Recruiting Update: Jaime Jaquez (2019)
CLAREMONT, Ca. – The rebounds, slashing drives, banging dunks and deep and mid-range jump shots that he put on display Saturday at the West Coast Elite 100 Camp at Pomona-Pitzer College are now the status quo for Jaime Jaquez.
The 6-foot-5 swingman from Camarillo High has spent the better part of the past 10 months or so using local, regional and national hoops stages to show audiences why he’s one of the better college prospects in the Class of 2019 – no matter which boundaries are used to define it.
After earning all-CIF Southern Section as a freshman during the 2015-16 season with the Scorpions, Jaquez joined the Nike- and Paul Pierce-fronted “The Truth” club program – run by Jason Crowe – and used his play with squad to bag himself an invitation to the USA Basketball “Mini Camp” (for the Classes of 2019 and ’20) in Colorado Springs last October.
It was there that a lot of non-Southern California-based hoops scouts and media members saw first-half that Jaquez was more just a “name” on a roster of 55 or so of players from coast to coast by way of the things he was doing Saturday at Pomona-Pitzer.
Anyone who follows the prep and grassroots hoops scenes – as well as the recruiters who scour the country for the players they want to sign to letters of intent eventually – knows all about Jaquez now.
Coaches from St. John’s and USC recently joined the staffs at Pepperdine, Long Beach State, Montana and Memphis in offering him scholarships, he said.
Look for that number to increase as much as three-fold by the time he’s eligible to sign a National Letter of Intent in November of 2018.
“It’s been a long and hard journey but it’s all been worth it,” he said Saturday evening after his “Northwestern” squad had knocked off its “Purdue” counterpart at the Ryan Silver-fronted camp.
“I’ve had a chance to play with and against a lot of great players and develop a lot of relationships (since the trip to Colorado Springs last fall) that could last a lifetime.”
He returned to Colorado Springs in June for the USA trials for the FIBA U16 championships but didn’t make the cut for the 12-player team that eventually won the gold medal last month in Argentina.
If there was harsh bitterness about not earning the spot and trip to South America, it wasn’t revealed in his face or by his words Saturday night.
“It would have been great (to make the cut) but they (USA coaches) explained to me why they made their decision and what I needed to work on to make myself a better player and, hopefully, get back there (with the national program) again,” he said, matter-of-factly.