Hoops Recruiting Is Back
With the Wolverines' season now in the books after a strong finish and a fifth consecutive Sweet 16 appearance, we now flip the page to recruiting.
As potential return/early entry decisions haven't been confirmed exclusive of DeVante Jones, the coaching staff doesn't know how many scholarships, and for what position group(s), are available.
Taking that into account, let's jump right into it with my most recent intel that will largely focus on the 2023 class.
**NOTE - In an effort to adjust expectations, I'm going to start emphasizing wholistic evaluations that focus more on projected impact as opposed to exclusive emphasis on a quantitative ranking. The overall talent level in HS hoops has declined significantly over the last five years and there has to be an adjustment that compensates for it and this is my attempt at doing so. The oversimplified example is that a prospect in the 15-40 range for the 2023 class probably doesn't project to be as good, or have as much impact, as a 2018 prospect in the same range, particularly as a freshman.**
NEW OFFER
Head coach Juwan Howard extended a scholarship to 2023 Fort Lauderdale Calvary Christian guard Marvel Allen on Tuesday.
Height/Weight: 6'4/195 (listed measurements), most likely a legit 6'2 - 6'3 and 185-190
Position: Combo-Guard
Mainstream Ranking: top-20 prospect overall to both the 247 + On3 composite rankings.
EM Ranking/Evaluation: Projected impact more closely resembles that of a 35-70 range prospect. More scorer than shooter that excels as a volume on-ball type that creates his own offense. College ready frame + solid positional size coupled with good athleticism allow him to finish through contact and absorb defenders attempting to bump him off his spots when penetrating to the rim. Above-average jumpshooter capable of hitting pull-ups from midrange, and from distance at times. Doesn't play off-ball much, so hard to measure his effectiveness as a floor-spacing shooter. Not a great playmaker for others at this stage of development. Probably a high-floor player at the college level due to size + frame/scoring ability.
Recruitment: There are some connections here, as Allen attends the same HS as 2022 signee Greg Glenn. On the other hand, Marvel was committed to LSU prior to Will Wade's termination. Those two factors in tandem make this a unique recruitment from a Michigan perspective, although one that is intriguing. There will be no shortage of suitors for Allen throughout the Summer.
YES, PLEASE
I was in Dallas over the weekend to take in my first travel ball event of the year at the Circuit League I. The prospect that absolutely blew me away was 2023 Zayden High of JL3 EYBL/Smithson Valley HS (TX). The appropriate folks were notified and contact has been made.
Height/Weight: Listed at 6'7-6'9/185-225. He's a legit 6'8-6'9 and 210 pounds at minimum.
Position: Power-Forward/Center
Mainstream Ranking: 3-star to every site (no ESPN profile)
EM Ranking/Evaluation: Projected impact resembles that of a top-50 prospect without question despite the mainstream ranking. And I'm only being that conservative on the basis that I need to see him more on the EYBL circuit. Potent perimeter shotmaker off the catch or the bounce. Outstanding vision as a playmaker for others that can facilitate offense. Appears to be a solid rim protector, with the caveat being that the competition, although formidable (Adidas Mass-Rivals), was a bit undersized. Zayden looks to be my Kyle Filipowski for the 2023 cycle. The kid that mainstreams don't love heading into the Spring/Summer, but will likely end up as a high 4-star/low 5-star prospect by August. High looks to be the perfect college prospect that may not have NBA-caliber positional size/agility/twitchiness (distinct from Filipowski that is a legit 6'11 - 7'). Assuming Michigan has a scholarship available for a big in 2023, Zayden should be an absolute priority.
Recruitment: Michigan is just now establishing contact, so impossible to measure how serious things may get, particularly since I predict Zayden is going to blow-up following the first live evaluation period in April. This is headed toward a national level recruitment in a hurry.
[Hit THE JUMP for a few more new names on the board]
UNDER THE RADAR, BUT ONE TO FOLLOW
Michigan has shown some preliminary interest in 2023 guard R.J. Jones of Drive Nation EYBL/John Paul II HS (TX), but no offer has been extended.
Height/Weight: Listed at 6'2-6'3/175-180 and that sounds right based on my eye test over the weekend.
Position: PG/SG
Mainstream Ranking: 4-star/40-75 overall
EM Ranking/Evaluation: Agree with the mainstream rankings, but would probably have him a bit higher at 35-60. From the body type to the shotmaking ability + shooting mechanics (genu valgum in the knees), Jones definitely reminded me a bit of former MSU standout Cassius Winston. Jones is an excellent shooter as a traditional floor-spacer and hitting pull-up jumpers off the dribble. While he didn't play on-ball much, I was impressed with RJ as a playmaker for others in his limited stints playing PG for Drive Nation. He definitely has some shiftiness off the bounce and changes directions easily with a live dribble. He's doesn't have a ton of acceleration, but he does have solid verticality in run + jump scenarios. Projects as a good multi-year college player that can excel as an on-ball playmaker or a catch + shoot floor-spacer that is compatible with any lineup combination.
Recruitment: Resides in Texas, but grew up in Florida until recently and Dad is originally from Benton Harbor. High academic student with 3.5+ GPA. Texas A&M and Cal are the two schools pursuing him the hardest right now. I'd expect a lot of new suitors over the Summer. This one seems to check all the boxes from a Michigan perspective both on the court and culturally. Would like to see this recruitment gets serious if the scholarship situation permits.
2024 THAT MAY BE WORTH MONITORING DOWN THE ROAD
2024 SG Kur Teng of Adidas Mass Rivals + Bradford Christian Academy (MA) was the best pure shooter I saw in Dallas. The staff has been keeping loose tabs on him, but no contact has been made to my knowledge.
Height/Weight: Listed at 6'4/165-185. Realistically 6'2-6'3 + 185-195.
Position: SG
Mainstream Ranking: 4-star/top-50 overall to both 247 and Rivals
EM Ranking/Evaluation: Projected impact more closely resembles that of a 75-150 range prospect assuming he's done growing. Outstanding shooter off movement via screens + relocations. Able to hit pull-ups when attacking closeouts. Can run half-court sets through him because of his ability to hit jumpers on the move. Limited ballhandler that doesn't change direction/speed with a live dribble. Limited athlete that doesn't possess ideal agility/speed/verticality. Not a playmaker for others at this stage of development. Quintessential "Just A Shooter" that doesn't project to be a great defender at this point.
Recruitment: Michigan isn't serious here just yet and I can see why. Offer list/interest closer to that of a MM+ caliber prospect and I agree with that at this point. If he gets to a legit 6'5-6'6 and/or develops some shot-creation ability that changes the equation.
March 28th, 2022 at 12:13 PM ^
Thanks Matt! Any idea why the talent level in HS hoops is 'down significantly in the past 5 years'? Seems like this statement implies more systemic changes than just a few random down years in talent.
March 28th, 2022 at 12:26 PM ^
Why do you think the talent is down?
You may jot have the generational talent every year, but overall high school kids get more skilled every year. You've got PFs and Ca legit spacing the floor, running like gazelles, and able to handle the ball.
Players scoring packages right out of high school are unreal.
The commenter isn't saying it, Matt is saying it.
**NOTE - In an effort to adjust expectations, I'm going to start emphasizing wholistic evaluations that focus more on projected impact as opposed to exclusive emphasis on a quantitative ranking. The overall talent level in HS hoops has declined significantly over the last five years and there has to be an adjustment that compensates for it and this is my attempt at doing so. The oversimplified example is that a prospect in the 15-40 range for the 2023 class probably doesn't project to be as good, or have as much impact, as a 2018 prospect in the same range, particularly as a freshman.**
Another reminder that it is a good idea to at least skim through the article before commenting on it. Avoids all sorts of embarrassing incidents.
Kids unsuccessfully attempting to play like Steph Curry.
March 28th, 2022 at 12:14 PM ^
Why is HS basketball talent down?
All those great athletes are now play soccer, of course. /s
There was this thing called Covid which impacted almost 2 years of development.
He said 5 years. Covid impact would have only been noticeable...in the last year or so.
If true, there must be something else far more systemic going on.
- Covid
- Basketball participation (from stats I found from 2019) has been going down slightly at the high school level
- More and more emphasis on performance academies / prep schools waters down participation at your average high school
- Young population has shifted away from areas where basketball is held in high regard - go look at Michigan's 1989 Roster and see where most of the players came from as opposed to a Beilein / Juwan team
- Too many kids just want to jack 3's without developing the rest of their game first (Steph Curry / NBA 2K Video game series effect). A few years back, I was appalled to watch an 8th grade game that featured a 5 out offense where 3's were regularly jacked by all members of the team. Unsurprisingly, the team 3 point percentage for the game was about 12%.
All my opinion.
The talent in ohio is down over the last few years. Everyone in ohio wants Holtman to have teams that win the big ten and big ten tourney like Thad Matta did. The problem is the talent pool in ohio has gone down. Matta had better players to choose from when he was coaching at OSU.
March 28th, 2022 at 12:35 PM ^
I read this and thought “why is HS talent down? I should ask.” Seems that is the same question everyone else had . . .
March 28th, 2022 at 12:52 PM ^
Just logged on. I wonder why HS talent is down. ;-)
March 28th, 2022 at 12:38 PM ^
Tons of questions re: declining talent. I'll just answer here to avoid clutter.
I would probably have another job title if I had the answer as to why the talent is down. I'm simply not intelligent enough to know. Obviously, genetics play a part in it, but not sure that's a great explanation for 5 consecutive years of the talent being down.
First it was 2021 is the worst recruiting class ever, then it was 2022.........and now it's 2023.
What I do know is that if you go back to 2018, you have guys in the 20-30 range that turned out to be rotational players at the NBA level (Naz Reid, Darius Bazley, Coby White, Kevin Porter, Ayo)
For context, there are guys in the 2021 class within the top 20 that can't even get heavy minutes at the college level (Watson, Sallis, Collins)
March 28th, 2022 at 12:42 PM ^
Interesting that the 2020 class isn't mentioned here.
I would say guys in the 20-30 range turning into rotational players is a huge success, which I think is what you're saying. There are only so many spots.
Is the issue that overall talent is down (lower number of NBA level guys from that class year), or that ranking accuracy is down (similar number of NBA guys, but more coming from lower ranked players). I'm sure you used guys in the 20-30 range as an easy example, but it doesn't necessarily tell the whole story.
It's like using the number of players that made a Pro Bowl as a way to evaluate the talent in an NFL draft class. A draft with fewer 1st round Pro Bowlers isn't necessarily less talented if it has a higher than average number of Pro Bowl players from rounds 2-7.
Now that I think about it, I think a plausible explanation/factor may be the recent trend of guys reclassing up a year. When you have 19-20 year old freshman, the development curve has a certain cap.
In other words, borderline grown men are beating up on HS kids..........but can't really do it as effectively against legit college players.
So it's not really that the talent level has dropped, but that kids are responding to the pressures of adults to shorten their junior career for a shot at a pro career and diluting the talent pool year over year?
If talent level is down it seems like the idea of trying to recruit top talent gets even more variable /risky than it already is. It seems like it makes sense for a college coach to leverage the portal and start recruiting like Villanova (i.e. good but not great talent that sticks around 3-4 years to develop personally and as a team.
Juwan Howard has shown the ability to leverage the portal. Do you think the right recruiting philosophy is in place or are adjustments needed?
Just curious, when was it realized in the scouting industry that 2021 was going to be a bad class historically?
Were those players in 8th grade and it was just clear 5 years out they didn't have it?
Or is it a case that they just never developed and then in their senior years everyone looked around and realized it was a down year?
I'm not knowledgeable enough about recruiting but is this downturn temporary or longer term? I mean, we're talking about a 4-5 year drop that coincided with a pandemic and (it appears) some issues with evaluations by various services.
The reason I ask is that I checked back on 2018's top rankings and compare it to 2020 and I don't see a ton of differences beyond the fact that 2020 has more guys still in college. Cade Cunningham, Jalen Green, and Evan Mobley are all better looking pro players than anyone in 2018 were when they came into the league, and guys like Cam Thomas and Porter Jr. feel like similar enough pros even if their games are a bit different.
It does feel like evaluations are at different and the pandemic may have altered how guys were viewed and maybe pushed some older guys up the pecking order when they shouldn't, but it doesn't make a ton of sense demographically for a large population of athletes to fall of in a couple of years.
The playing time difference could mostly be that it's now much easier for top programs to fill holes via the portal without having to play freshmen. For example if Gonzaga hadn't been able to get Rasir Bolton from the portal, Sallis would have almost certainly played big minutes.
In 2018-2019 there were guys like Quentin Grimes playing a lot of minutes despite playing very poorly (which still happens but perhaps not as often).
And there were also top guys in 2018-19 that didn't get heavy minutes at the college level partially because they were on stacked teams like the guys you mentioned this past year (Nassir Little, Quickley), and partially because some guys just don't pan out (EJ Montgomery).
I think it'll be interesting to see a quantitative analysis of how each of these classes pans out down the road in the NBA. If there is truly less talent in a given year, you'd expect there to be fewer NBA starts that a class makes in aggregate 3 or 5 years after graduating HS. Giving them that much time allows developmental pacing differences caused by these structural changes like the portal and reclassing to wash out.
Frankie isn't a top guy but also a good example. Had we not been able to pick up Jones, Frankie would probably have been thrust into a starting role the way Darius Morris was as a freshman. Doesn't mean he was any less qualified, per se. It's just that Michigan had the luxury of a better option.
March 28th, 2022 at 12:48 PM ^
Wow, definite yes on Zayden High (great name also). Very good balls skills and shooting touch. Reminds me a bit of a slightly smaller and skinnier Paolo Banchero (not saying he's on that level but maybe a similar type of game at a lower level). Or maybe a slightly more bouncy Isiah Livers (early years)? Admittedly this is judging based on a few clips but it seems 3 star is way, way too low. Good catch, Matt.
March 28th, 2022 at 12:57 PM ^
The appropriate folks were notified and contact has been made.
Is this in reference to Matt letting somebody at UM know about him? I didn't realize Matt had that type of a relationship with the program.
I was going to ask the same thing.
Seems this post created more questions than it answered.
He has made references to this effect before. It doesn't mean they take his word as gospel but they consider his and others' recommendations.
Juwan Howard obviously knows 1,000 times more about basketball than I do, but I wish Michigan was pursuing more shooters.
Agree with this, however 2020 and 2021 Juwan brought in Mike Smith/Chaundee with Livers, Eli and Franz to create a great perimeter shooting team.
I think we may look back at this past year as an outlier. Brandon Johns went from 33-34-36 to a very disappointing 29% 3-pt drop which was hard to really explain and I do not think anyone expected him to be so mentally lost this year.
Jones jumped from 29 to 36% in his final year at Coastal Carolina, which I bet Juwan thought he would continue to trend upwards, however was just about average at 34%
Then lastly Caleb Houstan coming in lauded as the best HS shooter in his class, and finishing with an underwhelming 35% stroke. Not bad for a freshman, but also not the lofty expectations we all had.
Depending on who stays and goes, Bufkin looks to have a nice stroke from 3, Houstan should come back and make a jump, who knows with Hunter/Moussa but they have shown some stretch big game. Add a couple grad transfer shooters and I think that would would a long way for the 2022-2023 team. Obviously trying to play optimist here.
We get sarcastic about "Just a Shooter", but we absolutely need a guy or two like that who you just can not leave unguarded on the perimeter for even a second.
They open up a lot of room inside.
Those kind of guys have killed us recently. Meanwhile we haven't had them.
I think Houstan qualifies as Just A Shooter because he was good enough that opposing teams didn't leave him readily. He shot 39% in the Big Ten and I think over 40% at home. He just needs to do that on the road. Twill qualifies as well.
When you have a guy like Dickinson sometimes you don't have a choice and you have to leave good shooters or you risk having happen what Izzo had happen.
Brooks was obviously outstanding this year. Jones was decent enough.
What brought Michigan's overall team percent down was the bench guys / Moussa that didn't have a lot of volume (Frankie was 17% (!!!), Moussa 21%, Bufkin 22%, and Johns 29%).
Johns and Bufkin was likely just a small sample issue / difficulty of coming off the bench, shooting one shot cold and then sitting back down. That's hard to do for most guys.
I imagine Bufkin's percent will be much improved with regular playing time next year (similar to Eli from his So to Jr years).
And hopefully he, Houstan (or Jett) and Twill will start 2-4. They should all be high 30s or 40s guys. Then we'll see what we have at center.
We currently have no scholarships open unless someone leaves. The most likely is Dickinson, who would create a need for a big man. I know you can have unexpected attrition but most of the team is young and are Juwan’s recruits, so I don’t see a lot of open spots due to transfers.
Does this assume Johns comes back for his covid year? I think at least two (Johns and Hunter) and possibly up to four (Houstan and Diabate) more guys will be gone.
No, if Hunter came back our scholarship count would be full. Hunter, T Will, Jace, Barnes, Tschetter, Collins, Bufkin, Diabate, Houstan, McDaniel, Glenn, Reed and Howard. That’s 13 including Hunter being here. To add any spots, someone has to leave from this list.
If this Jones guy shoots like Cassius Winston...yes, please.
March 29th, 2022 at 12:28 PM ^
I'm not a smart basketball fan and I know very little about the intricacies of the game, but in my time of fandom I've learned that you want players that can make basketball shots on your basketball team. I remember watching Stanley Johnson warm up before a Pistons game and it was so sad seeing him struggle to make a jump shot. It blew my mind that someone could shoot like that and get drafted in the top ten. As a Pistons/Wolverines fan I really do not want both of my favorite basketball teams to be built around players that are mediocre shooters.
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