Archive for April 20th, 2007

April
20
2007

Introducing the Basketball Recruiting Class of ‘07

6:27 pm — 

Bruce Weber most likely completed his recruiting last week when he signed Rodney Alexader, a JUCO small forward out of Redlands Community College in Oklahoma. The announcement of Alexander’s signing comes one week after Quinton Watkins, a highly recruited 4-star shooting guard out of Compton, Calif. Alexander was also a well sought out commodity, but choose Illinois over Indiana, Tennessee, Kansas State, Kentucky, Syracuse and Michigan, among others.

So Weber rounded up his class with two four stars, two three stars and a top-notch JUCO player. Here’s the five:

Demetri McCamey, PG, 4 Star, 6′4′’, 190lb, St. Joseph High School (Ill.)

Quinton Watkins, SG, 4 Star, 6′3′’, 175, Dominiguez High School (Calif.)

Mike Tisdale, C, 3 Star, 6′11′’, 195, Riverton High School (Ill.)

Bill Cole, PF, 3 Star, 6′9′’, 185, Richwood High School (Ill.)

Rodney Alexander, SF, 6′7′’, 225, Redlands Community College (Okla.)

The class is well balanced (notice, a player at each position). Three of the five–Alexander, Watkins, McCamey–will see significant minutes next year. Cole and Tisdale are works in progress, which is a given consider they’re both giants compared to McCamey, yet McCamey weighs as much as both of them. They need to build some muscle to say the least.

So what do you think of the class? Can the Illini compete with this crop next year? A few years from now?

Also, there are rumors out there that Michael Jordan’s son, Jeffrey Jordan, will attempt to walk on to the Illini. While his brother, Marcus, is the better player, what would it mean for recruiting and marketing to bring Jordan’s son to UI?