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NCAA Basketball Recruiting: Analyzing top-40 guard JJ Starling top 5 teams

By Tristan Freeman

Feb 11, 2020; Syracuse, New York, USA; Syracuse Orange guard Joe Girard III (11) in action during the first half against the North Carolina State Wolfpack at the Carrier Dome. Mandatory Credit: Rich Barnes-USA TODAY Sports
Feb 11, 2020; Syracuse, New York, USA; Syracuse Orange guard Joe Girard III (11) in action during the first half against the North Carolina State Wolfpack at the Carrier Dome. Mandatory Credit: Rich Barnes-USA TODAY Sports /
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NCAA Basketball JJ Starling Notre Dame Fighting Irish guard Prentiss Hubb Charles LeClaire-USA TODAY Sports
NCAA Basketball JJ Starling Notre Dame Fighting Irish guard Prentiss Hubb Charles LeClaire-USA TODAY Sports /

Northwestern Wildcats

The Wildcats are looking to continue the recruiting momentum after landing top-100 point guard  Rowan Brumbaugh in their 2022 class. He’s one of the highest-rated prospects out of high school to join the program, and Starling himself would by far be the highest if he were to choose them.

If Starling does pick Northwestern, he’d have to be willing to play off the ball, as Brumbaugh is more of a true point. But they’d be a great future core for the program to work with and if Boo Buie elects to go pro after next season, we could see these two start early in the 2022-23 campaign. But they’ll need more than these two if they’ll want to compete for a top-half spot in the Big Ten.

Notre Dame Fighting Irish

The core of the Irish has been around for a long time and is coming into their respective senior seasons, including leading scorer and passer Prentiss Hubbs. He’s the true and arguably only ball-handler on the roster, with both Tret Wertz and Cormac Ryan backing him up. This is an option that assuming Hubbs doesn’t take that extra year, would allow Starling to come in right away and have an immediate key role and likely start.

The downside of this option is that we have no clue who would be joining Starling to make up the future core outside of incoming four-star freshman Blake Wesley. This is a team that has struggled to reach the top half of the ACC with the group they currently have so this prospect would be risking joining a lower-tier program that’ll struggle to make the postseason.

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