- The big news of the week was clearly Austin Rivers committing to Duke in a move that was surprising not so much for the destination as when he made it, especially given his recent announcement about taking official visits to UNC and Kansas. Coming off last season’s title and with the long list of returning rotation players (including Seth Curry finally becoming eligible) the addition of Rivers has many people in Durham thinking “three-peat”. That might be premature, but it is enough to make people in Chapel Hill and many other college campuses across the nation feel nauseous.
- John Pelphrey‘s job at Arkansas may be in jeopardy, but the future of the Razorback program seems to be in good hands after Pelphrey landed Ky Madden to go along with a recruiting class that already included B.J. Young and could wind up being a top five class by the time the class of 2011 arrives on campus next fall.
- We know that Tom Crean is working hard at getting Indiana back to being a perennial contender in the Big Ten, but we are beginning to wonder about his methods. A few weeks ago we reported that Crean had secured a commitment from James Blackmon Jr., a rising freshman, from near Bloomington. Now, Crean has secured another class of 2014 commitment, this time from Trey Lyles, one of Blackmon’s AAU teammates. To be fair, we don’t know much about Lyles other than the fact that he is 6’9 coming out of middle school, which we are assuming meant that he towered over his competition. Still we find the trend a little disturbing and have delved into this issue two years ago. It will be interesting to see how many of these commitments are actually offered scholarships when their senior year rolls around three years from now. As for now, here’s a look at Indiana’s future below:
- Speaking of Indiana, it appears that the student body and Facebook nearly got the program into hot water with a Facebook campaign trying to lure Cody Zeller to become a Hoosier. We have seen this type of stunt before, but this time someone listed Victor Oladipo, a freshman on the team, and Austin Etherington, an Indiana recruit, as two of the three administrators purportedly without their knowledge.
- Louisville picked up a commitment from Angel Nunez, a 6’8″ forward who was once a top 30 recruit, but has slipped out of the top 100. Still it is a nice pick-up for Rick Pitino, who is still hoping to land Quincy Miller and/or Tony Wroten Jr. If he is able to land both of those guys he could have a class that could rival Kentucky‘s more hyped class (at least for this year).
- Speaking of Wroten, Jody Demling is reporting that the talented guard out of Washington is deciding between Louisville and Washington when he announces his decision on October 7th.
- It won’t directly affect the Pittsburgh program for another two years, but Jamie Dixon got a huge commitment from Khem Birch, a top five player overall in the class of 2012 and the highest rated recruit Dixon has ever landed. After all his success with less heralded recruits it will be interesting to see what Dixon can do with a talent like Birch.
- Seth Greenberg may no longer have to settle for his perpetual spot as the guy looking in from outside the NCAA bubble on Selection Sunday if he keeps landing prospects like Dorian Finney-Smith, the #15 player overall in this year’s class. It is interesting that that his final three were Virginia Tech, Florida, and Old Dominion, which are not your typical programs of interest for a player rated this highly. Is it just that Finney-Smith had some specific reasons to be interested in these programs or did other coaches see something wrong with his game that the scouts did not?
- Quinn Cook has narrowed his list to four schools (UCLA, Duke, Villanova, and Kansas) and does not appear to be influenced that much by the choices of other recruits other than Josiah Turner taking away his spot at Arizona.
- From what we have heard, Ben Howland is trying to speed up the Bruins and he may have a solid piece to do so in Norman Powell, an athletic shooting guard with a reported 45″ vertical, who committed to play for UCLA.
- Mick Cronin is going into New York and New Jersey to fill his Cincinnati roster as he added a commitment from Jermaine Sanders (New York City) after having landed Shaquille Thomas (New Jersey).
We couldn’t actually find any decent footage of Lyles so you will just have to settle for the photo below (he’s the tall one):
