Recruiting Report: Gary Trent Jr (2017)
A lot of the talk from the Team USA try-outs this past week has been about how Apple Valley’s Gary Trent Jr and national standout big Wendell Carter have talked about playing together in college. The pair of five star…
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Continue ReadingA lot of the talk from the Team USA try-outs this past week has been about how Apple Valley’s Gary Trent Jr and national standout big Wendell Carter have talked about playing together in college. The pair of five star players ranked in the top ten were open about playing together last week in Colorado Springs.
“We’ve been talking about a package deal for about a year and a half now,” Trent said in Colorado. “It all started when we were here, actually (at the USA training facility). Then we got close, our parents got close. Our fathers talk at least once or twice a week, either joking or sending funny photos. So they’re almost like family friends now in a sense.”
Everybody believes that Trent and Carter will land at Duke based on these conversations as Carter has said in the past he favors Duke (or at least that has been the way it’s perceived).
Gary on the other hand, is talking about five programs at the moment: Duke, Kentucky, Michigan State, Ohio State and UCLA. Ohio State is near where Gary grew up, Duke is the favorite, Michigan State and Kentucky are talking about visits, and then there is UCLA where Gary has visited twice.
In addition to going to UCLA twice Trent has went West several times in the past 18 months for visits, camps, events, and try-outs. He’s been to the west coast more as a 17 year old than many other well-traveled Minnesotans have been out there is whole life.
“It was great,” Trent said of seeing UCLA and the west coast. “I liked everything about it. It was a nice beautiful campus, it’s in a beautiful area, nice weather, can’t really get better than that.”
Trent plans on visiting Michigan State.
“Michigan State, I have not been able to see yet. Hopefully in the future as I cut my list down and they make it on the list, I can take a chance to visit out there. They have arguably one of the greatest coaches in history in Tom Izzo and they have a lot to offer. They get players to the next level.”
Ohio State lost an assistant that Gary was close to so they don’t seem to be in the same position as some of the others. .
“(Coach Boals) affected it in a big way, he was the lead recruiter,” Trent said. “I was talking to Ohio State almost once or twice a week. Now I talk to them once every two or three weeks. So it’s getting less and less. It’s changed a lot, dramatically actually. He left so that’s the biggest thing with them. But they’re still good, it’s my hometown. I know a lot about them, I know a lot about campus.”
Of course the national favorite for Trent is Duke even though I get a sense that UCLA will be in the running to the end, and there is Kentucky who seems to be considered as a favorite for anybody who is ranked where Trent is.
“The visit to Duke was great,” said Trent “They have arguably one of the greatest coaches ever. They send players to the next level, they do everything at the high level and an A1 standard. Kentucky as well. They have everything. They’re A1. Everything’s prestigious. Everything’s clean. Everything is at the top of the line at both of those schools.”
Gary still has not announced what prep school he will be at but that is something that is expected to be announced soon.