NCAA Basketball Recruiting: Analyzing top 5 top-150 forward Elijah Saunders

Notre Dame Fighting Irish

Head coach Mike Brey isn’t on the hot seat just yet but another poor season by the Irish create some real questions. But assuming he’ll be around, this would be as good an option as Miami when it comes to early playing time and a potential long-term spot without having to worry about being overrecruited.

Notre Dame’s frontcourt currently consists of senior forward and leading scorer Nate Laszewski, as well as Yale grad transfer Paul Atkinson. There’s very little depth outside out them, as both Matt Zona and Elijah Taylor have failed to get meaningful minutes in two seasons with the program. They have three-star commit Dominick Campbell part of the 2022 class but could use plenty more and Saunders would be a nice fit.

San Diego State Aztecs

As the lone west coast option among the five, that could give the Aztecs an advantge here. What also helps is that they’re in the Mountain West, which would give Saunders even better odds of beng an impact player and not risk not getting minutes at a power conference program. And among all five teams, San Diego State has arguably been the best from the past few years, including being ranked as high as No. 3 a couple of seasons ago.

San Diego State has a lot of upperclassmen forwards, including incoming transfers, Jaedon LaDee,  Tahirou Diabate and Joshua Tomaić. Only Duquense combo forward Chad Baker isn’t an upperclassman but he can play the wing position. The Aztecs need to add at least 1-2 forwards in the 2022 class and Saunders is one of their top targets, so expect them to make a big push for him.