Sorry, I hate this excuse. You're not recruiting a player to live somewhere the rest of his life, you're recruiting him to come and play in a certain system with certain players under a certain coach. That should be the main focus, not what city you're in. If playing in Ames takes away from playing under a top notch coach on a top 15 team in one of the best conferences in the country just because it's not sunny enough or not big enough then I don't want them anywhere near the program. Their focus should be what is offered in basketball and academics, not if they can wear shorts in December or if they can be near a big city.
100+ years of Cyclone athletics proves that it's hard to recruit there.
There is virtually no talent in-state, so you're automatically recruiting guys that are from far away, and have a hard time relating to a small town like Ames.
MBB is much easier than FB, because at least the northern climate states have a lot of basketball talent, so at least you don't have to overcome that. But there is still a big cultural difference.
In Lee's case, you're talking about a guy from Baltimore, who goes to school in Philly currently. I would say St. John's is a lot closer to his comfort zone than Ames.
Go look at LSU and some of the recruits these southern schools with very little basketball tradition pull in each year.
It's sickening.