End of May, down in Florida, 14 SEC men's basketball coaches sat in a room at a plush resort and discussed for hours how to improve the league -- both on the court and in terms of its perception. They bounced around ideas. Some coaches were more vocal than others. And, I'm told, there was no simple or consensus answer, though sources said non-league scheduling was identified as an obvious issue that should be addressed.
Either way, there's another thing multiple SEC coaches told me hinders improvement.
It's a little-known recruiting restriction mostly exclusive to the SEC.
It has, on some level, created an uneven playing field.
"Jae Crowder is a perfect example," said Georgia coach Mark Fox. "He's a Georgia kid. So I get the job [at Georgia in April 2009], and he's at Howard JUCO [in Texas], and I've got a good contact over there. But he wasn't eligible for us to recruit."
That's because Crowder started his career at South Georgia Technical, which is also a junior college. He then transferred to Howard County for his sophomore year and thus became ineligible for SEC programs because -- Did you even realize this? -- the SEC does not allow its members to enroll prospects who don't spend at least three semesters at the junior college from which they graduated, the lone exception being when a prospect only spends one season in JUCO after starting his career at a four-year school.
The overwhelming majority of other leagues have no such restriction.
But the Southeastern Conference, for whatever reason, does.
Consequently, Georgia never pursued Crowder for even a minute despite the fact that he was A) from Georgia, B) the top player on a team that won the NJCAA Division I title, C) the State Farm Junior College Player of the Year, and D) someone who averaged 18.9 points, 9.0 rebounds, 2.5 assists and 2.4 steals per game as a sophomore.
Crowder ultimately enrolled at Marquette.
He then led the Golden Eagles to back-to-back Sweet 16 appearances and was named the 2012 Big East Player of the Year before being selected 34th overall in the 2012 NBA Draft, and if you've ever wondered why such an accomplished prospect raised in the heart of the SEC was not recruited by any SEC schools even though he had offers from Big East schools, Big 12 schools, Mountain West schools and many others, well, now you know. Crowder was, quite simply, ineligible to enroll at all Southeastern Conference institutions.
For what it's worth, I'm told, SEC coaches would like this changed.
Would a change affect everybody?
Probably not -- because my guess is that, for different reasons, Kentucky's John Calipari, Florida's Billy Donovan and Vanderbilt's Kevin Stallings won't find themselves recruiting too many prospects who have spent fewer than three semesters at the same JUCO. But even they, I'm told, would prefer the restriction be lifted because it could theoretically help improve other SEC programs, which, after all, is what they spent all that time back in May at that resort discussing, you know, how to improve the league as a whole.
"Maybe not every coach in the league is going to recruit junior-college players," said first-year Tennessee coach Donnie Tyndall. "But I do feel like every coach in the league would support the rule being changed ... because they know it would put our league on a level playing field. It could help our league grow stronger."
I agree.
In fairness, again, this might not be a make-or-break issue for most SEC programs, and I'm not here to overstate things. But how good might Georgia have been in 2010-11 if its nucleus of Travis Leslie and Trey Thompkins also included Crowder? And what if a similar JUCO prospect is available next year from South Carolina or Alabama who could help Frank Martin or Anthony Grant boost their programs, which would by extension boost the SEC?
Bottom line, there are lots of ways for the SEC to get better in men's basketball, and some of them are rooted in something as simple as making sure the right coaches are in place to lead programs that are mostly overshadowed by football counterparts. But one obvious, if small, way to improve is also this: Stop making things harder than they need to be.
