Tourney proof talent gap narrowing in college hoops
INDI A N A nOLIS» One by one, the college basketball coaches had filed into the sweltering gym on the campus of Whitney Young Magnet High, dressed in their polos and windbreakers and sporting their school logos, all craning their necks to get a glimpse of one of the best prep prospects to come out of Chicago in years.
It was impossible to miss the 6-foot-11 frame of Jahlil Okafor, casually throwing down those dunks in the warmup line. It was much easier to miss freshman teammate Lucas Williamson.
A few years later, Okafor has gone from can’t-miss prospect to one-and-done star at Duke to the riches of the NBA, while Williamson has become one of the darlings of the NCAA Tournament.
The slender guard with the big game has become the do-everything star for Loyola Chicago, which is once again making an inspired run through March.
The fact that Williamson ended up at Loyola Chicago, and Loyola Chicago is in the Sweet 16, is evidence of what some coaches have predicted for years: A once-yawning talent gap between haves and havenots has narrowed to nothing.
The difference in a top-50 kid headed to Duke or Kentucky and an unranked kid heading to Loyola might have felt like night and day 15 years ago. Now, the difference is negligible.
“There’s just more good players,” Loyola Chicago coach Porter Moser explained. “Thirty years ago when I got into this in Texas, to now, you look at it — there’s so many five-star players.”
That sheer volume of talent on high school and AAU teams is why a kid like Williamson, who had every big-name school in his gym to watch Okafor during his freshman year, could still get overlooked by nearly everybody.
By the time he was a senior, Williamson had few scholarship offers and ultimately chose to join a team now led by AllAmerican forward Cameron
Krutwig, a three-star prospect out of high school in suburban Chicago.
Backcourt mate Braden Norris began his career at Oakland before he arrived on Chicago’s north side. Marquise Kennedy is perhaps the most coveted prospect Loyola has landed in years, but even he picked the Ramblers over offers from the likes of Bradley, Hofstra and Northeastern.
The bluebloods of college basketball weren’t beating down the doors for any of them.
Not that it bothers them these days. Kentucky and Duke didn’t even make the NCAA Tournament. Kansas and Illinois were sent packing the opening weekend. And the Ramblers, the guys who ousted the top-seeded Illini, moved on to face Oregon State on Saturday.
“The end of the day,” Williamson said, “the respect that teams give us before we play, that doesn’t really concern us. We’re only focused on winning games and continuing this big run that we’ve been having.”