Musselman's Decision to Go After High School Players Pays Off Big
When Eric Musselman was hired at Arkansas, some wondered if he could recruit high school players or did he just grab guys in the transfer portal.
There is an answer now.
The Razorbacks got final signatures from Nick Smith, Jr., and Derrian Ford to complete what is the No. 2-ranked class, according to the 247Sports composite rankings.
For a guy that is often hyped about even regular-season games, Musselman may have even surprised himself a little.
"To have this class of the group of guys talent wise but also as people, and then to have them sign ...," he said Monday afternoon.
Every single one of the five players the Hogs had at the top of their recruiting lists this year they got. Two five-stars and three four-star players make up the class.
And they all signed in the early period.
"What this does is it allows us to have a more in depth relationship with the players," Musselman said. "There is a limit to only see the guys seven times if they are not signed and we were about up on a couple of them.
"This changes things."
In addition to Smith, the highest-rated player signed in recent history, the Hogs have five-star Jordan Walsh who signed last week.
Ford capped a group of four-star recruits that included Joseph Pinion and Barry Dunning, Jr.
Getting them all signed is good. Landing all the signatures in the early period opens up all sorts of positives for Musselman.
"We can see their games," he said. "We can talk about them. I think it’s important moving forward both for the player and for us that it’s more than just verbal commit because there's things pertaining to the rules that we're now able to do some more things like watch them unlimited.
"They can come on campus during dead periods. There's just a lot of little things people don't realize."
Now he's proven top high school recruits will pick the Hogs. It's not just transfers, which is what he showed at Nevada he was very accomplished landing.
"Transfers, quite frankly, are being completely over-recruited right now," Musselman said. "There’s a lot of mistakes in the transfer market — a lot."
That's part of the changing landscape of college basketball.
"It wasn’t that way four years ago, but now, a lot of Power 5s are going after transfers that probably aren’t Power 5 players, to be completely honest," Musselman said. "We made a conscious effort a year ago to let everybody else go chase transfers and let’s try to get involved with some of these high school guys.
"I’m happy we did it that way, to be honest."
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