Rutgers head coach Eddie Jordan and assistant Greg Vetrone made Corey Sanders a priority all summer long.
On Thursday, their hard work paid off when the 6-foot-1, 180-pound Sanders committed to the Scarlet Knights for the Class of 2015.
“I don’t want to go somewhere where I would have to wait,” he told Jerry Carino of Gannett New Jersey. “I wanted to come to a place where I could work hard and be the guy right away.”
Sanders also likes the idea of playing for former NBA coach Eddie Jordan.
“I’m not only playing in the Big Ten, but with a coach who just coached in the NBA,” he told Carino. “He said I kind of remind him of himself as a player, how I play hard defense and control the team. He played in the NBA, so he knows what it takes. Coach Jordan is going to take good care of me.”
Said Showtime Ballers coach Diana Neal on Thursday: “They were the only school that offered and recruited him the hardest. They are more like a family to him. He also will play right away because they need a point guard. He loked at where he could be a pro as well and felt Eddie Jordan can help him follow his dream. They have been really great and have showed they need him more than just want him. He loved the school as well.”
The onetime UCF commit, who said he still has to take his standardized test in October, also considered DePaul, UCF, USF and Tennessee.
“I can pass, score, play defense, bring high energy, so everything,” he previously told SNY.tv.
Sanders is Rutgers’ first 2015 commit after Leroy Butts and Austin Burnette decommitted.
Rutgers had been recruiting Roselle (N.J.) Catholic point guard Isaiah Briscoe, who plans to announce in the spring.
With Sanders in the fold at Rutgers, Briscoe could opt to go elsewhere, with St. John’s, Seton Hall, Villanova and Arizona among those in the mix.
