2007 Basketball Recruiting Rankings & Review

Basketball Recruiting General NCS Basketball263

Basketball recruiting for this year’s class is complete and first year Head Coach, Sidney Lowe has an awful lot of which to be proud!! Coach Lowe made the best of his opportunity to make a big impact as early as he could last summer.

After inheriting a program that was in such disarray that Lee Fowler found it necessary to sign the new coach to an (uncustomary) SIX YEAR deal last year, Sidney bested expectations on the court during his first season and has continued his momentum off the court in recruiting.

(Sidebar: After six years of listening to “Coach” Fowler extol the strength of NC State’s program under Herb Sendek, I never understood the ‘logic’ and lack of consistency that the program was in such bad shape that Fowler needed to go outside of his box and give Lowe an extra year on his first contract. Don’t get me wrong, I am not complaining about the maneuver as it relates to Sidney – just flabbergasted at the hypocrisy of Fowler’s actions when measured against his words).

This year’s recruiting class started coming together when Johnny Thomas committed to the Wolfpack in early June of last year. The class kept picking up steam and then picked up momentum from there.

If you do not include point guard Farnold Degand or combo guard Marques Johnson who is transferring from Tennessee, the Wolfpack signed four players in this year’s class.

* JJ Hickson, C/PF, Scout – 5-star, #13 rank; Rivals – 5-star, #10 rank
* Tracy Smith, F, Scout – 4-star, #70 rank; Rivals – 4-star, #46 rank
* Javi Gonzalez, PG, Scout – 3-star, Top 150 rank; Rivals – 3-star, Top 150 rank
* Johnny Thomas, SF, Scout – 3-star, Top 150 rank; Rivals – 3-star, Top 150 rank

Not including the transfers, Coach Lowe’s first recruiting haul was ranked:

* 16th in the country CollegeHoopsUpdate.com. (Link to rankings)
* 16th by Scout.com (Link to rankings )
* 18th by Rivals.com (Link to rankings) (We particularly liked the Rivals article because of its format and easy access to past recruiting rankings.

The ACC Perspective
As always, the first place to turn for broad and deep analysis of the conference is Dave Glenn.

Glenn’s ACCSports.com has a detailed breakdown of both 2007 signees and a look ahead to 2008 recruits at this link.

The Fayetteville Observer highlighted the recruiting classes of the entire conference in this article that uses the Prepstars recruiting service for its basis.

Duke signed three of the top 20 basketball prospects in the Class of 2007, getting signatures from Kyle Singler, Taylor King and Nolan Smith in the fall. The only other top-20 player headed to the ACC is J.J. Hickson, who signed with N.C. State.

ACC schools are bringing in eight of the top 50 high school hoops players in the nation as ranked by prepstars.com. In addition to the three future Blue Devils, N.C. State and Florida State signed two apiece, while Georgia Tech got one.

Of the 43 high school players who signed with ACC schools, 20 are ranked in the top 100. One of those, however, Augustus Gilchrist, has said he will not attend Virginia Tech because of last month’s campus shootings.

None of Clemson’s three signees is rated in the top 100. All of the other ACC schools, with the exception of North Carolina, added at least one top-100 prospect.

Carolina did not sign anybody. In fact, the Tar Heels did not recruit anyone in the 2007 class after making the nation’s No. 1 haul last year. UNC’s 2006 group included six of the top 100 high school players.

Virginia Tech has the largest 2007 ACC class with six signees. Maryland has five.

The rankings are summarized below:

(1) Duke
(2) Georgia Tech
(3) N.C. State
(4) Florida State
(5) Virginia Tech
(6) Wake Forest
(7) Maryland
(8) Virginia
(9) Boston College
(10) Miami
(11) Clemson
(12) North Carolina

Related, Dave Sez has done a nice analysis on the talent entering the ACC this year.

NC State’s Future
We’ve been keeping a running list of the Wolfpack’s projected roster for the past year as we have been following recruiting. With the news that Tracy Smith has not only signed but is projected to academically qualify to play next season (and should be enrolling at State this summer), then it becomes more clear that someone on NC State’s current roster will not be returning to the program next season.

Early rumblings from Raleigh seem to indicate that Bartosz Lewandowski may be having some health issues that will preclude him from participating in college athletics in the future. We do not know who true this is and will be looking into it further; we will exclude Lewandowski for the purposes of the following projections. Also unknown for the purposes of the following projections is the classification of Marques Johnson next year. Will he be a freshman or a sophomore?

Senior Class
(1) Gavin Grant (2G/3F)

Junior Class
(2) Courtney Fells (2G)
(3) Ben McCauley (4F/5C)

Sophomore Class
(4) Brandon Costner (3F/4F)
(5) Trevor Ferguson (2G/PG)
(6) Dennis Horner (3F)
(7) Farnold Degand (1PG)

Freshman Class
(8) Johnny Thomas (3F)
(9) JJ Hickson (5C/4F)
(10) Tracy Smith (4F/3F)
(11) Marques Johnson (2G) (eligible after first semester)
(12) Javi Gonzalez (1PG)

HS Senior Commits
(13) Julius Mays (PG)
(1) CJ Williams (3F/2G) [Gavin Grant’s old scholarship]

More from Dave Glenn:

N.C. State is in the unusual position, even at this early stage, of having filled all of its open roster spots with commitments from members of the Class of 2008. These high school juniors won’t be in college until the 2008-09 season, remember, but Lowe already has secured pledges from Indiana guard Julius Mays and in-state (Fayetteville Jack Britt) swingman C.J. Williams. Unless a current team member leaves the program prematurely, the Wolfpack has no more available scholarships for high school juniors.

Given the nature (transfers, early NBA entries, etc.) of modern college basketball, of course, the Wolfpack is continuing to stay in contact with a variety of 2008 prospects, even without an open scholarship.

Updated – July 30, 2007
Link to WS Journal

There are four incoming freshmen to go with two players who transferred in last year and will be eligible in the coming season. The four freshmen alone – center J.J. Hickson, forwards Tracy Smith and Johnny Thomas, and guard Javier Gonzalez – gave State the No. 14 class in the nation, according to PrepStars, and the No. 2 class in the ACC behind Duke. Scout.com rated the class No. 17 in the nation and No. 2 in the ACC.

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Basketball Recruiting General NCS Basketball

263 Responses to 2007 Basketball Recruiting Rankings & Review

  1. CedarGroveWolf 06/06/2007 at 10:46 AM #

    “If you spread the floor to pass the ball around the three and toss up a three pointer when the clock is running down it will not work consistently.”

    Agreed. Glad that’s not what we did. Ced posted, guards posted, guards drove, back door cuts, etc… That’s why we went to the NCAA’s 5 straight seasons.

  2. xphoenix87 06/06/2007 at 11:01 AM #

    I never made any comments as to the effectiveness of our version of the PO, and I agree completely that there were many times we stood around on the perimeter too much. However, my earlier argument was that the PO, even our version, is heavily reliant on ball-movement and spacing. Your comment was

    “Did you actually watch our version of the PO?
    IT consisted of five gusy standing around the perimeter passing hte ball back and forth and then launching a three. How can anyone learn spacing form that.
    It is like you make stuff up to support your argument.”

    This is blatantly untrue, as I pointed out in the posts that followed it. Spacing is a huge part of any offense that emphasizes backdoor cuts and swinging the ball around the perimeter like ours did.

  3. Rick 06/06/2007 at 12:12 PM #

    We will have to agree to disagree then. I guess you could argue we used pacing because we stayed outside of the three point line but our ball movement was mostly passing it around the three point line. The last several years the back door cuts became a memory. It was not an effective offense and it did not teach proper ball movement or spacing.

  4. Rick 06/06/2007 at 12:13 PM #

    “Agreed. Glad that’s not what we did. Ced posted, guards posted, guards drove, back door cuts, etc… That’s why we went to the NCAA’s 5 straight seasons.”

    Dance, Dance, Dance

    At least you posted more than your “uh huh” statement. It just happens to be all wrong.

  5. CedarGroveWolf 06/06/2007 at 12:46 PM #

    “At least you posted more than your “uh huh” statement. It just happens to be all wrong.”

    Ced didn’t post up? Hodge, Cam, Grant did’t post up? No back doors by EA? We didn’t go to 5 straight NCAA’s?

  6. xphoenix87 06/06/2007 at 12:51 PM #

    Fine then, lets have it your way and assume that The offense involved simply passing the ball around the perimeter and jacking up threes. If that is the case, shouldn’t Gavin know better than to

    A) Stand right next to other players on the perimeter when the ball gets swung around.

    B) Hold on to the ball every time it gets swung to him instead of making a quick pass to keep the defense moving.

    These are both mistakes I saw Gavin make many, many times throughout last year. Maybe I can overlook the fact that he can’t throw a post entry pass (despite the fact that most high school players can do that and the fact that Fells improved immensely in that department while Gavin didn’t) because it wasn’t a big part of the PO. However, I find it very hard to attribute his complete lack of ball-movement fundamentals to the failures of the old regime.

  7. Rick 06/06/2007 at 1:49 PM #

    “Hold on to the ball every time it gets swung to him instead of making a quick pass to keep the defense moving. ”

    So every time it was passed to him he held on to it? Who is using hyberbole now?

    I said the PO didn’t work adn you go into histronics that it worked sometimes then turn around and say Grant always screws up.

    You keep doing the very things you are acusing me of doing. You would be much easier to take seriously if you didn’t.

  8. Rick 06/06/2007 at 1:50 PM #

    “We didn’t go to 5 straight NCAA’s?”

    The rallying cry for the great Herb lover.
    Dance monkey boy dance.

  9. xphoenix87 06/06/2007 at 2:16 PM #

    I did not once say that the Princeton offense worked. What I said is that it had many more facets than you’re giving it credit for.

    Yes, you’re right, that was hyperbole. What I should have said was “Hold on to the ball when it gets swung to him instead of making a quick pass to keep the defense moving.” However, you’re diverting away from the actual point. Sure, Gavin didn’t always hold on to the ball when it got swung to him, sometimes he made the quick pass to keep the ball moving. Even a broken clock is right twice a day. The point is that he very consistently didn’t make that pass, he doesn’t exhibit an understanding of ball-movement at all.

  10. Rick 06/06/2007 at 2:25 PM #

    “I did not once say that the Princeton offense worked. What I said is that it had many more facets than you’re giving it credit for. ”

    Huh?

    So now you are saying it didn’t work but it had alot of facets. Who cares how many facets it has if it is inconsistent?

    I said before Grant has his faults. They are just not as bad as you like to make them out.

    Sounds similar to your stance on Herb. The big difference being I am supporting a current player. You… not so much.

  11. lush 06/06/2007 at 4:38 PM #

    “Ced didn’t post up? Hodge, Cam, Grant did’t post up? No back doors by EA?”

    Are you even reading the posts? Every single shot is not going to be a three the entire game. Of course there were post ups and back door oppurtunities, but we DIDNT DO THAT CONSISTENTLY. What we did do consistently was NOT execute the PO. Which is why sane people see Herbs version of the PO as standing aroung shooting threes instead of those easy layups that you are so quick to point out that we got, sometimes, when we were playing prarie view a&m tech, so that we could go to the tourney 5 straight times.

  12. xphoenix87 06/06/2007 at 8:28 PM #

    You said that our version of the PO didn’t require ball-movement and spacing, and I said that was BS. That’s it. My point through all of this is simply that you can’t blame the previous system for Gavin’s blatant lack of basic court sense. That’s all I ever said about our version of the PO.

    “I said before Grant has his faults. They are just not as bad as you like to make them out.”

    exactly, that’s the whole reason this debate started. I made a point about Gavin and a bunch of people disagreed. The point is that nobody has actually given me any reason to change my view. My original point that he basically does 2 things, slashing and rebounding, still stands. He’s not a good passer, he’s not a good defender, he’s not a good perimeter shooter. Please tell me where I’m wrong here. Put together a solid case for how I’m overstating his faults. Nobody has actually put forward a valid point as to why I’m wrong. In summary, here’s the points against Gavin.

    – He’s not a good perimeter shooter (31% from the 3-pt line and 2nd lowest EFG% of anyone on the team)
    – He’s not a good passer (more turnovers than assists, huge TO rate)
    – He’s not a good defender. You can’t really bring up any statistics for this, so I’ll have to rely on your ability to get this from observing him. The one thing you could say is that his defensive statistics (STL+BLK is only 1.1) are very low for a player who plays as many minutes as he does.
    – He’s a good rebounder, though not amazing (Horner’s rebounds per minute are basically the same)
    – He’s not a particularly efficient scorer (2nd lowest offensive rating on the team)
    – You can’t blame his poor decision making on playing the point guard spot (A/T ratio is worse after Atsur came back)
    – He didn’t markedly improve last year while other players (most glaringly Fells) did.
    – The best thing you can say about him is that he plays a lot of minutes, but that won’t be required next year when we have a much deeper team. You can make a case that playing such a large amount of minutes hurt his play last year, and there’s probably some truth to that. However, he only played 2 more minutes per game than our two bigs, and they were much more handicapped because there were absolutely no other options at post. Also, if you look at the games where he didn’t log big minutes, his statistics weren’t any better (9-22 from the field, 9-16 from the line, 1-7 from 3pt, 8 REBs, 10 ASTs, 14 TOs, 1 BLK, 1 STL in the 3 games he played less than 30 minutes).
    – In a per-minute evaluation, Horner’s stats are not only better than Gavin’s, they’re a lot better. Does this mean he needs to be given all of Gavin’s minutes? No, but in my opinion he’s a better option as a starter, and Gavin fits better as an energy guy off the bench.

    (statistics from ESPN.com and KenPom.com)

    There you go, prove me wrong.

  13. CedarGroveWolf 06/07/2007 at 8:47 AM #

    yeah, but phoenix, Herb sucked.

  14. lush 06/07/2007 at 8:51 AM #

    ^agreed

  15. lush 06/07/2007 at 9:03 AM #

    “In a per-minute evaluation, Horner’s stats are not only better than Gavin’s, they’re a lot better. Does this mean he needs to be given all of Gavin’s minutes? No, but in my opinion he’s a better option as a starter, and Gavin fits better as an energy guy off the bench.”

    Yeah but isnt a comparison like that moot if the minutes are not the same? Thats like saying A-rod went 2-4 in 1 game while derek jeter went 10-30 in 5 games, so A-rod is better because he batted .500 and jeter went .333. The more time you spend on the court/field the more chances you have to screw something up, so if horner only plays 10 minutes and grant plays 40, of course his effeciency is going to be lower.

    Besides all that Grant is a senior who has much more experience. He deserves to start……if hes not deported.

  16. xphoenix87 06/07/2007 at 10:14 AM #

    Granted, it’s not a perfect measure of someone’s ability, but it is a tool we can use to analyze a player. Statistics are all flawed in some way, but you can usually get a pretty good picture if you look at a bunch of them. I did acknowledge that it’s very possibe fatigue could’ve played a factor in Grant’s loss of efficiency. Horner player 650 minutes last year, and 18 a game. Not a ton, but plenty to get a statistically significant sample from. It’s not like he played in a few games and a few games and pulled out some remarkable rating. For comparison’s sake, Rayshawn Terry only played 3 more minutes per game than Horner did and Dennis played almost exactly the same minutes Gerald Henderson played (and topped both of them in offensive rating, btw). Statistically speaking, that difference in minutes played becomes less significant the more games you pile up. In your example, what if A-Rod had played 40 games to Jeter’s 80? It’s still a difference, but you’ve got a pretty strong sampling from both players. That’s more the situation we’re talking about here. Granted, as I said it’s not a perfect statistic. You just have to look over at ESPN and Hollinger’s NBA Player Efficiancy Ratings, where Bruce Bowen is always near the bottom of the list and a guy like Chuck Hayes can be in the top 30, to know that statistics are flawed, but they can help get a hazy picture of the player.

    “Besides all that Grant is a senior who has much more experience. He deserves to start”

    Bull. All things being equal, yeah, you start the senior over the sophomore. However, all things are not equal and a basketball coach has to play the players he thinks give his team the best chance to win, seniority should have nothing to do with that. How much does Grant’s experience matter if he continues to make dumb turnovers and not have good fundamentals? Where that experience does matter is in keeping a level head in ceratin situations, like when an opposing team is making a run or when you need a basket at the end of a half/game. Gavin doesn’t have to be starting to be effective in these situations, and in fact would work very well as a guy who can come in off the bench and give his team a lift at those points in the game.

  17. CedarGroveWolf 06/07/2007 at 10:35 AM #

    Grant, our only Sr & most experienced player will start & play a lot of minutes. Who else will play the 3? Horner can’t guard the other team’s 3. Horner can shoot better & will have fewer turnovers, but Grant is a better scorer, driver, defender, rebounder, post player, & can help to break a press better. Besides, Grant probably kills Horner in practice everyday.

  18. lush 06/07/2007 at 10:52 AM #

    ^^ How can you say that your statistical analysis of Grant and Horner has Horner deserving to start, and at the same time say “it’s not a perfect measure of someone’s ability”? You dont know if Horner will do any better in the game situations you mentioned because he doesnt even have half the experience grant does.

    I get it, you like Horner more than Grant, and you think Horner should start, but it is pure speculation to say that he MIGHT give us a better chance to win IF he gets the more playing time.

  19. lush 06/07/2007 at 11:02 AM #

    Did your figures come from the entire regular season? Do you think they would be different if it was just the ACC and postseason play?

    And this is still college athletics. They are student-athletes. It is pretty cold to tell your lone senior leader on the team “your effeciency rating is lower than a sophmore who doesnt play as much, and we think that he might be able to help us win more games, so thanks for your commitment to the program, but he’s gonna start because the stats show he is probably better than you”

    If you were a betting man, who would your money be on to start?

  20. Rick 06/07/2007 at 11:03 AM #

    So our coaching staff, who sees the players play every day played Grant more than Horner. Too bad they did not have the statistical evidence that xpheonix has. What were they thinking?

  21. xphoenix87 06/07/2007 at 11:33 AM #

    Look, I can’t know for certain who is the better option. I’m not watching them in practice every day, I’m not there coach. All I can say is that from what I as an observer can see, Horner is the better option to start. I can’t base an argument only on what I’ve seen, since I have no video evidence, and since you may not see things the way I do, I have to use statistics to back up my point. Now, are these statistics perfect? No, they’re not, but they give us a pretty general idea of a player’s ability. If you look over a lot of these statistical categories, the guys at the top are the ones you would expect to see there, the All-Americans and such. That’s generally a pretty good indication that the stats are doing their job. Of course I can’t say with certainty that Horner would be a better starter than Grant, if I could then there would be nothing to debate here.

    “You dont know if Horner will do any better in the game situations you mentioned because he doesnt even have half the experience grant does.”

    Did you even read what I wrote? I said that those game situations where experience is paramount are times when Gavin could come in off the bench and give his team a lift because he has that experience.

    “I get it, you like Horner more than Grant, and you think Horner should start, but it is pure speculation to say that he MIGHT give us a better chance to win IF he gets the more playing time.”

    Exactly, but it’s speculation based on my observations of the two players and their statistics. Pure speculation would be more along the lines of “We would’ve won the ACC tournament if only Big Lew could’ve played.” In the end we can only trust in Sid to know his players and play the right ones.

    “Horner can’t guard the other team’s 3.”

    From what did you draw this conclusion? Horner showed last year that he’s a very solid defender. He’s scrappy and he gets his hands on a lot of passes. Also, whatever stock you want to put in defensive statistics says Horner is better as well (almost identical STL and BLK numbers in half the playing time). Gavin has never been a good defender, and plays most every possession standing straight up as opposed to being in a defensive stance. He gets killed by anyone who is remotely quick, and he doesn’t get around screens well either.

    “Grant is a better scorer”

    Debatable. He takes more shots and shoots a much lower percentage. Statistics say that Horner is a much more efficient offensive player. Also, if you look forward to next year and note that we’re going to have an exceptional front line, a guy who can hit consistently from the perimeter to make teams pay for double teams is really important.

    “driver”

    No argument here.

    “defender”

    Addressed above. Gavin is a terrible defender.

    “rebounder”

    Agreed, but it’s not as big a difference as you might think. If you measure per-40 minutes, Gavin’s only got him by like half a rebound. I expected this to be a big weakness when I looked at Horner, but he got to more rebounds than I remembered. I agree that this is one of Gavin’s strengths, it’s just not as much a weakness in Horner as you might think.

    “post player”

    probably true, though he doesn’t do this nearly enough. He’s very good for this when playing point or two guard, but I didn’t see him posting up much against other 3s who didn’t give up as much height. This really isn’t a part of Horner’s game at all though, so I’ll give that to Gavin.

    “can help to break a press better”

    Gavin’s 151 TOs say otherwise.

  22. CedarGroveWolf 06/07/2007 at 11:33 AM #

    ^ I guess that didn’t hold true when the previous staff made PT decisions. Heard too many: “Why didn’t _______ play more? What an idiot to sit ____.

  23. xphoenix87 06/07/2007 at 12:06 PM #

    “So our coaching staff, who sees the players play every day played Grant more than Horner. Too bad they did not have the statistical evidence that xpheonix has. What were they thinking?”

    Like I said in the post above, I don’t see the players everyday, and ultimately we have to have faith in the coaching staff to play the right guy. Last year they did a great job with managing Horner’s minutes as a freshman. He got a lot of spot duty, did some good things, and then really came on at the end of the year. What I’m saying is that from what I’ve seen, I’d love to see Horner start next year instead of Gavin. This is based on what I saw from them last year, and it’s also based on the fact that I saw considerable improvement in Horner over the course of the year, and that I’ve seen very little improvement in Gavin over the last 3 years. Who knows, maybe Gavin makes a huge jump this offseason and tears everybody up next year. The coaches are going to do what they’re going to do, I’m just here as a fan speculating during the offseason.

    BTW, you’re the one who brought up statistics in the first place. Don’t get mad because my statistics are better than yours 😛

    “Did your figures come from the entire regular season? Do you think they would be different if it was just the ACC and postseason play?”

    My figures are whole season. I don’t know how they would change, though my guess would be that Horner would come out looking better since he seemed to improve as the year went on. That’s just speculation on my part though.

    “And this is still college athletics. They are student-athletes. It is pretty cold to tell your lone senior leader on the team “your effeciency rating is lower than a sophmore who doesnt play as much, and we think that he might be able to help us win more games, so thanks for your commitment to the program, but he’s gonna start because the stats show he is probably better than you””

    Look, if Gavin really cares about winning games, he’ll do whatever his coaches ask, whether that be starting or coming off the bench. Maybe he would use coming off the bench as motivation to improve, who knows?

  24. CedarGroveWolf 06/07/2007 at 12:11 PM #

    “He gets killed by anyone who is remotely quick”

    Grant is much quicker than Horner & an all-around better athlete to recover better.

    “Statistics say that Horner is a much more efficient offensive player.”

    Horner shot a lot of his shots being wide open. Grant is more of a slasher/driver which a team needs & Horner can’t provide. Grant can also run & finish on the break much better.

    “Gavin’s 151 TOs say otherwise.”

    put Horner @ PG & see how many TOs he has.

  25. xphoenix87 06/07/2007 at 12:34 PM #

    “Grant is much quicker than Horner & an all-around better athlete to recover better.”

    It doesn’t matter if Gavin is quicker if he doesn’t play proper defense. Obviously Grant is the superior athlete, but it doesn’t matter how fast you are if you play defense standing straight up, you’re gonna get beat every time.

    “Horner shot a lot of his shots being wide open. Grant is more of a slasher/driver which a team needs & Horner can’t provide. Grant can also run & finish on the break much better.”

    By that same token, Gavin missed a lot of wide-open jumpshots and is a much better perimeter shooter, which a team also needs. They’re completely different types of offensive player.

    “put Horner @ PG & see how many TOs he has.”

    Gavin had a worse A/T ratio when he stopped playing point guard, and he’s never been a good passer. Stop using that excuse, it doesn’t hold water.

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