Catching up with the latest recruiting news

The Recruiting Wars are heating up in Football with Signing Day just around the corner. But basketball recruiting has heated up, with more and more 2007 recruits pledging themselves to big name programs. On top of that, we have the expected inter-semester transfers (eg Terry Martin had enough of Bob Knight and back to Louisianna/LSU).

Details here at CSTV

Some big names have pledged, including super-guard Corey Fisher (did he pledge to a team with a four-guard offense?)

The Micah Downs sweepstakes

Following the departure of Micah Downs from Kansas for "personal reasons", I'm sure the Pacific Northwest teams are officially and unofficially wanting to get him. Gonzaga may have the easiest sell of all: "You, Mr Micah Downs, can be the next Adam Morrison!". Hard to say no to that. Assuming Mark Few wants him, and why wouldn't he? The Zags recently picked up BYU transfer David Burgess and it is a lot easier on the players where there's two of them sitting out instead of one (Apparently transferring runs in the Burgess family as his older brother transfered from Duke).

Others who could/should be interested in Micah Downs are Washington. Washington State will be harder sell, and probably Oregon since Ernie Kent may not be there by the time he gets eligible. The other Pac10 schools may jump in as well, but he will probably end up at either Gonzaga or Washington - unless they don't want him.

Duke is King in 2007?

Duke managed to edge out Villanova (!) and Gonzaga (!) for the services of SoCal super-prep Taylor King (2007). His coach mentioned North Carolina finished fourth. This was revealed at the local FSN channel and then spread through the wire.

In retrospect, his early commitment to UCLA had been a marriage of convinience for King (didn't have to worry about recruiting) and Ben Howland (just hired at UCLA, gets a splashy future commit). But after surpring people with his talent level and actually living up to expectations he decided he wanted to play somewhere more "fun".

Villanova is already receiving dividends from their NCAA run last year and the 05-06 season. This is a great sign for Jay Wright - being in the Top 3 and ahead of UNC for a SoCal prospect.

Gonzaga is also huge, as now they can sell the "Adam Morrisson" angle to potential versatile forwards (such as Taylor King).

Another interesting pattern is the cycle of Duke and North Carolina. UNC has a super 2006 class, Duke is building towards a super 2007 class. Carolina was the top team in the country in 2004-05, Duke is the top team in 2005-06. Their recruiting seems to follow the same pattern. Interesting...