NCAA Basketball Recruiting: Kerry Blackshear to visit Kentucky and Tennessee

St. John’s first-year coach Mike Anderson still trying to fill out Red Storm’s roster for the upcoming NCAA Basketball season.

The St.John’s Red Storm hosted grad transfer Nick Rutherford and junior college prospect Devale Johnson on Sunday, per Adam ZAGORIA of ZagsBlog. 

Rutherford struggled last year in his lone season at Monmouth. The 6’3” point guard averaged 5.3 points, 4.6 rebounds and 2.3 assists along with 2.0 turnovers in 35 contests, including 15 starts. Rutherford shot a career-best 37.8% from the field, on a career-low 4.1 shots a game, although he made just 23.7% of his 3-pointers (9-38). The Indianapolis (Ind.) native spent his first two seasons at FAU.

Rutherford is expected to provide leadership for the Red Storm, who saw Shamorie Ponds depart early for the NBA draft. Rutherford is an excellent distributor and showed tremendous improvement as an on-ball defender last year — leading the MAAC in steal percentage, defensive win shares, and defensive rating. While he is not much of a shooter and is no threat from beyond the arc, he can get into the paint and possesses an array of finishes. Turnovers also remain a problem.

Johnson also expects to play this upcoming season. Whether it will be with the Johnnies, we shall see. He is reportedly also talking to Albany and Farleigh Dickinson and has plans of visiting  Wagner, Nichols State and St. Joseph’s.

The 6’7″ forward, who received honorable mention in the 2019 JUCO Recruiting’s  top-100 transfers, had a fantastic season at Williston State. He averaged 13.4 points, 8.9 rebounds, and 1.8 blocks while shooting 53.7% from the field and 43.3% from the 3-pt line..

Johnson is very springy and has a great frame overall. He is a good shooter with excellent range and a very good rebounder. The Brooklyn (NY) native also has the ability to defend multiple positions and plays with a high motor.

St. John’s has two scholarships remaining for 2019. Point guard is a huge need for Anderson as three-star recruit Johnathan McGriff (Bowie, MD) is the only true lead guard on the Red Storm roster besides walk-ons Justin Cole and Brandon Lawrence.  McGriff is joined by 6’7″ forward Julian Champagnie (Brooklyn) as well as JuCo transfer Damian Seers as current members of Anderson’s recruiting class.

The Red Storm also have interest in three-plus star center Carl Lewis (Henderson, NV) and several other junior college prospects. Lewis also holds offers from Georgetown, USC, Long Beach State, and Oregon State. USC is considered the favorites for his services.

Kerry Blackshear Jr. to take to more visits.

Former Virginia Tech Hokie Kerry Blackshear is slated to take an official visit to Tennessee on June 14, per 247Sports’ Evan Daniels. Daniels also said that the 6’10” power forward is expected to be in Lexington for an official visit with the Kentucky Wildcats sometime this week. He visited Florida and Arkansas this past week. Virginia Tech is also in the running, although a return to Blacksburg seems unlikely.

Despite being a little late to the recruiting process, it seems that Arkansas and Tennessee have a legitimate shot at Blackshear. But if the Volunteers are able to nab the No. 1 graduate transfer on the open market, they would have to let a scholarship player move on as Tennessee already has the maximum number committed. And the player that the Volunteers are most likely to “release” is Oregon transfer Victor Bailey, who is in Knoxville currently on an official visit.

Bailey– who has yet to sign an NLI with the program — will likely have to sit out this upcoming season, so it is conceivable that he will remain with the program but may not receive an athletic scholarship for the 2019-20 campaign.  In other words,  Bailey would have to “pay” his own way or more than likely Tennessee would get creative and cover his schooling through non-athletic funds.

I still think that Kentucky is the favorite, but you never know. The Wildcats have three scholarships remaining to award this season. However, with the return of Nick Richards and EJ Montgomery along with the addition of grad transfer Nate Sestina, the Wildcats frontcourt is kind of full already. Not that Kentucky, like any of the other five schools, would reject a talent like Blackshear because of numbers.

Other recruiting news

• Tennessee offered 2019 prospect 6’10” Josaphat Bilau a scholarship on June 8. The 6’10 power forward, from France, had previously disclosed a top-4 which included Pitt, West Virginia, Wake Forest, and Georgia. He has taken official visits to Pitt and West Virginia and planned to take one to each of the other two schools. With the Volunteers being very late to the party, it is unlikely to mean much but it is an interesting move by coach Rick Barnes.