Recruiting Report: David Thornton (2016)

<p><em>(Photo credit: Aurora Sentinel)</em></p><p>In basketball, much as in life, the closing of one door often provides the opening to the others.</p> <p><strong>David Thornton</strong>, a 6-foot-5 senior forward at Cherokee Trail, found himself hit with a bittersweet feeling when the calendar closed on his final summer with the Colorado Hawks.</p> <p>"It’s sad that I have to leave my brothers,” Thornton said. “I’ve been knowing those guys for so long, especially De’Ron (Davis). We’ve known each other since we were so little and playing football together. We’re all still family. Experience-wise, it was always great ever since I first came to the Hawks and we’d go out of town and play (on the Adidas circuit). I loved the atmosphere, loved playing big games against top players and top teams and having the environment of having top college coaches watching you. We had Coach K come to our games. It was always so surreal.”</p> <p>Luckily, Thornton has plenty of great atmospheres to look forward to in his final season at Cherokee Trail, where he and the Cougars are eager to make a strong playoff push after suffering narrow upsets in the first round of the Class 5A playoffs each of the past two seasons.</p> <p>Thornton is the leading returning scorer (13.6 points per game) and rebounder (5.6) for a Cherokee Trail team that has a great deal of talented and experienced players returning this season, including senior guards Ronnie Barfield and Isiah Gilbert and juniors K.J. Sapp and Jaizec Lottie, one of the best pure point guards in the state.</p> <p>An athletic, slashing forward, Thornton said he dedicated himself this offseason to becoming a better ball-handler.</p> <p>“I really haven’t had that so much, but since I’m not 7 feet tall, not a center, I know that I need handles in my game,” Thornton said. “I’ve been working on that, and that’s been really good. And I always work on my jump shot, and that’s getting better. Really, I’m just always working on the little things.”</p> <p>Thornton said he gets great competition every week playing against two older brothers who put his newfound skills to the test. They’ve helped him stay in shape and stay sharp. He has also been working hard on a jump shot he knows he’ll have to rely on at the next level.</p> <p>As for where he sees himself landing at that next level, Thornton said he is keeping an open mind. He’s been recruited hard, he said, by a Hawaii Pacific, a Division II school out of Honolulu.</p> <p>“They called me a few weeks ago,” Thornton said, “and they keep calling me and asking questions and stuff. Their the hardest recruiting school I’ve had. ... I still have the opportunity to attract more schools. That’s my main objective, to attract more schools, and once the season is over I’ll look at the schools I’ve got and pick one.”</p> <p>As for what schools will like watching Thornton: He has a great motor and is relentless in transition. On a small, guard-oriented team, Thornton has played the post, but he runs the floor like an athletic wing and uses that to finish around the basket consistently.</p> <p>“I can be versatile to go anywhere I want,” he said. “I have the freedom to go where I need to. I’m the big, but I can choose the shots I need. I just do what the team needs. ... I’ve grown up running the floor. My dad always told me, ‘Run the floor and you’ll get easy buckets.’ So I’ve always concentrated on running hard all the time and being the first person down the floor, right by the hoop.”</p> <p> </p>