Updated 2018 Basketball Rivals 150: Big jumps for Castleton and DeJulius

Submitted by Bambi on

Link to the Rivals 150

Yesterday Rivals put out their updated Top 150 list for basketball. It was a good day for Michigan recruits as 3 saw upward movement and 2 with big jumps.

  • #57 Brandon Johns, up 8 spots from #65
  • #85 Colin Castleton, up 42 spots from #127
  • #93 David DeJulius, up 36 spots from #129

The last two Michigan recruits aren't on the list. Adrien Nunez didn't make the cut while Ignas Brazdeikis is a 5 star recruit who went to HS in Canada and thus is not on the Top 150 list. If he were on the list, as a 5 star he'd be somewhere in the top 30 as the lowest 5 star currently is #29. 

247 I think still has an update to do but when the new composite comes out expect this to be Michigan's highest rated recruiting class under Beilein, and probably since the Fab 5.

Other top 150 B1G recruits:

  • #22 Jalen Smith (Maryland), 5 star, highest rated B1G recruit without knowing Iggy's ranking
  • #28 Ayo Dosunmu (Illinois), 5 star
  • #38 Aaron Wiggins (Maryland)
  • #41 Joe Wieskamp (Iowa)
  • #49 Jerome Hunter (Indiana), former Michigan target
  • #56 Daniel Oturu (Minnesota)
  • #58 Marcus Bingham (MSU), highest rated MSU recruit 1 spot behind Michigan's second highest rated recruit
  • #62 Foster Loyer (MSU)
  • #63 Miller Kopp (NW)
  • #64 Pete Nance (NW), former Michigan target
  • #67 Luther Muhammad (OSU)
  • #72 Eric Ayala (Maryland)
  • #75 Jaedon LeDee (OSU)
  • #82 Tevian Jones (Illinois)
  • #97 Gabe Brown (MSU)
  • #99 Robert Phinisee (Indiana)
  • #104 Montez Mathis (Rutgers)
  • #109 Thomas Kithier (MSU)
  • #111 Aaron Henry (MSU)
  • #114 Damezi Anderson (Indiana)
  • #117 Eric Hunter (Purdue)
  • #124 Trevion Williams (Purdue)
  • #127 Jake Forrester (Indiana)
  • #128 Serrel Smith (Maryland)
  • #132 Ron Hunter Jr (Rutgers)
  • #133 Jordan Lathon (NW)
  • #140 Myles Dread (PSU), 3 star
  • #142 Duane Washington Jr (OSU)
  • #149 Alan Griffin (Illinois)

Wisconsin and Nebraska are the only two B1G schools missing from the list

Barn Animal

April 17th, 2018 at 11:06 AM ^

Plus Rivals considers Iggy to be top 30 since he is a 5 star but they don't rank him because he's Canadian which hurts his ranking in the 247 composite. This class is stacked.

Edit: Oops you said it in the OP, mea culpa

ldevon1

April 17th, 2018 at 11:10 AM ^

I don't really follow basketball recruiting, but how can a kid be a 5 star if they don't rank him? Where does the 5 star ranking come from? 

Bambi

April 17th, 2018 at 11:17 AM ^

They still scout him and judge his talent level the same way the would with any other recruit. Just as a rule on Rivals if you go to school in Canada they don't give you a ranking within the class. They can still judge whether you're a 5 star/4 star/whatever talent level the same they would any other recruit.

In 2016 they gave out 26 5 star rankings compared the the 29 on the list this year. They hae some cutoff of what's a 5 star vs a 4 star player beyond rank in the class, and Iggy was judged to be a 5 star.

BlueUPer

April 17th, 2018 at 11:17 AM ^

Our staff can develop talent and recruits heavily based on a player's integrity and their fit in the UM system.  

With that said, I'll take any and all 4 and 5 star kids who meet the aforementioned criteria.  

 

 

Blau

April 17th, 2018 at 3:24 PM ^

I know getting lower rated 3* recruits and turning them into All-Americans is just so Wisconsin-y but this is a team only a few years removed from playing in the championship with a history of making deep runs in the tourney every couple of years.

 

Losing a lot of their roster hurts a lot but not making the tournament in 2017 and now not having 1 recruit in the top 150 might signal a rebuild in Madison.

corundum

April 17th, 2018 at 11:17 AM ^

There's a lot of talent going to the mid-tier Big Ten programs. The conference schedule is going to be tough for the foreseeable future, which hopefully bodes well for NCAA tourney seeding. Would be nice to get that ACC uplift.

Maison Bleue

April 17th, 2018 at 11:35 AM ^

I would guess that that the 2012 class (ranked 8th) withMcGary, Stauskus, GRIII, Levert and Albrecht will still be Beilein’s highest rated class. But this class isn’t far behind, especially if Iggy actually got ranked by Rivals.

Bambi

April 17th, 2018 at 11:43 AM ^

I guess it depends on how define best ranked. Looking at 247 Composite 2012 was 8th nationally, 2nd in the B1G. This one is currently 16th nationally, 3rd in the B1G. However this doesn't include any updates from recent reranks (including this Rivals one) so the 2018 class will move upward. It also doesn't include the fact that Iggy is a consensus top 40 player being rated in the 70's in the composite.

If you look at the average class rating, this class has an average rating of 93.98 while 2012 was 93.73. After reranks are accounted for the 2018 class should jump well north of 94 despite Iggy not being properly rated. That puts the 2018 class in a better light.

CaliUMfan

April 17th, 2018 at 11:51 AM ^

Iggy is about as highly regarded as  GRIII was at this point in the recruiting cycle. At this point McGary had dropped but was still slightly ahead of where they have John's ranked. Stauskas was in about the same range as Dejulius and Castleton. Nunez is more highly regarded than Spike or Caris were. It seems like if you go down the line, the top 3 were ranked just slightly higher in 2012 but the 4th and 5th players are ranked much higher this year (including a 4th top 100 player). I'd say the classes are pretty comparable but I'd give the edge to this class.

poppinfresh

April 17th, 2018 at 11:39 AM ^

am i the only one who watches him and think he is over ranked relative to our other guys? obviously he is a sniper and a hunter, but his athleticism gives me pause.  when i see dejulius or johns play i cant help but think these guys are just as talented.

Bambi

April 17th, 2018 at 11:55 AM ^

The recent scouting report on Iggy is a great catch and shoot guy but too many pull up, off the dribble threes which he doesn't shoot well on. DeJulius is great at both, at least in HS. Whether he can be like DWalt and do that in college remains to be seen, but shooting is not a knock on him at all.

maquih

April 17th, 2018 at 12:35 PM ^

Fair enough, I'm no basketball scout but there's something about Iggy's game that strikes me as a complete basketball player out of high school, whereas with DDJ and Johns, it seems like maybe they're not quite complete in all aspects yet, thus the 4-stars.  Of course, we've seen beilein turn 3-stars into bona fide superstars!

wahooverine

April 17th, 2018 at 2:23 PM ^

Iggy has more polished and advanced offensive moves at this point.  Hard to compare with DeJulieus since, you know, he's a PG, but relative to Johns he has handle, footwork and an array of moves from anywhere on the floor, plus he's a good set shooter.  He already has a beefy, college ready frame.

Johns is gonna be great too but his game right now, IMO, is more reliant on being bigger, stronger and leapy-er than everyone else, though he's very skilled.  If he went to MSU, you could see him becoming a limited Kenny Goins or Gavin Schilling style dunk machine.  Beilein will turn him into an NBA small forward or wing depending on his handle and shot development.  Future is bright.

Bambi

April 17th, 2018 at 11:53 AM ^

Athleticism is obviously an important/desireable trait to have but non-elite athleticism isn't a huge deal in college. You look at the best player on various teams in recent Michigan memory and you have guys like Moe, Walton, Nik and Burke. None of those guys were top tier athletes yet all were outstanding college players. Look at Nova's teams in recent years, they've won 2 titles without a single lottery pick/elite athlete up until Bridges this year.

Being a top tier athlete is important in the NBA, which is why you see 5 star guys at Duke/Kentucky who are mediocre to bad college players get drafted in the first round. If you're trying to project Iggy out to the NBA, I agree his lack of athleticism is limiting. In college it probably won't matter. He's still a better athlete than most guys he'll face, and a better basketball player than 95% of them. In college that's all that matters.

WorldwideTJRob

April 17th, 2018 at 3:09 PM ^

Devicinzo is a very elite athlete. Mo is also a plus athlete for a guy his size. Think about the context of our team this year, we got to the championship game because we had more athletes on the floor than in past seasons. Matthews, Z, And Livers are all good athletes thus raising our Defensive level and making us a much better team. 2 of those guys are average to subpar shooters yet our team was more complete with their emergence. Don’t ever discount athleticism to a team, there is a reason why Beilein went after Barrett hard this year, a subperb athlete(shot is shaky) like that on the wing with Matthews would cause havoc for opposing coaches.

Bambi

April 17th, 2018 at 3:44 PM ^

I agree that DiVincenzo is a great athlete so you can add him to the mix if you want. But Brunson, Booth, Spellman and Paschal are all average to above average athletes at best. Going back to their last title team before that with Hart, Arci, Jenkins and Ochefu, none of them were elite athletes.

Obviously if you can get elite athletes you want them. I said as much as in my post. I acknowledged that being a great athlete lends itself to being a great NBA player, and by extension a great college players. So yes, of course Beilein would go after a guy like Barrett, any coach would and they'd be stupid not to.

And yes a guy like Moe is a solid athlete for his size. All of those are true but none of them go against what I said. My point was you don't need to be a great athlete to be a great college player, especially in Beilein's system. Is it nice and a huge added benefit? For sure. But we've seem plenty of guys with good but not great athleticism excel in college and under Beilein, like Moe. Iggy is like Moe, a good not great athlete. My point was that's good enough to be great in college and shouldn't be a reason to be skeptical of Iggy.

Also saying we got to the finals because we out athleted all our opponents is just not true. By no means did we out athlete A&M or FSU, that's just a wrong statement. We got to the finals because of our great D, weak path to the finals, great coaching and good athleticism in spite of our terrible shooting.

The big concern about our team next year is shooting/shot creation. It was an issue this past year and it'll be a biggerone next year. We've seen this issue on plenty of athletic teams in the past, like FSU or A&M or Kentucky. That's like a guy like Iggy, who isn't a great athlete but a great basketball player, is necessary.

WorldwideTJRob

April 17th, 2018 at 5:21 PM ^

Ok let me correct myself, no we didn’t out athlete our way to the title game. However, I think you are selling us short as far as team athleticism goes too. A part of being a great defensive team is being athletic on the perimeter. Having lateral quickness and strength to keep your man in front of you, plus showing quick twitch ability to get up and contest shots to me is all the signs of good to great athleticism. I don’t know too many great defensive teams who do not have plus athletes on the perimeter or an elite athletic rim protector in the paint. But even by your measure if we look at the Elite 8 teams I would venture to say the majority of them had good to great athleticism(Duke, Kansas, Kansas State, FSU, Texas Tech, and even Michigan). Add that with good skill and you can make it far. So do you have to be Anthony Davis to make an impact in college? No, but there are not to many squads full of athletes like Matt Vogrich & Ben Cronin winning big...lol.

For the record I think Iggy has good athleticism and under Sanderson he may evolve into an even better one.

WestQuad

April 17th, 2018 at 12:09 PM ^

Isn't Eric Hunter the Purdue QB in the mid-90s who had a mental break down?     He played at the same time as Antwan Randel-El and we played both IU and Purdue back to back.  I remember thinking the kid was going to be huge star.    Weird that they are getting a basketball recruit with the same name.

Looks like the QB was shot and kiled this last summer.  Sad.

Dawggoblue

April 17th, 2018 at 12:32 PM ^

Here is the list sorted by school

#22 Jalen Smith  Maryland
#82 Tevian Jones  Illinois
#149 Alan Griffin  Illinois
#28 Ayo Dosunmu  Illinois
#99 Robert Phinisee  Indiana
#114 Damezi Anderson  Indiana
#127 Jake Forrester  Indiana
#49 Jerome Hunter  Indiana
#41 Joe Wieskamp  Iowa
#38 Aaron Wiggins  Maryland
#72 Eric Ayala  Maryland
#128 Serrel Smith  Maryland
#56 Daniel Oturu  Minnesota
#62 Foster Loyer  MSU
#97 Gabe Brown  MSU
#109 Thomas Kithier  MSU
#111 Aaron Henry  MSU
#58 Marcus Bingham  MSU
#63 Miller Kopp  NW
#133 Jordan Lathon  NW
#64 Pete Nance  NW
#67 Luther Muhammad  OSU
#75 Jaedon LeDee  OSU
#142 Duane Washington Jr  OSU
#140 Myles Dread  PSU
#117 Eric Hunter  Purdue
#124 Trevion Williams  Purdue
#104 Montez Mathis  Rutgers
#132 Ron Hunter Jr  Rutgers
#57 Brandon Johns Michigan
#85 Colin Castleton Michigan
#93 David DeJulius Michigan

 

MHWolverine

April 17th, 2018 at 12:52 PM ^

I still think David DeJulius was robbed of the Mr. Basketball award by Loyer. Nothing against Foster Loyer, he's a great player but DeJulius straight balled out last year. Oh well, MBB loking real good for the next few seasons!! 

Go Blue!! 

2004B1GCHAMPS

April 17th, 2018 at 4:34 PM ^

Cheap and baseless commentary doesn’t score points with me, If that makes me an MSU guy, then sure. I can’t respect the guys basketball accomplishments? Who cares.