RU and St John's new assistant

Adam Zagoria writes this morning that Norm Roberts has hired Kimani Young as an assistant coach on his staff at St John's. This is a move that certainly impacts Rutgers. For one thing, the two schools not only play in the Big East, but are also close neighbors. They have and will continue to recruit many of the same kids.

That is what this move is all about - recruiting. Young is the director of the New Heights grassroots program (AAU to you old-schoolers), and as such has enormous influence with the D-1 prospects who are on New Heights: Jayvaughn Pinkston, Ashton Pankey, Devon Collier, and Devon McMillan.

Let there be no doubt about it: Young has clout with these kids. Even though Pankey and Collier will both play their final two seasons at St Anthony's, Young still remains far more influential in each of their recruitments than Bob Hurley does now.

Not that RU is necessarily recruiting either that hard, though. Same for Bishop Loughlin's Jayvaughn Pinkston. RU under Fred Hill has made New Jersey a top recruiting priority. That makes enormous sense, considering the abundance of talent in NJ, and the fact that Rutgers has never been a dominant recruiting force in its home state.

They've indeed succeeded in making massive inroads in New Jersey, but New York City just got that much tougher for them.