I think Hobbs completely lost his recruiting mojo after Omargate. But he was almost intimidated to recruit in the DMV for some reason and I think that was FAR more problematic than not recruiting in any other area. I think NYC presented a similar problem that the DMV did for Hobbs - he had really stopped wanting to play footsie with the major AAU teams. You need great AAU ties to recruit in the DMV and even more so in NYC. I also don't think that GW recruited that much in the NYC area in recent years. I know that Hobbs really went after TT's HS teamate who ultimately went to Cinncinati - Sean Kilpatrick. The AAU thing only explains part of it though - since Hobbs came to believe that he simply couldn't get DMV kids to come to GW.
The other areas that we recruited in were largely a function of where the assistant coaches were comfortable. Collucci was from Florida and had lots of contacts there and I think he was involved with the Hollis recruitment AND Bynes. Hobbs was most comfortable in his old haunbts the NE prep scene. Roland really focused (mostly unsuccessfully) on his old haunts in Philly - Daymon Warren was his othe recruit. Ellerbe was just starting to make inroads in the DMV but left. Donyell had contacts in Pennsylvania where he had his own AAU team and his son (and Donovon Jack - who we went after hard but he ended up with Duquense) play. I think that Donyell would have become a great recruiter but obviously he didn't get a chance.
I think all the coaches went to the big AAU tournaments like in Vegas and that's where they came upon Jon Lloyd and other West Coast kids like Aaron. Roland was assigned to a kid in Dallas - Spacey who ultimately went to Florida State and that's how they came upon Trey Davis who was recruited mainly by Donyell. Nemanja really fell into their laps and came to GW after an extremely short courtship. Fitzgerald was like our 3rd choice from the same school in Mass. Laurent Rivard who went to Harvard was our main target at that school. We didn't really even recruit Dan Guest during his senior year and when we failed to land Loyd, Hobbs was scrambling around looking for another PG. Hobbs had lots of relatiosnhips with various coaches up in the NE prep and someone recommended Guest and Hobbs gave him a tryout (along with about 2 other PG's) and after much debate decided to go with him when they just didn't have any other options.
So a very long round about way to say that Hobbs really was always kind of scrambling looking for guys and went where he could to find sleepers. Ultimately his undoing was that he didn't have consistent excellent assistants who could do the job. Broadus, for example was a great recruiter - though he had a limited respect for the rules. I believe that Rice, Omar and JR were his recruits. Pikell got Ricky Lucas - the highest rated local recruit under Hobbs. Brooks had deep DMV ties and I think he got Diggs.
If you look at the new staff you quickly see how they go to the areas where they have contacts and relationships. Sutton - International, Montverde and Montrose (Paris, Garino, Larsen, Wainright, Carrera). Strickland is a great DC guy - went to Dematha - hence Kris Jenkins. He recruited Armwood at NC State and was a logical guy to step in when he wanted to leave Villanova. Strickland has great contacts throughout DC - is buddies with the coach at McGruder - hence Nick Griffin. Obviously Lonergan has deep DMV ties and has hit the local circuit heavily with the other coaches. These guys have been at DMV HS games virtually every single day/night since they've been hired at every possible moment when GW wasn't actually playing a game.