Ameer Shamsud-din COMMITS TO PEPPERDINE.

[ironlions]

THIS IS NOT A JOKE.

Talk about it in The Gold Rush
Just over a week ago, the recruiting process appeared over for Ameer Shamsud-din. The all-around 6-foot-2, 175-pound guard from Benson Tech High School in Portland made his college decision by committing to Loyola Marymount and appeared all set to sign with the Lions in the fall. But fast forward to this weekend and now Shamsud-din is heading to a rival program in the WCC instead.



Ameer Shamsud-din is now a Wave
"I committed to Pepperdine today," Shamsud-din said on Sunday night. "I had always had the feeling that they should be in the mix, so me and my family called them to see if they were interested and they had a scholarship available and they said that they would like to have me come there."

"So I sat down with my family and looked at my two choices, Loyola Marymount and Pepperdine," Shamsud-din said. "We decided that Pepperdine was the better fit for me."

It was only last Friday that Shamsud-din committed to Loyola Marymount after seeing options at Oregon State and Nevada fall through. He felt confident with his choice at the time, but started investigating on his own the possibility of playing with some good in-state friends at Pepperdine. And once he found out he had a spot, the new selection was made.

"Playing with Paul (McCoy) and Brad (Tinsley) will be a better fit for me," Shamsud-din said. "I've been playing with Paul forever and it's going to be great playing with him again. Their system really fits me too."

Shamsud-din felt comfortable enough with the opportunity to play with his fellow Oregonians that he made his commitment before even seeing the campus - which will happen on an official visit this weekend. So after he made the call to Loyola Marymount to let them know of his intentions, he gave the Pepperdine staff a ring with his new commitment.

As noted, Shamsud-din is the third member of the Class of 2008 to make a commitment to sign early with Pepperdine, joining Brad Tinsley of Oregon City and Paul McCoy of Grant.

OregonPreps.com would like to congratulate Shamsud-din and his family on his decision.

[ironlions]

[ironlions]

Can't blame the kid for want to play with his friends but boy does it suck big time for us.

I'm a firm believer in everything happens for a reason. Its time for our coaching staff to go after Oscar Bellfield FULL FORCE.

Go Lions!

[lmu]

Ooooooooooooooh well. Just another reason to trash the ripples when they come to GP next year.

Go Lions!

[Deleted]

[ironlions]

A lot of emotions for me this morning. I followed Ameer recruitment closely and was really happy when he committed to LMU. But I'm coming to the conclusion that if he was looking else where within a week...who really wants someone like that. I would rather have a recruit who want to be a part of our program %100. I wish Ameer the best now that he can play with his friends from Portland.

Back to checking the recruting sites to see who we can get for our PG.

Go Lions.

[lionspride]

Just got out of class, checked the board, and saw the news. Sad to hear. We need to get Wendell Wright signed. I hope this news does not influence him.

UGH!

[lionspride]

I like alert 2 attitude. Turning a negative into a positive. We will be ready for Ameer when he steps into Hank's House in 2008.

[ironlions]

That's if he is still on the roster...he might commit to the Zags next week.

[ldawg]

^ what a ridiculous setup. In times like these all you can do is laugh. Got to love the lions. Nobody said we had it easy and without loads of high drama. We got coaches and now players pulling donovans.... maybe the entire cross country program will just leave and go to Dominguez Hills

[ironlions]

I kid I kid

[UPStonehouse]

Yeah... I took some heat from the Pepperdine fans a few weeks ago when I questioned Walberg and what he was up to in my WCC preview blog.

I have nothing against Walberg and Pepperdine, but I definitely do see a pretty disturbing trend in what has been going on down there:

* All but one of Westphal's recruits leaving, including Kingsley Costain last week. That shows no loyalty to players he didn't bring in.
* Agreeing to hire Mark Campbell as an assistant coach several months before he was officially hired, allowing Campbell to have carte blanche during the spring/summer AAU circuit.
* Additionally, Campbell has very little coaching experience (two seasons at as an asst. at a CC in Portland) and was hired mainly because he is extremely close friends/Bible Study partners with Brad Tinsley, a big-time recruit.
* Walberg gave scholarships to two sons of Terry Tucker, the coach of Crawford High in San Diego. One son, Rico, was a legit prospect (transferred from Minnesota) but the other son is undersized and not considered a D1 prospect. Not coincidentally, Terry Tucker had two big-time recruits (Tyrone Shelley and Malcolm Thomas) on his team at Crawford and heavily encouraged those players to go to Pepperdine together.
* Hiring a HUGE staff (look at his team photo from last year... there are almost as many suits as players), including not one but TWO of his daughters. (Nepotism, anyone?)
* Snatching Ameer away from LMU after he had already committed, almost assuredly at least partially due to Walberg contacting him after his verbal.

And all of this has happened in a little over a year.

Now, each piece taken individually could easily be explained away. Even two or three of them. But all of them? The cummulative effect shows me a coach that is playing fast and loose with all sorts of rules and who doesn't have a lot of loyalty to players or a high level of ethics.

Will he be successful? That remains to be seen. You can't deny the talent he is brining in. But just compare all of that stuff to what Tention, Reveno, Keating and Grier (all new WCC coaches) have done in the past few seasons... I can think of maybe one or two things out of all of them that would cause me to even raise my eyebrows in the slightest. But Walberg? He's working on a laundry list of questionable activities.

I hope I'm wrong... I hope Walberg has done it all by the book. But the rational side of me tells me that the whole thing is going to blow up down there at some point, especially if he starts ticking off other WCC coaches by poaching their recruits. Coaches will turn a blind eye to a lot of things (it's part of the "code" or whatever), but when it comes to snatching away recruits? Watch out. That's what got Mark Few to turn Lorenzo Romar in to the NCAA.

[ironlions]

UPStonehouse...a very nice summmary.

[pdine]

Ok, i'll take a stab at a few of the easier-to-explain ones ...

I've never seen his daughters listed on any formal list of department staff members. Is it possible they are doing it without being paid? Can't see that as such a travesty, either way.

No loyalty to Westphal's players? That's assuming the players wanted to stay and play for him, each and every one that are being lumping together. I like that he's given them all a chance at fighting for spots in his system. Plus, there is a HUGE difference between Westphal's laissez-faire, "players coach" slow-down half-court style VS. Walberg's quasi-bobby knight persona demanding an intense 40 minutes of offense and defense hell? Quite the 180, personality and style wise.

Regardless, as I said on the Pepp board, I do feel bad for LMU on this situation and hope you rebound well. I don't think I'm alone in wishing our teams continue the rivalry, but at the top of the conference.

[lionspride]

Nice write-up UPStonehouse. I like when people are "real" on this board. Sometimes I feel people hold back. Agree with your comments....individually they can be explained away, but taken as a whole....well NO.

I was afraid of Ameer or Wendell backing out. It appears that Ameer did not backed out...he may have been coerced be someone. Like scoop writes...it is extremely odd to see within one week a player go back on his word and then out of the blue committ to another school that was not in the mix.

With that said, we need to get over it and move on. The season is right around the corner.