This Skal Labissiere recruitment just gets more interesting by the day, doesn’t it?
The 6-foot-10 Haitian power forward on Tuesday announced a final six schools of Kentucky, Memphis, North Carolina, Georgetown, Baylor and Tennessee.
Noticeably missing from the list was Ole Miss, which had pulled out all the stops to land Labissiere, who lives in Memphis and not that far from the Ole Miss campus.
Ole Miss coach Andy Kennedy indicated to The Clarion-Ledger in Tuesday’s editions that he was prepared to hire Labissiere’s guardian, Gerald Hamilton, to fill a vacant assistant coaching position in a package deal that would bring aboard Labissiere.
“You guys are pretty smart,” Kennedy told the paper. “You probably realize what I’m doing, if it evolves like I want it to.”
So despite this blatant offer — quoted in the paper — Labissiere did not include Ole Miss in his final six.
You wonder what Hamilton — who did not respond to a text message seeking comment — thinks about all of this.
The Ole miss move wouldn’t have been unique. Memphis just hired Keelon Lawson and shortly thereafter picked up a commitment from his son, Dedric, the second Lawson son to pick Memphis.
Seton Hall recently hired Lincoln coach Tiny Morton after landing a commitment from Lincoln star Isaiah Whitehead.
But of course Lawson and Morton were established high school coaches, whereas Hamilton reportedly only had experience sitting on the bench of Labissiere’s AAU team.
Meantime, Labissiere seems inclined to spend this year in high school and 2015-16 in college seeking an NCAA title instead of going to play overseas. He had previously told CBSSports.com he might consider following Emmanuel Mudiay overseas to play for pay.
“I just want to play for a great coach and be surrounded by guys who are going to get me to the next level, not just on the court but as a person, too,” he told SNY.tv Monday in New York at the Reebok Classic X.
As if all this weren’t enough, Labissiere may be transferring high schools for his senior season, with John Martin of ESPN in Memphis reporting the big man may head to another Memphis private school, Lausanne Collegiate School.
In July, Labissiere told SNY.tv he might transfer from Evangelical Christian.
