Jenica Lewis releases her top 5, and ISU is not on it. (TCU is team #5, which you can't see without clicking to see the entire picture)
***WBB: 2026 Recruiting Thread***
- Thread starter mred
- Start date
Never got any buzz we were really in the running.
North Carolina and TCU are sure showing up on a lot of short lists, or so it seems to me.
Yeah, I wasn't too optimistic, but I don't exactly have my ear to the ground on this stuff.
You might want that to be anywhere but TCU since they will actually battle us in the standings.
That's only one or two time a year. She picks iowa and it's CC all over again with Iowa dominating the spotlight plus the edge it gives them regarding future state of Iowa prospects.
She's not really a Clark/Bueckers level five-star, more the best of the next tier of four-stars. I think the Clark thingie might even be a detriment for recruiting an Iowa resident guard to Iowa. It would set up unrealistic expectations and impossible to meet comparisons like "Hey, our last star guard from Iowa took us to the Final Four!"
Not a ton of upcoming highly regarded state of Iowa prospects after 2026 for anyone to get an "edge" recruiting. 2027/2028/2029 for the state includes only one ESPN ranked recruit and she's committed already to Stanford. Could be some late bloomers or sleepers jump in or could end up being just a bunch of UNI/Drake level players.
Another thing probably in play is how much money we have available for the 2026 class with the vast majority already going to Audi Addy and Jada.
If you have good players rotating through the program, that issue isn't going away and every other top program is dealing with it, except for possibly Big East programs who don't do FB.
