mike montgomery & the cal staff originally signed sami "where's waldo" eleraky, a developing 5 from denmark...eleraky (a good student) could not enroll at cal because of academic admission requirements related to being an international student...so sami went to barton community college in cold azz kansas (he did not enjoy the winter weather or the non diverse community, eleraky is of a mixed heritage family including egyptian blood), did not play ball there but completed almost 15 units & then returned to denmark
eleraky then returned to the united states to play for the winningiest coach in the history of college basketball (87% winning record), former bears walk on justin labagh at city college of san francisco...while at ccsf sami took full loads including summer school & also on line classes in order to complete the 2 year degree
gregg gottlieb ran point on eleraky's recruitment & watched several of his games...i also caught a game at ccsf & wrote a post re: his skills & upside...after mike watched sami in a league game late in the season the decision was made to head in a different direction for a 2014 big & eleraky ended up signing with the university of pacific
john montgomery completed an extensive international player search & identified jakof poeltl of austria, a very strong student with advanced offensive skills for a big...gottlieb then got involved & also built strong relationships with the poeltl family
because of the distance, jakop poeltl & his family made the decision to visit cal, arizona & utah during a week plus tour of american colleges
sean miller had 3 international bigs on the arizona war board with poeltl as his #1 target (this info is from a golf acquaintance of mine who is one of the wildcats largest donors...he never seems to forget that i honestly think tuscon is a dump, of course he doesn't live there either)...so sean miller tripped jakob first among his 3 prospects...the official visit did not go well as the lack of academic focus for the arizona basketball program became clearly evident to the poeltl family, the wildcats operate more like a minor league professional sports team not a well regarded educational institution
both the cal & utah visits went really well with the poeltl family loving the san francisco bay area the most (they also liked salt lake city as it reminded them of their hometown in austria with maybe a couple more mormons here & there)
jakob (far left, wearing the backwards cal lid) is pictured above in the 1st row with the good looking montgomery women, sarah & my partner in bears crowd noise, anne
after returning home from the united states, jakob made basically a silent commitment to the cal staff & started the comprehensive & lengthy required international student admissions acceptance process/applications...attending the #1 ranked public university in the world was a significant factor in this decision
when mike retired, jakob quickly switched his commitment to utah (coach krystowiak is highly respected by mike, larry played for him at montana back in the day)...coach martin never had a chance to build a relationship with the promising austrian blue chipper
coach martin had a commitment from kingsley okoroh while at tennessee in large part due to his longtime friendship with jai steadman, the head coach at westwind preparatory academy in phoenix
so austria's jakop poeltl signed with utah, dusan ristic of serbia signed with arizona & coach martin signed the king of england
cal basketball recruiting=icebergs#