Rutgers associate HC bashes reporter for video of coach with recruit after game: ‘It’s weird.’

A significant part of college sports media coverage is recruiting coverage. That includes coverage of coaches’ meetings with recruits. And when those coaches do that in a public space, as Rutgers men’s basketball coach Steve Pikiell did with Don Bosco Prep (Ramsey, NJ) guard Dylan Harper (ranked No. 2 nationally in the class of 2024 by ESPN, 247 Sports, and more, and already committed to the Scarlet Knights) after Harper’s season debut Thursday, it’s expected that that will get some attention. Such as NJ.com’s Brian Fonseca tweeting a short 10-second video of that:

Rutgers coach Steve Pikiell chats with Dylan Harper after his season debut: pic.twitter.com/cuV4N3xvNk

— Brian Fonseca (@briannnnf) December 15, 2023

But for some reason, this led to remarkable criticism from Rutgers’ assistant coach Brandin Knight, including loaded terms such as “weird” and “creepy.” And that led to quite a Twitter dispute, including with NJ.com columnist Steve Politi:

This is exactly what I was talking about with you yesterday. You’re doing this for clicks. It’s weird to film people while you hide in crowds. You’ve done this at tailgates for football games. It’s pretty weird.

— Brandin Knight (@bknight20) December 15, 2023

His article covered that. But videotaping individuals without them knowing and without any context is creepy. Also hiding behind trees or in the bushes to take videos of minors, is usually considered to be weird. That’s all I’m saying.

— Brandin Knight (@bknight20) December 15, 2023

We’ve shared the same sentiment directly with him and he’s chosen to ignore it. This was not the first time he’s done that. Also I’m a big boy @StevePoliti I really don’t need any advice when I’m sharing MY opinion. This was MY opinion not Rutgers.

— Brandin Knight (@bknight20) December 15, 2023

We've delivered nonstop positive coverage of your program for two straight weeks, but you're on here beefing with our writer over a happy video of your head coach and the nation's No. 2 recruit. Trust me, you need the advice.

— Steve Politi (@StevePoliti) December 15, 2023

And this is the second media/recruiting controversy around Rutgers, and around Harper, in a week. Last week, Harper’s father Ron (the former NBA star) went in on ESPN’s Adrian Wojnarowski for a “BS” scoop on his son’s commitment, with Wojnarowski reporting that before Dylan made the commitment official in a scheduled event at the Fanatics HQ in New York. We don’t have an “I will catch up with you” from Knight here, but this is still a remarkably hostile tone towards media coverage.

Of course, we’re only seeing what elements of this conversation Knight chose to make public, and he references a further in-person conversation with Fonseca. We don’t know what happened there. But Knight’s claims certainly don’t seem to stand up to much scrutiny for anyone with any knowledge of recruiting coverage. And it seems a little odd that someone with his extensive experience (he’s in his third season as Rutgers’ associate head coach, has been an assistant at the school since 2016, and has been a NCAA program staffer/assistant coach since 2006, following his own playing career) is going off on something that doesn’t appear out of the norm.

Perhaps there are more details to this than what Knight shared publicly. The “hiding behind trees or in the bushes” in particular feels like a strange claim that hasn’t received enough detailed and factual support here. But the “videotaping individuals without them knowing” is an odd argument if it’s about newsworthy things happening in an open-to-the-public forum, such as a court after a basketball game. And it seems odd for Knight to go in so hard on one particular writer for things that feel like standard practices in the recruiting world.

And the “doing this for clicks” is an unusual criticism as well. Yes, of course Fonseca wants people to read his stories, as do all journalists, but it’s hard to claim that this particular thing was any level of irresponsible clickbaiting. Pikiell attending Harper’s game and talking with him afterwards absolutely is worth at least a photo and a tweet. And it’s far from clear why Knight got so incensed about a shared photo of a newsworthy event taking place in a public space. But it did provide an unusual media controversy.

[Brandin Knight on Twitter]