Wolfpack adds another Top 75 power forward

Basketball Recruiting45

Pack Pride is reporting that NC State has landed a verbal commitment from 6-foot-8 power forward, Luke Cothron. (Link)

Cothron selected the Wolfpack over Tennessee, Alabama, and UCONN among others. He is rated a four-star prospect and the No. 13 power forward in the country by Scout.com. Cothron is generally regarded as a top 60 prospect in the 2010 class.

In 2010 Cothron will join a roster that includes Tracey Smith, DeShawn Painter and Richard Howell.

Wolfpack Hoops has more, but be warned that those guys go a little overboard with the importance of the commitment, and recruiting in general. But, they do address one of the major questions that Cothron’s commitment raised for me:

We are hearing that even with the addition of big Luke, they are still actively recruiting local star CJ Leslie, who has shown an extreme increase in versatility this summer. Leslie is starting to show the ability to dominate from the wing and college coaches are starting to see the option of recruiting him as a small forward instead of a power forward. His recruitment will more than likely continue until the very end, but the talk that the Pack is still working on him is good news for State fans.

The N&O blogged on this on Friday.

N.C. State coach Sidney Lowe and assistant Monte Towe lured Luke Cothron with their plan to restore Wolfpack basketball to prominence.

Cothron, a highly recruited senior forward from Red Springs (N.C.) Flora MacDonald Academy, liked what he heard and committed to N.C. State on Friday morning.

He is 6-foot-8 and 215 pounds and also considered Alabama, Connecticut, Florida State and Tennessee.

“Those guys were all in there, but in the end, the common component they didn’t have was Coach Lowe,” Flora MacDonald coach Derrick Bond said. “Just his pitch, his history with North Carolina State, Coach Towe’s history and how they talked about the past and the Pack pride and the history and championships they were accustomed to, and just getting it back to that, they did a great job of selling Luke.”

Cothron, who’s originally from Huntsville, Ala., averaged 27 points, 18 rebounds and four blocked shots per game as a junior. He is rated the 57th-best prospect overall in the Class of 2010 by scout.com.

Projected 2009-2010 NC State Basketball Roster

Senior Class
(1) Dennis Horner (F)
(2) Farnold Degand (PG)

Junior Class
(3) Javi Gonzalez (PG)
(4) Tracy Smith (4F)

Sophomore Class
(5) Johnny Thomas (Wing)
(6) Julius Mays (PG/SG)
(7) CJ Williams (Wing)

Freshman Class
(8) Scott Wood (Wing)
(9) Richard Howell (PF)
(10) Josh Davis (WF)
(11) Jordan Vandenberg (C)
(12) DeShawn Painter (PF/C)

2010 Commits
(13) Lorenzo Brown (PG/SG)
(1) Departure of Dennis Horner – Ryan Harrow (PG)
(2) Departure of Farnold Degand – Luke Cothron (PF)

2011 Commits
(3) Departure of Javi Gonzalez
(4) Departure of Tracy Smith

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Basketball Recruiting

45 Responses to Wolfpack adds another Top 75 power forward

  1. Daily Update 10/09/2009 at 8:57 AM #

    This is great the staff was able to close him this Fall when Cothron had mentioned waiting until the Spring. Painter last Spring, now Cothron…Leslie playing small forward isn’t any new revelation. IMO, he always projected there long-term.

    Assuming everyone shows up on campus, we are going to have NCAA tournament caliber talent in 2010/2011. That is a big step. Unfortunately it will have taken 5 years to put the roster together.

  2. choppack1 10/09/2009 at 8:59 AM #

    Wet blanket alert: I’m going to delay whooping it up until this guy actually shows up on campus. When the talk from a respected poster brings this up, it dampens my enthusiams from what is otherwise an encouraging committment…especially after what we saw happen w/ Brown.

  3. Daily Update 10/09/2009 at 9:08 AM #

    What do you mean Choppack1? I am not sure if he has taken the SAT, but his GPA is supposedly solid though.

  4. nycfan 10/09/2009 at 9:18 AM #

    Nice addition, though Cothron is a bit of a luxury given the class this year in the post.

  5. DRW 10/09/2009 at 9:25 AM #

    It’s cool that we added another quality big man, but don’t we really need quality guards, especially a point guard, much much more?!?!?

  6. 61Packer 10/09/2009 at 9:26 AM #

    Just wait until next year!

  7. Sw0rdf1sh 10/09/2009 at 9:30 AM #

    DRW, I believe in Harrow you will have your quality guard…even as a freshman he will bring talent…PLUS, Brown could play that spot even though we would want him at 2 as much as possible.

    Javi has gained some ground every year and I’m interested to see how things go this year with him.

    Can anyone confirm that JT will be able to academically graduate at the end of this year? I could have sworn I read that somewhere in the past but will have to search for it.

  8. zahadum 10/09/2009 at 9:41 AM #

    I’ve seen Leslie play before a few times, but never Cothron. What’s his game like? True PF or combo type? Athlete type, skilled type, or both? And can he hit a freaking FT?

    Good news though, for sure.

  9. DoubleE 10/09/2009 at 9:42 AM #

    http://wolfpackhoops.blogspot.com/2009/07/off-season-update-johnny-thomas.html

    WPH: Johnny, could you tell us a little bit about yourself off the court?

    JT: “I like drawing and architectural design a lot. I pretty much like to relaxing when I get the chance. I like drawing buildings and stuff like that. I’m going to graduate next summer, a year early, so I’ll have 2 years to do other stuff and I probably will get into architecture.”

  10. Thinkpack17 10/09/2009 at 9:50 AM #

    Great, Great news.

    Swordfish I speculate that if they are still going after CJ they may expect this to be JT’s last year. For one reason or another. That’s just a guess though.

    I don’t why someone would suggest we need another PG…we’ll have a traffic jam at that slot next year. I thought we needed an athletic, versatile 3 man. But I’ll take a quality big man any day, Phil Jackson says big men are the key to any championship.

  11. packalum44 10/09/2009 at 9:56 AM #

    We need another ball handler as opposed to a one and done CJ Leslie. Any guards on our radar?

    ^ We had 3 PGs on the roster last year…how’d that work out?

  12. Thinkpack17 10/09/2009 at 10:03 AM #

    ^We’re getting two top ten point guards next year. And basic understanding of college sports would suggest:

    Jr. Julius Mays>Freshman Julius Mays

    Sr. Javi Gonzalez> Soph. Javi Gonzalez.

  13. Thinkpack17 10/09/2009 at 10:05 AM #

    CJ would surely take care of my versatile SF request.

  14. McPete 10/09/2009 at 10:11 AM #

    This is a top 10 class with these three players alone. If SL somehow managed to land CJ Leslie (again), i’d be amazed. That’s alot of faith in a program that’s had three straight bad seasons with a fourth on the way. You have to credit the staff for still being able to lure talent.

    I haven’t followed recruiting that long, but is it safe to say that the potential 4 man class would be one of State’s best classes ever?

  15. wolfonthehill 10/09/2009 at 10:17 AM #

    (4) Departure of Tracy Smith

    Just seeing that written makes me cringe…

  16. DRW 10/09/2009 at 10:28 AM #

    swordfish: That’s if Harrow qualfies and actually ends up playing here. Based on State’s track record recently, you’ll pardon my pessimissim.

  17. choppack1 10/09/2009 at 10:31 AM #

    McPete – let’s wait until they arrive in Raleigh. Last year’s class was supposed to be one for the books but the top recruit didn’t qualify.

  18. bradleyb123 10/09/2009 at 10:46 AM #

    I see pessimism here, in the face of this very good news. And there are posts here about Luke maybe not qualifying, etc. Is there any reason to think any of these kids may not qualify? I mean, has anyone heard that someone is failing a required course, or is unlikely to score high enough on his SAT? Or are we, as State fans, just conditioned to expect the worst?

    I’m not a Sid lover, but I’m one of the fans that thinks we have good reason to keep Sid this year and next year (at a minimum) just because of the recruits he’s getting. Some want Sidney gone as soon as possible, and would be willing to risk losing recruits in order to bring in a new head coach. I’m sure there are some that are gritting their teeth because these recruits make Sidney look better, and quite possibly removes some heat from his proverbial seat.

    But until and unless there is a reason to be pessimistic about recruits qualifying, why be pessimistic about it?

  19. packalum44 10/09/2009 at 10:53 AM #

    Thinkpack: Sorry, I guess I forgot how talented those two PGs are and Lowe’s track record of player development. Maybe by next year they’ll be able to dribble the ball past half court without bouncing it off their foot.

    Meanwhile, if CJ committed we’d have 5 talented (4 and 5 star) big men plus a 7+ footer coming off the bench.

    Contrast that to 2 talented guards (4 and 5 star). Lo Brown is a true SG btw. Give me another athlete who can press and create off the dribble.

  20. ryebread 10/09/2009 at 11:01 AM #

    Some you like to take anything positive and try to turn it into something negative. I personally think this is fantastic news for NC State. I think that Cothron is the type of banger that we haven’t had on the inside in a long time. Pair him with the committed guards that we have coming in next year and that’s a solid nucleus.

    Now, I’ll be the first to admit that this is the first step in this process. We need the kids signing their LOIs (sooner as opposed to later). We also need the kids to make the grades. You can lead a horse to water, so it’s really up to the kids to do their part.

    For now though, there’s no way that this can be viewed as anything but good. Great job to SL and the staff on this commitment! 🙂

  21. Rick 10/09/2009 at 11:04 AM #

    “I don’t why someone would suggest we need another PG…we’ll have a traffic jam at that slot next year”

    Quantity is not a substitute for quality.

    One thing I have learned with NCSU is to always be skeptic.

  22. Rick 10/09/2009 at 11:06 AM #

    “I think that Cothron is the type of banger that we haven’t had on the inside in a long time.”

    Is he different than Howell? I thought Howell was the banger we have not had in a while.

  23. Thinkpack17 10/09/2009 at 11:10 AM #

    LOL…

    Packalum44,

    I don’t know how much basketball you watch…but good teams are almost always top heavy with big men. Big men get winded quicker and they get into foul trouble. Have you counted the big men on UNC’s roster this year? So your answer to our PG woes is to forego CJ and recruit another PG who is in all likelihood is going to be a weaker player than both Lo Brown and Ryan Harrow? Spot on! BTW Lo is a combo guard who is VERY comfortable playing the 1.

    Javi may not be be a Ty Lawson but to imply he made no improvement between his freshman year and sophomore year is laughable. And Julius absolutely improved down the stretch. Save the hyperbole…it doesn’t help your ridiculous point.

  24. Bubba 10/09/2009 at 11:10 AM #

    Cothron is ranked #33 at Rivals overall

    #8 PF

    Slowly but surely putting the pieces together

  25. Sw0rdf1sh 10/09/2009 at 11:11 AM #

    Word on the (informed) streets is that both Harrow and Cothron are not to be worried about regarding academics and qualifying.

    Pessimism is not a problem and understandable though….just remember that Lo Brown was projecting to qualify but had an attendance issue that should have never occurred and out of NCSU programs capabilities to monitor.

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