – 2006), Brandon Wright (#3 – 2006), Ed Davis (#15 – 2008), John Henson (#5 – 2009)
Recruiting Flops - none
Best Below-the-Radar Recruits - Danny Green, Deon Thompson
Program Killing One-and-Done Players - J.R. Smith – never made it to campus, Williams, and Wright

My beloved Tar Heels. Every once in a while, they seem to have a season like they are having now (still top 25, just not a contender for the National Championship). For the most part, though, they’ve had as good of a decade as you can have… of course, it helps if you conveniently forget the Matt Doherty era (as I have). In Roy Williams six years, though, you have three Final Four appearances with two national championships. Plus they are at or near the top of the uber-competitive ACC ever single year. It surprises me that NC is this low on the list.

7 –Duke Blue Devils
Record over last six years – 180-40
Top Recruits - Luol Deng (#2 – 2003), Shaun Livingston (#2 – 2004), Demarcus Nelson (#17 – 2004), Josh McRoberts (#2 – 2005), Greg Paulus (#11 – 2005), Gerald Henderson (#11 – 2006), Brian Zoubek (#24 – 2006), Kyle Singler (#5 – 2007), Elliot Williams (#16 – 2008), Ryan Kelly (#20 – 2009)
Recruiting Flops - Brian Zoubek
Best Below-the-Radar Recruits - Jon Scheyer
Program Killing One-and-Done Players - Williams (how does it work he’s eligible this year?), Deng, Livingston

They definitely haven’t had the post-season success. Of all of their recruits, only Deng, Henderson, Singler, and Scheyer stand out as being above average. A lot of these guys game into college highly rated, but had slightly disappointing college careers. McRoberts stands out as a guy that was never the second best player. I’m not a Duke fan, but Coach K does a good job getting these guys ready to play and adjusting his program to his players. 180 wins over the last six years is second only to Memphis so far on this list.

6 – Kentucky Wildcats
Record over last six years – 127-65
Top Recruits - Joe Crawford (#9 – 2004), Randolph Morris (#10 – 2004), Rajon Rondo (#25 – 2004), Patrick Patterson (#17 – 2007), Eric Bledsoe (#23 – 2009), DeMarcus Cousins (#2 – 2009), Daniel Orton (#22 – 2009), John Wall (#1 – 2009)
Recruiting Flops - none
Best Below-the-Radar Recruits - Jodie Meeks, Ramel Bradley
Program Killing One-and-Done Players - none

Before this year, Kentucky was lacking the big dog. Rajon Rondo may have had that ability had he hung out through his senior year. This year, though, they seemed to have put everything together and sprinted out of the gate. This team is as favored as anyone to win the NCAA championship this year although, in all likelihood, they will have any championships won during the Calipari-era eventually revoked, so what’s the difference.

5 – Florida Gators
Record over last six years – 156-53
Top Recruits - Nick Calathes (#14 – 2007), Chandler Parsons (#19 – 2007), Kenny Boynton (#12 – 2009) Recruiting Flops - none
Best Below-the-Radar Recruits - Lee Humphrey, Chris Richards, Corey Brewer, Taurean Green, Al Horford, Joakim Noah, Marreese Speights
Program Killing One-and-Done Players - Speights

It’s been kind of interesting that the back-to-back championship team wasn’t a team made up of blue-chip, five star recruits. In fact, you can argue that Florida was better when they had a bunch of solid recruits rather than the last few years when they’ve had a few random five-star recruits thrown in there. It would’ve been interesting what one more year of Calathes and Speights could’ve produced as I think they both were really nice players. Anyone that didn’t love the energy that their two championship squads displayed needs their head examined.

4 – UCLA Bruins
Record over last six years – 152-54
Top Recruits - Trevor Ariza (#18 – 2003), Arron Afflalo (#26 – 2004), Jordan Farmar (#22 – 2004), Kevin Love (#6 – 2007), Jrue Holiday (#2 – 2008), J’Mison Morgan (#25 – 2008)
Recruiting Flops - Holiday
Best Below-the-Radar Recruits - Josh Shipp, Russell Westbrook, Darren Collison, Luc Richard Mbah a Moute
Program Killing One-and-Done Players - Holiday, Love, Ariza

The Ben Howland-era of UCLA basketball has been quite successful. After two tough seasons, the Bruins made three consecutive Final Four appearances with essentially three different teams (the Farmar/Afflalo team in 06, the Afflalo/Shipp/Collison team in 07, and Love/Collison/Westbrook team in 08. Love leaving after his freshman year really hurt the ’09 team although they probably were hurt more that Jrue Holiday never played like the number two player in the nation. Honestly – would you rather have had Holiday last year or guys like Brandon Jennings, Tyreke Evans, Al-Farouq Aminu, or Willie Warren. I suppose the good news is that he did outplay the #1 player in the nation – BJ Mullens.

3 – Louisville Cardinals
Record over last six years – 156-53
Top Recruits - Juan Palacios (#30 – 2004), Sebastian Telfair (#6 – 2004), Derrick Caracter (#25 – 2006), Earl Clark (#22 – 2006), Terrence Jennings (#18 – 2008), Samardo Samuels (#9 – 2008)
Recruiting Flops - Jennings (thus far), Caracter, Palacios
Best Below-the-Radar Recruits - Edgar Sosa, Terrence Williams
Program Killing One-and-Done Players - Telfair (went pro)

Rick Pitino took over from legendary coach Denny Crum in 2001 and turned Louisville from a perennial 20-win team that they had become to a national contender. 2004-05 was a Final Four season for Louisville – their first since the national champion team of 1985-86. I don’t know how exactly to feel about Louisville. First of all, I’m surprised that they rank ahead of my Tarheels because I don’t see any players here that I’m real envious didn’t wind up in Carolina. I thought Earl Clark could’ve been one of the most dominant players in college hoops if he’d ever come out of his self-induced coma. Overall, though, a solid job by Pitino.

2 – Connecticut Huskies
Record over last six years –158-46
Top Recruits - Rudy Gay (#5 – 2004), Stanley Robinson (#14 – 2006), Kemba Walker (#14 – 2008), Alex Oriakhi (#21 – 2009)
Recruiting Flops - Curtis Kelly (#27 – 2006)
Best Below-the-Radar Recruits - AJ Price, Hasheem Thabeet, Jerome Dyson, Josh Boone, Marcus Williams
Program Killing One-and-Done Players - Andrew Bynum (never made it to campus)

The mid-90s through early part of this decade was a beautiful time to be a UCONN fan. Look at the stars they produced (Emeka Okafur, Ben Gordon, Richard Hamilton, Ray Allen, Caron Butler, Donyell Marshall, Josh Boone, Charlie Villanueva, and Kevin Ollie). The team has been consistently good with a national championship in 2004 and a Final Four visit last year.

1 – Kansas Jayhawks
Record over last six years – 168-39
Top Recruits - JR Giddens (#19 – 2003), David Padgett (#7 – 2003), Rodrick Stewart (#25 – 2003), Russell Robinson (#27 – 2004), Mario Chalmers (#12 – 2005), Brandon Rush (#13 – 2005), Julian Wright (#8 – 2005), Darrell Arthur (#16 – 2006), Sherron Collins (#21 – 2006), Xavier Henry (#8 – 2009), Elijah Johnson (#24 – 2009)
Recruiting Flops - Russell Robinson, Rodrick Stewart
Best Below-the-Radar Recruits - Cole Aldrich
Program Killing One-and-Done Players - David Padgett (transferred to Louisville), Micah Downs< (transferred to Gonzaga)

As successful as Roy Williams was at Kansas, it’s hard to believe that thus far, Bill Self has been more successful than Roy. They’ve only been to one Final Four, but that Final Four led to a championship in one of the most excited championship games I’ve ever seen.

So, a few fun facts to finish. The top five records over the past six seasons of these 30 teams are Memphis, Carolina, Duke, Kansas, and Connecticut. If you number these 30 teams 1-30 in terms of recruiting classes and then also number these same teams 1-30 in terms of win-loss records, a few things stand out. The top five teams that have “outperformed” their recruiting classes are:
1) Georgetown
2) Syracuse
3) Memphis
4) Oklahoma State
5) Michigan State

The five teams that have underperformed their recruiting classes are:
26 – Florida State
27 – Arizona
28 – Kentucky
29 – Arkansas
30 – Indiana

So after all of this research, who do I think recruits the best with the least? The answer may surprise you because it’s two teams that aren’t on the top 30 list. The first team is Wisconsin. They’ve had the 25th best recruiting class once. They’ve gotten major contributions from underrated guys coming out of high school like Kammron Taylor, Jon Leuer, Trevon Hughes, Marcus Landry, and many more. They have the 8th best winning percentage of any of these teams on the list with a lot of postseason success. The other team I’d point to is Pitt. They had the 5th best winning percentage playing in an extremely tough conference despite having one five star recruit in 2009. They’ve gotten huge performances from Ashton Gibbs, Sam Young, DeJuan Blair, Aaron Gray, Chris Taft, and Carl Krauser… none of whom were guys identified by the recruiting experts as top players. Hope you enjoyed my research and analysis. Let me know on Twitter if you enjoy these kinds of articles.

By the way - happy birthday Mom!