NCAA Basketball Recruiting: Analyzing C Christ Essandoko top 7 teams
Illinois Fighting Illini
All-American big man Kofi Cockburn will be back for one more season but odds are good that it’ll be his last one way or another. His replacement is junior center Omar Payne, along with backup Brandon Lieb. There’s definitely a path to playing time for Essandoko here and the opportunity to play in the Big Ten is very appealing.
Illinois has been aggressive in reloading the backcourt in the last two classes, including landed guard commits, Sencire Harris and Jayden Epps. They need to land at least a couple of frontcourt players in the 2022 class and simply for depth purposes, adding Essandoko would help round things out nicely.
Maryland Terrapins
The Terrapins are in a similar spot to Illinois, as they have a clear starting big man in Georgetown transfer Qudus Wahab, without much depth behind him. In fact, a case could be made that Essandoko may have been able to find some minutes behind him this upcoming season.
Either way, Maryland needs to get a center in the 2022 class and after missing out on a couple of targets, could really use Essandoko to join. And when head coach Mark Turgeon has had legit centers to work with such as Jalen Smith and Bruno Fernando, things went very well for both those players and the team on the court.
NC State Wolfpack
The Wolfpack’s frontcourt is set for next season with Manny Bates holding things down. But in the chance he leaves afterward, that leaves just Ebenezer Dowuona, who played just nine games last season left on the roster. They’re after both Essandoko and three-star center prospect Shawn Phillips and have a legit chance at both but if one commits early, the other may look elsewhere.
Although NC State likely will target an experienced transfer next offseason, there’s still a clear pathway for Essandoko to get early playing time and if he impresses, starts for an ACC team. And with Wake Forest out of the picture, the Wolfpack becomes the “local” option among all seven teams in the running.