NCAA Basketball Recruiting: Syracuse and UConn pursuing 2020 F Noah Collier

 NCAA Basketball 3-star recruit Noah Collier is drawing interest serious interest from several Northeast and mid-Atlantic programs.

2020 prospect Noah Collier continues to garner attention from high-major programs despite remaining kind of under the radar. Although he was a late addition to NBPA Top 100 camp this week, the 6’8 forward has made quite an impression, per Ari Rosenfeld of ZAGSBLOG.

“It was spur of the moment. It was a 50/50 decision,” Collier told Rosenfeld. “I didn’t know if I wanted to come or not, and then I thought about it and felt that the late invite was something that I wanted to come down here and prove people wrong about and show them that I should have been here from the beginning, and I feel like I’ve been doing that throughout the entirety of the camp.”

The New Jersey native is all over the map in terms of rankings by the recruiting services. ESPN has Collier as a four-star recruit and the 62nd prospect in the class. However, 247Sports has him as a three-star prospect ranked 230th in the nation while 247Sports Composite has him at No. 165.  He also has been given three stars by Rivals, who also doesn’t have him among their top 100 players.

Still, Collier has been really active on the recruiting circuit. He currently holds offers from Maryland, Syracuse, Xavier, George Washington, Penn State, Temple and UConn among others. He told Rosenfeld that UConn, Syracuse, Maryland, and Xavier has been pursuing him the hardest.

The Westtown School (PA) product has taken an official visit to UConn and an unofficial to Syracuse already.

Right now, it appears that UConn and Syracuse have a leg up on the rest of the country, but it is still early in the process. Collier has said that he doesn’t know where he will take his other official visits, but he does expect to receive more interest. He also said he hopes to have a decision made before the start of the upcoming high school campaign.

West Virginia sign s2019 recruit and receives commitment from 2020 four-star prospect.

The West Virginia Mountaineers nabbed their first commitment from the Class of 2020 with Isaiah Cottrell verbally agreeing to join the team on June 13. He chose WVU over Kansas, LSU, Texas Tech, Rutgers, Washington, Wake Forest, and UNLV. All eight schools made his finalist list.

“They have showed that they really want me and not just that they need me,” Cottrell told Keenen Cummings of Rivals. “Their efforts coming out to Las Vegas and across the country at times to see practice and come and check on me stand out.”

In addition to WVU, Cottrell took two other official recruiting trips to Kansas and Rutgers. He also made a handful of unofficial visits to various campuses.

Cottrell is a consensus four-star recruit and a top-65 player in the class. He is ranked 64th in the country by Rivals, 60th by 247Sports and 61st by 247Sports Composite. ESPN has him ranked 63rd in the nation.

The 6’9 athletic big man can run the floor and possesses a nice shooting touch. He also is a strong rim-protector, has the ability to score around the rim as well as knock down perimeter shots.

Cottrell averaged 15.2 points, 9.3 rebounds, and 4.3 blocks for Bishop Gorman High School (Las Vegas, NV) last season, earning first-team all-state honors.

WVU currently only has 11 scholarships committed to players for the 2019-20 campaign following the inking junior college transfer Ethan Richardson last weekend. Two of the players on scholarships are seniors Jermaine Haley and Chase Hurler. Meaning that the Mountaineers could have three more open spots in 2020-21 if they don’t fill the remaining two spots for the upcoming campaign.

Richardson is a big athletic center from Fresno, California. The 6’10 240-pound junior averaged 16.3 points, 7.3 caroms and shot 63.8% from the field last season while helping Fresno City College reach the California Community College Athletic Association semifinals. He started his college career at the City College of San Francisco.

Richardson is the third junior college player that coach Bob Huggins has signed in 2019-20 with Tajzmel Sherman (Collin College) and Sean McNeil (Sinclair CC) being the others.

If everything remains the same, the Mountaineers will be pretty set in the frontcourt next year. Along with  Richardson and Cottrell, the Mountaineers should also have sophomore Derek Culver and four-star 2019 signee Oscar Tschiebwe. That being said, point guard and small forward are two areas that will need to be addressed next season.

Other recruiting tidbits

• Four-star 2020 commit LJ Cryer committed to the Baylor Bears on June 11. Cryer chose Baylor over Houston, LSU, Oklahoma State, Purdue, and Texas A&M. He is the Bears first commit in the 2020 class. Baylor is reportedly still pursuing five-star Greg Brown and four-stars Dawson Garcia, Xavier Foster, and Jayden Stone.
• Former Virginia guard Marco Anthony transferred to Utah State on June 14. The 6’5 guard saw sparse time in his two seasons with the Cavaliers. Anthony will likely have to sit out this year and will have two years of eligibility left.
• Wilkerson “Kenny” Isnord (Bahamas) committed to FIU on June 14.

• Top 70 consensus 2020 prospect Reese Beekman verbally committed to Virginia on June 13. Beekman picked the Cavaliers over Marquette, Alabama, and Houston, among others. Beekman joins four-star guard Carson McCorkle in UVA’s 2020 class.
• UNLV received a verbal commitment from 2020 three-plus star shooting guard Nick Blake (Las Vegas, NV) on June 14.