Apocalypse Now: Rakeem Christmas to Syracuse

This freaking sucks.

why the fuck did we let David Cox go? FUCK

We clearly have no use for an elite, shot-blocking big man anyway.

KILL ME NOW

…this has made me lose my appetite.

I’m crossing over to the cynical side.

FUCK MY LIFE!

I wish him well.

Fact. We haven’t landed a top 50 recruit since Greg Monroe. Funny that was the year after the Final Four. Since then we’ve lost in the 2nd round of the NCAA, 1st round NIT, 1st round NCAA.

But tournament success shouldn’t be the mark of a successful program. I assume recruiting shouldn’t be the mark of a successful program too.

Here is the idiot himself

Real nice that the first school that comes out of his mouth of the also-rans is Georgetown.

people have on his facebook have been congratulating him all day. lets just hope 1) this is just a rumor and 2) its a weak verbal meaning he’s still open to other schools

Watch him say it for yourself dammit

Syracuse wasn’t even in the picture a month ago… they just fucking swoop in and steal our recruit that we’ve been recruiting for more than a year.

We need a banner season….literally.

http://isitchristmas.com/

Press Release

Rakeem Christmas, rising junior in 2011 class, narrows school choices to eight Universities

Bryn Athyn, Pa, August 10, 2009: Rakeem Christmas has had a long summer of outstanding performances at the most coveted basketball events. With the AAU basketball season drawing to a close, the nation’s "best defensive player" has garnered attention while playing for Team Final and also participating in individual camps including NBA Players Top 100, Rumble in the Bronx, Amar’e Stoudemire & Lebron James Skill Camps, Nike’s Peach Jam, Super Showcase and most recently Adidas Nations Global, in which he played for USA’s 2011 Team coached by Frank Johnson. Before wrapping up his summer events next week at Boost Mobile Elite 24 game at Rucker Park in New York, the rising junior and his family decided on the schools he plans on looking closely at for options of attendance in 2011. “It’s been a process, one that we wanted to make sure that the best choices were made for Rakeem,” said Amira Hamid, Christmas’ aunt and legal guardian. “He has been receiving scholarship offers since the 8th grade. With such an overwhelming number of schools interested in him, it was important that we did our due diligence with finalizing this list.” The universities that make up this list include: Baylor University, University of Florida, Georgetown University, Indiana University, Ohio State University, University of Oklahoma, University of Texas and Villanova University. “I appreciate the interest that many coaches have in me but these are the schools that my family and I think would be a good fit for me” Rakeem stated. "My family and I are thankful to everyone that has offered me a scholarship and participated in my recruiting. I’m looking forward to my season at ANC and playing for Coach Givens. I’ve played with some of the players during the summer and I had a good time. After summer is over I want to make sure that I do well and improve in class and on the court."

Press Release

Rakeem Christmas’ list of eight becomes a list of five Universities
Bryn Athyn, Pa, December 1, 2009: The nation’s "best defensive player", Rakeem Christmas, is ready to begin the basketball season at the Academy of the New Church.
"Since our last announcement, certain schools have made a valiant effort regarding Rakeem’s recruitment. Stronger bonds have been established with a few programs and their staff. Our current list reflects that" stated Amira Hamid, Christmas’ aunt and legal guardian. "Once we know it’s right for Rakeem and once he feels 100% confident about the situation, everyone else will know. This process has been lengthy but we are in no rush to meet a timeline. We’re pleased with the current schools we are considering and looking forward to watching them play this season."
The five universities that are still being considered for Christmas’ attendance in 2011 include: Florida International University, University of Florida, Georgetown University, University of Oklahoma and University of Texas.
In regards to his short list of options, Christmas released the following statement, "I’m happy to work with a smaller group of schools going into the season. I’ve been so busy with maintaining my grades and practicing with the team, that I think this will help me focus with having to deal with less pressure during the season. My transition at ANC has been great. I’m enjoying my classmates, teachers, and teammates. Coach Givens has been great with the workouts. I’m just ready for the season to start."
The Academy of the New Church home season opener is scheduled for December 4th at 7:00pm against Atlantic Christian. For full schedule visit www.ancss.org/athletics/calendar.html

This whole thing just smells fishy…in the Calipari kind of way.

i hear ronny seikaly is a great mentor

ashamed that a 17 year old’s knee jerk desicion about where to accept a basketball scholarship to play basketball 15 months from now gets me down. Espcially when it is likely one of the biggest days of this kids life. That said he picked cuse, so enjoy upstate NYC in winter.

why the fuck would you make such an important decision having such a huge effect on your development and career based on where you’re friend went…

man.. fucking teenagers

You got 3 Syracuse fans to sign up for the Blog this week - weatcoastorange, JON_S and VerbalKint

the 4th ‘Cuse ’athletic supporter’ that signed up for the blog in the last 3 days

…that had all of these ‘Cuse fans not come over to this thread, we’d probably still be whipping ourselves and wailing…instead, we’re all feisty now.

Who says this rivalry is dead?

You guys sure are bitter about all this and like to use the same jokes over and over. Losing one potential recruit means that much to your entire class?

Well good luck guys, looking forward to next year’s battles on the court.

Rejection hurts. Especially when your school has spent so much time and effort to recruit this kid, just for him to take a long, extended look at your program and say “no thanks”. I get the seriously hurt, bitter feelings that makes you want to say “The other school HAD to have cheated. No way he likes that school better, my school is so superior, why can’t he just see that!” First off, argue academics all you like, the chance of a top 10 recruit graduating in four years is slim to none. And as much as you like to tout your school, Hibbert, Monroe, and Summers all left without graduating, so academics really is not a deciding factor, as much as we would like it to be. It couldn’t POSSIBLY be that he looked at both programs and saw a 2011 Georgetown squad without Wright, Freeman, and Vaughn, bringing in a 2010 class that is weaker than SU’s, and nary a single peer in 2011 versus playing on an absolutely stacked 2011 ‘Cuse roster. Melo, Christmas, Joseph, Waiters, and Triche starting with Moussa Keita, Riley, Fair, Southerland, and his buddy Cooney coming off the bench. Nope, no way that could be the rationale, it must be something nefarious. "When I was in elementary school, that school had some assistant coaches that cheated behind the head coach’s back. I don’t care what the investigation found, he’s dirty and they must have been doing it for the last 18 years without getting caught once! Yeah, that’s it!" Rejection hurts.

Compare the time JT3 has been at gtown to the last 6 years of cuse basketball. We went through a rebuilding period when our hall of fame coach retired in the early part of the decade. you will have yours shortly. mike hopkins = craig esherick (long time assistant taking over for HOF coach, it never goes well)

JT3 (2005-2010) – 4 NCAA Tournament appearances, 1 Final Four, “2” Sweet Sixteens (incl. Final Four year), 2 Regular season titles, 1 conference tournament title, 3 appearances in conference tournament final

JB (2005-2010) – 4 NCAA Tournament appearances, 0 Final Fours, 2 Sweet Sixteens, 1 regular season title, 2 conference tournament titles, 3 appearances in conference tournament final.

JT3 has Final Four over JB. JB has 1 BET Title over JT3.

Which one would you rather have?

Where is this Cuse Dominance you speak of? Looks like typical JB, underperforming when it matters.

what significance does a decade have to a recruit? do you think a recruit cares about time periods before the coach was recruiting them was at the school? do you think john wall had reservations about committing to kentucky because of billiy gillispie’s legacy?

so compare apples to apples – john thompson III at georgetown vs JB at cuse.

or compare program history:
syracuse has more wins. georgetown has had more post season success (more BET titles, more final fours, and better history of creating NBA talent

my stupid reply button isnt working

Conference head to head is 35 Cuse, 32 Gtown – that is hardly anything to brag about.

Gtown leads head to head in post season play, 7-6 – again hardly anything to brag about

there is your head to head, if a 3 game margin is the difference between an “incredible, world dominating team” and a “crappy team on a swamp” than i’ll stop talking.

but you know its not

as for last two years – it is ebbs and flows. Georgetown has not had a senior starter on their team the last two years. young teams don’t do well in the big east.

if you compare conference results, post-season results and sending players to the nba – georgetown actually has an advantage over your well-funded, snow-ridden program.

i dont see it anywhere. not when comparing coaches of similar time periods at their schools, not when comparing programs.

you got christmas, sucks for us, we’ll deal with it.

thanks for stopping by, and helping us cope with out short term misery.

right, winning the big east regular season and losing in the sweet 16 is the same as a final four.

from 7 years ago is somehow trumped by a Final Four banner from a couple of years ago then there is nothing that will drag your head from the sand. To say “well since the national title they haven’t been as good” is disengenuous, because the national title means more than any other accomplishment a program can acieve. Ewing and Zo are HOFers no doubt, but Carmelo’s name rings out more now simply because he is a current superstar. Recruits can watch him play, can play as him on PlayStation, and can see his influence in the training facilities he paid for on campus. To say that this does not sway recruits is to ignore that better recruits are coming to Syracuse.

doesn’t anyone have anything to do on a Saturday? Go to museums, restaurants, festivals, cultural events, or just hang out with enjoyable company?

oh that’s right you live in upstate NY.

that the 23 point near-comeback in game 2 and the game 3 dismantling were flukes and not spurred by the fact that the Hoyas had figured out the zone… oh one problem with your bs fantasy, Boeheim himself admitted after the BET that Gtown had played them so much they had figured out the zone. …. hmm… your own coach disagrees with you, troll.

Your team lost its 3 best players and are relying on one-and-done freshmen to replace that gaping hole. It won’t work this season, and then they’ll be gone, b/c really, who wants to stay at Syracuse if they had any choice….

when christmas de-commits from ’cuse in the fall and signs with georgetown instead.

see you then, ’cuse trolls!

I’m done with this thread after this.

Cuse landed a center Georgetown wanted. Congrats Cuse. You guys had an incredible regular season last year, before being upset in both the BET and NCAA Tournament. Congrats Cuse. But to come over here and demand some sort of recognition for “destroying” us last year and every year is both ridiculous and outright obtuse. Both programs are historic and collectively made the Big East what it is today.

Since the inception of the Big East. Georgetown and Cuse have the same amount of national championships and have played in the same amount of national championship games.

Georgetown has more Final Fours, Cuse has more Sweet 16s.
Georgetown has more Elite Eights, Cuse has more tourney appearances
Georgetown has more BET titles, Cuse has more regular season titles.
Georgetown has had more success developing All-Star NBA talent, Cuse has more wins.
Both teams have or have had Hall of Fame coaches.
Both teams are on TV, constantly.
Both teams demand national attention.
And both sets of fan bases are just in thinking their team is better.

You have not owned Georgetown. You won 2 out of 3 last year. The series have been split in years prior. For all the “two decades of dominance” you all like to tout, you are still only leading the historic head-to-head series (since conference play began) by 3 games. Your “two decades of dominance” has led to 1 National Championship and 2 Final Fours. Georgetown has had 1 Final Four in that time frame. The national championship is no small feat, good for you. But that isn’t dominance. Especially considering how many Georgetown players have seen success in the NBA . Cuse has Derrick Coleman, Etan Thomas and Carmelo Anthony. Georgetown has Alonzo Mourning, Dikembe Mutumbo and Allen Iverson. Even the most orange-blind Cuse fans knows there is a big difference between the two sets.

Not sure what you expected coming over here trying to piss us off but like someone said before, I appreciate it. It made me less pissed about Rakeem and more excited for the season. I also wish you nothing but failure this season and all upcoming seasons your prison-Orange Orange[men] suit up, in the Big East, Big Ten, or whatever conference your hapless football team drags you to.

1) he has an AAU team mate in the same class who has been pulling for him to go to SU.
2) SU has invested heavily in facilities (see melo center) and its paying off.
3) Fab Melo will likely been a one and done player so Christmas was probably promised the started job as a freshman
4) Its an up tempo system that guys want to play in
5) The Dome – largest on campus crowds
6) Rob Murphy and Hop have proven they are great recruiters
7) Bernie Fine has shown he can develop big men
8) Jimmy B is a HOF’er and coming off a COY award.
9) SU just had a great season when they were on TV all the time and got to the number 1 ranking
10) SU has been putting high profile kids in the league

that being said: