Reposting this from another thread, since I think it's useful info to have on hand as we 1) start to close in on more 2017s, and 2) start hearing about 2018s we may be recruiting.
Here's our latest scholarship grid, courtesy of
@tcf15:
There is a chance, from what we've heard, that Brown enters as a 2016 and is a freshman next year. There's also a chance that Purvis or Hamilton are gone after this year (though I think it would be a mistake for either/both).
Regardless, we can rest assured that our roster is 95% done for next year.
And then it gets tricky. I'm going to assume that we'll be lucky enough to have Hamilton stay for his junior year, then head to the league. I'm also going to assume that KO closes on our two top targets for 2017: Point guard
Makai Ashton-Langford and shooting guard
Hamidou Diallo.
Going by
@tcf15 's grid above, that would leave us with three open scholarships. It would also leave us with the following depth chart for the 2017-18 season:
PG: Adams (Jr.), Alterique (So.), MAL (Fr.)
SG: Diallo (Fr.)
SF: Larrier (Jr.), Jackson (So.)
PF: Durham (So.), Diarra (So.)
C: Enoch (Jr.), Brown (So.)
So I think we're done recruiting PGs for 2017 once we sign MAL. That means no
Tremont Waters (4-star, top-60ish Connecticut kid) or
Ishmael El-Amin (Khalid's kid, a top 200ish 3-star player).
You can see the lack of depth at wing. I suspect that's where we'd focus for the rest of the 2017 recruiting efforts (once we've wrapped up Diallo & MAL). Two names that jump out are
Jay Jay Chandler, a fast-rising, 6-foot-4, 4-star SG from Katy, Texas, and
Chaundee Brown, a 6-foot-6, 4-star SG from Florida. Both of these guys have a ton of offers from SEC and Big 12 schools, but none from Kentucky, Kansas or Texas (yet).
Our "reach" recruit at the SF spot is
D.J. Harvey, a 5-star kid from Maryland. We're going up against everybody you'd expect for a guy like that - Duke, UNC, Maryland, etc. The local option is
Jermaine Samuels, a top 60 recruit from Massachusetts. He's been to campus multiple times and I believe was at Midnight Madness last year, but am not 100% sure.
I wouldn't be shocked if we got two wings from that group, or another wing who we start recruiting out of nowhere since we have need.
The other issue is that there are only 4 true bigs, though I suspect Jackson will spend a good deal of his time on the court as a stretch 4. We're not recruiting a ton of PFs, but one who we are on is
Malik William, a 4-star, top-100 player from Florida (and Chaundee Brown's teammate). He is completely earthbound at this point in his physical development, but he's described as a brilliant passer with a high IQ and a monster rebounder thanks to his long arms and big old butt. The comparison folks have made is to the kid from St. Joe's who tore us up in the tourney back in 2014.
Maybe even more interesting is that
we're apparently still going hard after Nick Richards, a 5-star C from NYC who played, I believe, on the same AAU team as Diallo. I assumed, once we got Zach Brown, that we were likely going to back off on other elite 2017 centers. But I guess not (no complaints here!).
The other thing to note: No seniors. There are three guys (Adams, Enoch, Larrier) who probably have a decent chance to work themselves into NBA prospects by then, but none is a lock. Diallo may very well come in as a one-and-done if his improvement curve continues, and Zach Brown's 7-foot-1, so if he's at all decent he'll get interest.
However, this does kind of put our 2018 recruiting in flux, which is why we haven't heard that much about it as of yet. KO's not offering as many guys from that class early in the cycle, which is a drastic change from what he did in 2016 and 2017.
Here's the NERR list of the top 75 '18s:
http://www.newenglandrecruitingreport.com/rankings/new-england-class-of-2018
We've reportedly been in to see Swider & Reeves, but no offers yet as far as anyone knows. In fact we've only offered 5 2018s so far: 5-star PG
TJ Moss from Memphis; 5-star wing
Cameron Reddish from Pennsylvania; a pair of 5-star PFs in
Nazreon Reid of New Jersey and
Marvin Bagley from Arizona; and 5-star center
Mamadou Doucoure from NYC.
We are competing against exactly who you'd expect for each of those guys.
Like I said at the top, things can and will change. But hopefully this gives people an idea of what we have going forward and what KO's looking for.
