Here's our roundup of IU basketball, football and recruiting news.
Jordan Wells / Basketball Beat & Recruiting News
Slower few days in terms of basketball recruiting, as is usual for this time of year.
The Villages (Fla.) four-star guard Tre Mann (6-4, 170 pounds, No. 37 player nationally) trimmed his list to Florida, Tennessee and Kansas, so Hoosiers are out of the mix in this one. But it seemed like a shot in the dark from the start.
We caught up with the high school coach of Bettendorf (Iowa) four-star guard DJ Carton. You can read that story here - https://indiana.rivals.com/news/ind...ton-s-coach-talks-recruiting-process-hoosiers
We also updated the 2019 hot board. You can check out the breakdown from that on our premium board - https://indiana.forums.rivals.com/threads/updated-the-2019-hot-board-today.167718/
We’ve also got some video on a couple 2021 prospects to keep an eye on. Check out Lawrence North forward DJ Hughes (https://indiana.rivals.com/news/indiana-basketball-scouting-notes-dj-hughes-spring-2018) and Forest Park forward Curt Hopf (https://indiana.rivals.com/news/indiana-basketball-scouting-notes-curt-hopf-spring-2018).
We’ve got more video to roll out and the Indiana-Kentucky All-Star series is coming up early June. So a few things to look forward to over the next few weeks.
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Stu Jackson / Basketball Beat & Recruiting News
Quickly approaching the decision deadline for Juwan Morgan on whether he'll stay in the draft or return to school.
The latest is that he's scheduled to work out for the Atlanta Hawks, one of six players being evaluated by the franchise today. After that, he'll have until May 30 (next Wednesday) to decide whether to keep his name in consideration for this summer's NBA Draft or come back for his senior season.
While Morgan is getting workouts with NBA teams, it would be surprising if he kept his name in the draft based on current projections.
ESPN NBA Draft analyst Jonathan Givony did not include Morgan in his rankings of the Top 25 juniors last updated April 1 - despite Morgan's stellar season - nor did he include Morgan in the Top 100 prospects for this year's draft as of its most recent edition published May 13.
NBADraft.net ranked the Top 50 juniors and Morgan still didn't make the cut as of May 12. He also didn't get slotted in the website's Top 100 Big Board, though that hasn't been updated since the first week of April.
Morgan is also excluded from Sports Illustrated's latest mock draft published May 21.
Keep in mind there are only 60 picks in the draft, too, which should give you an idea of how far on the outside Morgan is looking in.
For now, we wait until May 30.
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Stu Jackson / Football Beat & Recruiting News
Recruiting news:
June is shaping up to be a busy month for IU football with recruit visits, and that's not a coincidence. IU head coach Tom Allen told us last Friday during our one-on-one conversation that it's the soonest they want prospective Hoosiers taking their official visits, because anything earlier than that feels like there's too much time between the visit and when kids sign in December.
As posted on the board earlier in the week, 2019 3-star Brownsburg (Ind.) High wide receiver Bryce Kirtz will be taking an official visit to Indiana this weekend. This comes off an official visit to Northwestern last weekend.
Kirtz has been focused on a final four of Indiana, Northwestern, Purdue and Duke for quite some time, but it will be interesting to see if his offer from Notre Dame this week changes things. In addition to that final four, he had also said at the beginning of this month that he planned to commit "within the next month." We'll follow up with him after his Indiana official visit to see if he plans on visiting Notre Dame or revising his current commitment timeline.
Speaking of official visitors, 2019 3-star Alabama DT CJ Person announced Thursday night that he would be taking an official visit to Indiana the weekend of June 15-17. The Hoosiers seem to be in really good shape here, and the fact that Person's making a return visit should be viewed as encouraging. Person previously took an unofficial visit to Indiana on April 4 - the same day as IU's Pro Day. Story here.
Additionally, 2019 3-star Florida cornerback Tiawan Mullen released his Top Five this week and Indiana made the cut, joining Mississippi, Nebraska, TCU and Pittsburgh as finalists. So far, he has one official visit scheduled and that is to Pittsburgh the weekend of June 15-17. More on Mullen's recruitment here.
Meanwhile, for Indiana's visitors last weekend - 2019 4-star Carmel (Ind.) High DE Beau Robbins and Florida WR/TE Brett Seither - all indications are that those visits went well. Robbins is a high-profile in-state recruit - Rivals has him as the No. 5 player in Indiana - but his recruitment has been fairly quiet aside from the occasional offer announcement on his Twitter feed.
Semi-related to recruiting: There was also the big news out of Clemson this week that former five-star quarterback and Brownsburg (Ind.) High standout Hunter Johnson would be transferring from the program.
Rivals' Clemson site broke that news and within that story reported that Northwestern and Purdue would be under strong consideration, but our Josh Helmholdt on Monday evening was the first to tell you not to count out Indiana because of both obvious and non-obvious connections. The obvious connection is offensive coordinator Mike DeBord and quarterbacks coach Nick Sheridan, both of whom recruited Johnson out of high school while at Tennessee. It will be interesting to see where that goes, but knowing how big Allen is on in-state talent, the Hoosiers will find a way to make it work if the interest is mutual.
Team News:
Slowly rolling out stories from my 1-on-1 sitdown with Allen last week. This week the focus was on the strength program and how pleased Allen has been with its new direction under Director of Athletic Performance David Ballou and Athletic Performance Coach Dr. Matt Rhea.
The biggest takeaway there was how the data Ballou and Dr. Rhea collect provide tangible feedback which in turn has helped players buy-in. Allen also said it takes out a lot of the guesswork compared to previous strength programs he's been around.
Additionally, Allen told us five players in particular make very impressive progress under that new program, including sophomore running back Morgan Ellison, redshirt senior defensive tackle Michael Barwick, redshirt senior defensive end Nile Sykes, redshirt sophomore offensive guard Mackenzie Nworah and redshirt freshman OT Britt Beery. Specifically, Allen mentioned those players because they were the ones who have made "the most dramatic improvement' when it came to transforming their bodies and increasing their strength/explosiveness. You can read more about that here.
Jordan Wells / Basketball Beat & Recruiting News
Slower few days in terms of basketball recruiting, as is usual for this time of year.
The Villages (Fla.) four-star guard Tre Mann (6-4, 170 pounds, No. 37 player nationally) trimmed his list to Florida, Tennessee and Kansas, so Hoosiers are out of the mix in this one. But it seemed like a shot in the dark from the start.
We caught up with the high school coach of Bettendorf (Iowa) four-star guard DJ Carton. You can read that story here - https://indiana.rivals.com/news/ind...ton-s-coach-talks-recruiting-process-hoosiers
We also updated the 2019 hot board. You can check out the breakdown from that on our premium board - https://indiana.forums.rivals.com/threads/updated-the-2019-hot-board-today.167718/
We’ve also got some video on a couple 2021 prospects to keep an eye on. Check out Lawrence North forward DJ Hughes (https://indiana.rivals.com/news/indiana-basketball-scouting-notes-dj-hughes-spring-2018) and Forest Park forward Curt Hopf (https://indiana.rivals.com/news/indiana-basketball-scouting-notes-curt-hopf-spring-2018).
We’ve got more video to roll out and the Indiana-Kentucky All-Star series is coming up early June. So a few things to look forward to over the next few weeks.
-------
Stu Jackson / Basketball Beat & Recruiting News
Quickly approaching the decision deadline for Juwan Morgan on whether he'll stay in the draft or return to school.
The latest is that he's scheduled to work out for the Atlanta Hawks, one of six players being evaluated by the franchise today. After that, he'll have until May 30 (next Wednesday) to decide whether to keep his name in consideration for this summer's NBA Draft or come back for his senior season.
While Morgan is getting workouts with NBA teams, it would be surprising if he kept his name in the draft based on current projections.
ESPN NBA Draft analyst Jonathan Givony did not include Morgan in his rankings of the Top 25 juniors last updated April 1 - despite Morgan's stellar season - nor did he include Morgan in the Top 100 prospects for this year's draft as of its most recent edition published May 13.
NBADraft.net ranked the Top 50 juniors and Morgan still didn't make the cut as of May 12. He also didn't get slotted in the website's Top 100 Big Board, though that hasn't been updated since the first week of April.
Morgan is also excluded from Sports Illustrated's latest mock draft published May 21.
Keep in mind there are only 60 picks in the draft, too, which should give you an idea of how far on the outside Morgan is looking in.
For now, we wait until May 30.
-----------
Stu Jackson / Football Beat & Recruiting News
Recruiting news:
June is shaping up to be a busy month for IU football with recruit visits, and that's not a coincidence. IU head coach Tom Allen told us last Friday during our one-on-one conversation that it's the soonest they want prospective Hoosiers taking their official visits, because anything earlier than that feels like there's too much time between the visit and when kids sign in December.
As posted on the board earlier in the week, 2019 3-star Brownsburg (Ind.) High wide receiver Bryce Kirtz will be taking an official visit to Indiana this weekend. This comes off an official visit to Northwestern last weekend.
Kirtz has been focused on a final four of Indiana, Northwestern, Purdue and Duke for quite some time, but it will be interesting to see if his offer from Notre Dame this week changes things. In addition to that final four, he had also said at the beginning of this month that he planned to commit "within the next month." We'll follow up with him after his Indiana official visit to see if he plans on visiting Notre Dame or revising his current commitment timeline.
Speaking of official visitors, 2019 3-star Alabama DT CJ Person announced Thursday night that he would be taking an official visit to Indiana the weekend of June 15-17. The Hoosiers seem to be in really good shape here, and the fact that Person's making a return visit should be viewed as encouraging. Person previously took an unofficial visit to Indiana on April 4 - the same day as IU's Pro Day. Story here.
Additionally, 2019 3-star Florida cornerback Tiawan Mullen released his Top Five this week and Indiana made the cut, joining Mississippi, Nebraska, TCU and Pittsburgh as finalists. So far, he has one official visit scheduled and that is to Pittsburgh the weekend of June 15-17. More on Mullen's recruitment here.
Meanwhile, for Indiana's visitors last weekend - 2019 4-star Carmel (Ind.) High DE Beau Robbins and Florida WR/TE Brett Seither - all indications are that those visits went well. Robbins is a high-profile in-state recruit - Rivals has him as the No. 5 player in Indiana - but his recruitment has been fairly quiet aside from the occasional offer announcement on his Twitter feed.
Semi-related to recruiting: There was also the big news out of Clemson this week that former five-star quarterback and Brownsburg (Ind.) High standout Hunter Johnson would be transferring from the program.
Rivals' Clemson site broke that news and within that story reported that Northwestern and Purdue would be under strong consideration, but our Josh Helmholdt on Monday evening was the first to tell you not to count out Indiana because of both obvious and non-obvious connections. The obvious connection is offensive coordinator Mike DeBord and quarterbacks coach Nick Sheridan, both of whom recruited Johnson out of high school while at Tennessee. It will be interesting to see where that goes, but knowing how big Allen is on in-state talent, the Hoosiers will find a way to make it work if the interest is mutual.
Team News:
Slowly rolling out stories from my 1-on-1 sitdown with Allen last week. This week the focus was on the strength program and how pleased Allen has been with its new direction under Director of Athletic Performance David Ballou and Athletic Performance Coach Dr. Matt Rhea.
The biggest takeaway there was how the data Ballou and Dr. Rhea collect provide tangible feedback which in turn has helped players buy-in. Allen also said it takes out a lot of the guesswork compared to previous strength programs he's been around.
Additionally, Allen told us five players in particular make very impressive progress under that new program, including sophomore running back Morgan Ellison, redshirt senior defensive tackle Michael Barwick, redshirt senior defensive end Nile Sykes, redshirt sophomore offensive guard Mackenzie Nworah and redshirt freshman OT Britt Beery. Specifically, Allen mentioned those players because they were the ones who have made "the most dramatic improvement' when it came to transforming their bodies and increasing their strength/explosiveness. You can read more about that here.
