Category Archives: Recruiting News

Recruiting News

Spring Swings and Misses: Why Can’t PC Find a Guard?

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Win totals increasing each year Ed Cooley has been at PC – 15 to 19 to 23 – a trip to the NIT Quarterfinals followed by a Big East Tournament Championship and trip to the NCAA Tournament 2nd round, updated athletic facilities, scoring and minutes holes at the guard position. That all sounds really good for the Friars’ prospects of bringing in an impact guard or two this Spring as Ed Cooley mentioned was his plan. It sounds really good except they haven’t been able to sell any of the available guards on coming to play at Providence.

First it was Devonte’ Graham.

Graham’s situation was unique in that he couldn’t speak to coaches until he got his release from Appalachian State which didn’t come until early April 2014. While Cooley had made his interest clear to Brewster Academy coach, Jason Smith, it’s hard to compete when Kansas comes calling.

Continue reading Spring Swings and Misses: Why Can’t PC Find a Guard? →

Recruiting News

Two New Names with Providence Interest from Putnam Science Academy

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A new name in the class of 2015 for Friar fans is a player who is also new to New England prep basketball. Andrew Robinson, along with twin brother Aaron, decided to do a prep year at Putnam Science Academy this upcoming season. Andrew is the more heralded prospect and he is the one that PC is showing increased interest in. The Robinson’s older brother is former Syracuse guard, Billy Edelin.

The 6’5 wing player had offers from Binghamton, Delaware, Drexel, LIU-Brooklyn, Marshall, Robert Morris, Siena and Towson after his last season at Springbrook in Maryland. He averaged a team high 17 ppg for the Blue Devils and also pulled down 6.4 rpg last season. Since announcing in late April that he will be prepping at PSA this year, he has received interest from Providence and Dayton. After speaking with a couple people familiar with his game from high school and watching some of the highlight tapes (see below), it seems like Robinson is athletic enough to play in the Big East but needs to hone his ball skills and increase his quickness. It should also be noted that Andrew is not just talented on the court. He had a weighted GPA of 4.04 at Springbrook and was the sports editor for the school newspaper.

In the July live period he will be at the Reebok Classic Breakout Camp from July 8th-11th then at the Hoop Group Summer Jam Fest from July 18th-20th.

 

The other new name is in the class of 2017 and will also be making his New England prep basketball debut this upcoming season. Hamidou Diallo is a 6’3 shooting guard from Flushing, NY. He runs with the NYC Jayhawks on the AAU circuit where he led the 15U team to the Elite 8 at the Pittsburgh Jam Fest during the April live period. He attended URI Elite camp on June 27th and attended NERR Elite 75 camp on June 30th and got an offer from Fairfield while on a recent visit there with another PC target from PSA, Mamadou Diarra. Diallo is young and still growing into his body but he’s a name that will likely become more familiar over the next couple of years to those that follow New England prep basketball.

Follow me on Twitter @pcbb1917

Recruiting News

Providence Recruit Jalen Adams Commits to Connecticut

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Providence seemed to be on the back burner of Jalen Adams’ recruitment these last few months and there was a growing suspicion that the 2015 guard liked UConn more and more. I’m not surprised by this commitment though I am a little surprised of the timing. I thought he might wait until after the July live period but it appears he didn’t want to wait.

https://twitter.com/JalenAdams25/status/483629614623756289

Adams and Donovan Mitchell seemed to be two top PC targets at one time but then the focus of the PC staff shifted towards Mitchell and away from Adams. Maybe they had a feeling he was UConn-bound all along and didn’t want to waste resources but in the last year, he has really made a name for himself nationally and has risen up recruiting boards.

 

Recruiting News

2015 Big Man Steve Enoch Visiting Providence Today

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Every year there is a player that comes from relative obscurity and blows up during the early AAU season. The class of 2015’s version of this is Connecticut big man, Steve Enoch.

Enoch attends Norwalk HS and has only played one season on the varsity but its clear he can play. It seems like he didn’t really begin to take basketball seriously until about a year ago and now that he has the interest and offers are flooding in. He also went from nowhere on the list to being ranked 54th in the class of 2015 nationally by Rivals.com’s latest release of their Top 150 and 61st in the class by Scout.com.

Providence was one of a few teams that watched him work out prior to the April live period and liked what they saw. Assistant Coach Brian Blaney was in Pittsburgh during the April live period for the Pittsburgh Jamfest and watched Enoch there with his AAU squad, High Rise Team Up.

Now the Friars will be hosting Enoch for an on campus visit a day after having priority recruit, Donovan Mitchell in Friartown yesterday. Enoch visited UConn yesterday and they offered. I would expect the same to happen today. In addition to PC, Enoch will visit URI today.

Click here to watch some highlights from his high school season.

Recruiting News

#pcbb Weekly Recruiting Update 6/27/14

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The NBA Draft showed how silly it can be by leaving a lot of very good college players off the board, including Bryce Cotton. But one thing that stuck out to me was the number of guys that got drafted who were top 100 recruits coming out of high school. It goes to show you just how important recruiting high level talent really is for programs. Obviously not every top 100 guy is going to pan out but it’s a numbers game and the more talent you acquire, the more likely it is that talent will develop and translate to on-court success. As an example, using ESPN’s top 100 high school player rankings, of the 24 non-international players drafted in the 1st round last night, 19 were in the top 100 in their class coming out of high school. Of those 19, 8 were ranked in the top 10. The 5 unranked guys were Nik Stauskas, Elfrid Payton, Doug McDermott, C.J. Wilcox and Josh Huestis.

Ed Cooley has upped the talent level at PC in his time in Friartown and this weekend he will be hosting a lot of talented recruits. 2015 recruits Donovan Mitchell and Steve Enoch will be on campus this weekend with Mitchell already at PC today and Enoch heading to URI and PC tomorrow.

With the news that Tramaine Isabell committed to Missouri on Thursday, Ed Cooley and his staff are going to have to weigh the available options against standing pat and going into the season with what they have right now. The only two names I have heard PC interested in at this point are Armel Potter and Ricky Council. I’ll profile both guys individually early next week.

We learned last week at this time that Wake Forest transfer, Tyler Cavanaugh, had received a call from Ed Cooley. Cavanaugh visited George Washington on Tuesday, per Adam Zagoria. Syracuse.com’s Donna Ditota reported last week that Cavanaugh plans to take 3 to 4 visits before deciding. CBS Sports’ Jon Rothstein had this to say today:

Wake Forest transfer Tyler Cavanaugh visited George Washington this past week and is also considering Butler and Dayton. The 6-9 forward averaged 8.8 points and 3.8 rebounds last season and has two years of remaining eligibility.

Continue reading #pcbb Weekly Recruiting Update 6/27/14 →

Recruiting News

Class of 2014 Target Tramaine Isabell Commits to Missouri

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The spring misses continue for Ed Cooley and the Friars. Seattle guard Tramaine Isabell has committed to Kim Anderson and the Missouri Tigers after visiting Columbia last weekend. He left there without committing but his comments indicated that he may never make it to Providence for a visit and it appears he decided to make his decision on his birthday, June 27th.

Isabell told Scout.com’s Evan Daniels, “me and my mom thought it was the right decision…We enjoyed our visit a lot. I got a good relationship with the coaches and the players.”

Ed Cooley is just returning from Colorado with a gold medal from the FIBA Americas games but he had yet to win a recruiting battle this spring in his search for guards after Josh Fortune announced his transfer. The pickings are getting slim at this point with former Florida Atlantic commit, Armel Potter and German guard Tyree Chambers possible drawing more interest now.

Recruiting News

#pcbb Weekly Recruiting Update 6/20/14

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I took last week off from the weekly recruiting update but it’s back this week and there is plenty to mention. Since the last update on June 6th, Niagara graduate transfer Antoine Mason committed to Auburn which is another Spring miss for Ed Cooley and staff.

Next up is Seattle guard Tramaine Isabell who is currently on a visit at Missouri with plans to visit Providence after that and then decide. Though he told ShowMeMizzou.com “that if he likes Missouri enough, there’s a chance he might not need to take any other visits.”

The Providence Journal’s Kevin McNamara mentioned that PC had a German guard on campus for a visit a few weeks ago and UndercoverFriar revealed that player to be Tyree Chambers. That doesn’t seem to be anything more than interest and an offer was never made.

One other guard option that has been mentioned in recent weeks is 2014 guard Armel Potter. Jeff Ferrucci of ScoutFriars.com spoke with Potter last week. Potter revealed that PC hasn’t offered but is “showing high interest.” The scoring guard visited Tennessee Tech last week and is also being recruited by Appalachian State, Ball State, Iona, Niagara, Winthrop along with some other mid majors.

If I had to choose between Isabell and Potter, I would definitely take Isabell despite the rumors of him possibly having some issues qualifying because he is definitely the more talented player but Potter is a guy that can score the ball despite being undersized. We’ll see how Isabell’s visit to Missouri shakes out but I would expect interest in Potter to increase from Coach Blaney if Isabell commits to the Tigers before leaving Columbia.

One other note on the recruiting front is a potential transfer candidate in former Wake Forest PF Tyler Cavanaugh. He was granted his release this week and has already spoken to Ed Cooley who recruited him out of high school when Cooley was still at Fairfield. He never overlapped with PC redshirt Senior Carson Desrosiers at Wake but I wouldn’t be surprised if Cooley put the two in touch to discuss the transition from Wake to PC. Cavanaugh, a native of Dewitt, NY (upstate near Syracuse) told Syracuse.com’s Donna Ditota, “I want to try to come a little bit closer to home, but I want to be open to any opportunity. I just want to make sure I find the perfect fit for my last two years of eligibility.” He also said that he plans to narrow down schools to 3 schools to visit and decide within “the next couple weeks.” He would have to sit this upcoming season and would have two years of eligibility remaining. The 6’9 stretch power forward averaged 19 mpg, 7 ppg and 3.2 rpg in 64 career games for the Demon Deacons, including 28 career starts.

Continue reading #pcbb Weekly Recruiting Update 6/20/14 →