ESPN ran a series of articles on their website this week about NCAA recruiting outside of the “top 7 conferences.” No surprise, Gonzaga was lifted up as an elite program. Joe Lunardi, one of the “experts,” had this to say about UD: “If you made a list of programs outside the Power 5/Big East that have the most going for them, I'm not sure second place behind Gonzaga wouldn't be the Dayton Flyers. There's a reason the NCAA continues to hold its First Four event in Dayton. It is a genuine major program in every respect: facilities, access to players, fan base, history and (with one giant asterisk) recent success.”
In a separate article, available only on ESPN+, they broke down the conferences … primarily through comments from anonymous coaches. VCU and UD were cited as the top recruiting schools in the A10. There was plenty of praise for the Flyers, particularly the arena and the fan base. I was surprised to see a few comments giving the edge to VCU on overall facilities (counting player housing, practice facility, weight facility, player lounge, etc.).
One coach said, "The Dayton community is so supportive of the program. They sell out almost every single game, their arena is unbelievable. I don't think the rest of their facilities really wow you, but when you sell out and you're in Dayton and everybody knows you and gives that type of support, it really pays dividends in recruiting.”
We might quibble with some of the assessments, but overall pretty positive.
Gonzaga's emergence and what else matters in top mid-major conferences
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