How I Update Rankings, and Other Topics I Want to Highlight

After starting the ranking process this time, I realized I never explained how I go through and update rankings. It's only fair that I go through how I go through and decide who goes where. What you're reading will be my final article for the month, and I will update the 2025 rankings on Monday.   Before I get into the process, I want to disclose a few things. I discuss drafts with people I trust, high school coaches, AAU coaches, college coaches, or other evaluators. Multiple people than just myself lay eyes on who's where. Another thing I want to make abundantly clear is that I'm not the all-seeing eye who thinks they're 100% correct on everything. I also don't find it fun going through rankings, but I have to do it every so often. If you like where you're ranked, prove me right. If you don't like it, prove me wrong.   Levels   Everything I do is tier-based. I have ten groups that I place kids in to try and keep things separated. I label them one through ten. Below is the key I use in every ranking update.   1:HM+ D1    Whenever I think of a Tier 1 kid, I think of someone who's one of the top players in the country. Kids in this tier can play anywhere they'd like in the country. In the state of Wisconsin, think KK Arnold or [player_tooltip player_id='189502' first='Allie' last='Ziebell']. It's for the elite of the elite.   2:HM D1   Kids in this tier can play at the Power Five or high-major level. Most kids in this tier are more than capable of competing against kids in tier one but may be missing a few qualities that would make them one of the best players in the country. Kids in this tier will end up in competitive programs in conferences like the Big Ten. Players in this grouping are still some of the top players in the country.     3:MM to HM D1    Once we get into tier three, we're talking about kids who could be high-level players at mid-major programs in conferences like the Horizon League or possibly earn scholarships to play at low Power Five schools. In my experience, I usually find the most disagreement over kids who land in this tier because I may think someone is good enough to play at the Power Five level, and the other person may think they aren't at that level, or vice versa.    4:MM D1    Players who are solid Mid-Major prospects will usually draw some minor Power Five interest, but most will earn scholarship offers from schools in the Horizon League or Missouri Valley. I believe this has been the healthiest group of kids in the state since I've been writing.   5:LM to MM D1-    Now that we're at tier five, we start seeing a lot of variance in what kinds of interest you're seeing. Kids in this group will likely get a wide variety of interest. I could see a kid in this group as a kid who could be a solid rotational piece or a low-end starter in a Mid-Major Conference, or they could be an elite piece for the non-D1s. They may see some interest from high-end D2 programs in the GLIAC or GLVC, and possibly, depending on their situations, WIAC schools may also start sniffing around once they get to their senior seasons.    6:LM to MM + D1    Kids in tier six are players who are talented enough to play at a D1 level but may not be a kid who's a lock to earn rotational minutes over time. However, these kids will be points of interest for high-end D2 programs and will likely be kids who'll get minutes early on in their college careers at non-D1 levels.   7:LM D1 / D2 / NAIA    Tier seven kids are still scholarship-level kids who are good enough to play D1 basketball and may find a fit at that level but will mostly see their offers come from schools at the D2, NAIA, or D3 levels.   8:D2 / NAIA   Tier eight is the solid D2 kids in my eyes. There is no grouping that's as small as this one in Wisconsin. However, a significant chunk of these kids will also draw interest from schools like Grand View in Des Moines or even William Penn because NAIA schools will see value in kids who are scholarship level but may not have a clear D2 route or are intrigued by the NAIA route. NAIA's aren't as prominent in our state, so it's uncommon for Wisconsin kids to take the NAIA route, but it does happen.   9:D2 / D3 / NAIA    Usually, when I place a kid in Tier Nine, I believe they'd be a kid who'd contribute at a high level in the WIAC. Some kids in this tier will earn low-D2 scholarships or NAIA scholarships elsewhere and get out of the state. However, I expect most kids in this tier to be heavily pursued by schools in the WIAC.   10:NAIA / D3   In this tier of player, I see kids who could either play a role at WIAC schools or be talented players at schools in other D3 conferences in the state or surrounding states.   11: No Range   Kids in the final tier will likely be unranked, but I still want to monitor.   *I also tier kids within the last grouping to have some order in the backend of the rankings, but it's the most subjective part of the top 100.   A few things that I'd like to talk about are things that I don't consider when it comes to ranking players.   One that may be difficult to comprehend is raw scoring. For instance, look at the top two scorers in Wisconsin high school basketball boasted a year ago in [player_tooltip player_id='388287' first='Alayna' last='West'] (DePaul) and [player_tooltip player_id='209900' first='Sydney' last='Cherney'] (Grand Valley State). As talented as both of those kids are, the reason those two schools wanted them is not necessarily for their scoring. West is a supreme athlete who can defend athletic guards at the next level, and Cherney is an undersized wing who battles for extra possessions and plays bigger than her 5-6 height. Few in college basketball score 20 points per game. It's more about the other stuff that you can do.   Not only for my aspect of rankings but for recruiting as a whole, don't worry about statistics. They'll accumulate over time, and you should be proud of them, but coaches want winning players over kids who can score 30 because hundreds, maybe thousands, of kids can score 30 in a game. I won't claim to be the brightest person in this world, but if I can tell you're chasing stats or accolades, everyone else can. Focus on having fun, and the rest will sort itself out.   Another thing, especially with the rising sophomores, is their playing time on varsity. We can look at a kid like [player_tooltip player_id='533070' first='Allison' last='Jirsa']. At Verona last season, she was behind [player_tooltip player_id='209595' first='Taylor' last='Stremlow'], [player_tooltip player_id='209608' first='Reagan' last='Briggs'], Megan Murphy, and Abbi Rupnow. A backcourt that won a Big Eight Conference title already, and she was likely not going to earn much playing time as a freshman, but that doesn't make her a worse player. It was her situation, and she made the most of it. Speaking of which, she could take a step this season as a third guard who could do some creative stuff when the ball gets swung to her. Heck, a kid I have as a top-ten kid in 2026 who hasn't played much varsity basketball yet to drive the early varsity playing time not mattering point home.   Now that you know things I don't value highly. Let me tell you some things I do value.   One is athleticism. The best athletes will get more chances than anyone else. Those are kids that coaches believe they can get something out of them defensively and can develop their overall game. Skill is another, but not flash. A few things I consider skill are footwork, composure with the ball, efficient shooting, not volume shooting, IQ, and effort. Even without high-end athleticism, a college staff might overlook that if you can do everything else well.   Let's finally talk about the process of ranking kids.   The process involves looking at probably 200ish kids I have in databases in each class and placing them in a tier. After grouping those kids in each graduating class, I sort them in a Google sheet and go through and rank them in those tiers, and, boom, that's it.    My evaluation of them usually spans multiple years, but I never look at the tier I placed them in last time around to try to avoid confirmation bias. Sometimes players go up, some go down, and it's fluid. Things change all the time. Some kids get better, some stagnate for different reasons, and others stop playing altogether for other reasons. I've watched probably 95% of the kids I rank in person at some point, and all of them on film for some time. I make a point to watch everyone by any means necessary before ranking them. I will not act like I evaluated a kid before I can digest their game.   When I update rankings, I don't consider any other evaluation from other sites, like ESPN or any other site. I'm also not ranking the best high school players. I rank players in terms of their prospects for the next level. Qualities like size matter in this equation, and there's no getting around that.   In conclusion, I will put my name on everything I write and update. However, rankings are an imperfect science that people more intelligent than myself can disagree on. None of this is personal, and I'm more than willing to admit I'm wrong about players, and I love it when I am proven wrong. I want everyone to be the best version of themselves as basketball players and people.

After starting the ranking process this time, I realized I never explained how I go through and update rankings. It's only fair that I go through how I go through and decide who goes where. What you're reading will be my final article for the month, and I will update the 2025 rankings on Monday.