NEW YORK — Louisville coach Rick Pitino and assistant Kenny Johnson came to the Archbishop Molloy open gym on Thursday primarly to watch 7-footer Moses Brown, but left by offering a scholarship to his teammate Khalid Moore.
The offer was first reported by Andrew Slater of 247Sports.com, and confirmed by Moore.
Moore, a 6-foot-7 wing who runs with the NY Rens, was one of the breakout 16U players this summer at the Peach Jam and is coming into his own entering his junior season.
It doesn’t hurt that he’s part of a “Big Three” at Molloy that includes Brown and Class of 2019 point guard Cole Anthony, the son of former NBA point guard Greg Anthony.
“Yeah, I’m feeling good right now,” Moore told me. “I got a few schools [offering] lately playing in the open gym and over the summer.”
In the last month or so, Moore has added offers from Louisville, Virginia, St. John’s and Syracuse to go with offers from Rutgers, Miami, VCU and Seton Hall.
In addition to Louisville, Florida head coach Mike White and assistant Dusty May plus assistants from UConn, Miami and Indiana watched the open gym. UConn and Florida told Moore they would follow his progress. Maryland and Syracuse are also high on him.
“It’s exciting, I just appreciate it very much,” he said. “Any school that can help me develop as a player is what I’m looking for.
A long and lanky athlete, Moore wants to work on “getting stronger” and become “more consistent shooting the ball.” With two years left in high school alongside Brown and Anthony, Moore should continue to improve as Molloy challenges for city and state titles.
“I still have a lot of time to improve,” Moore said.
Molloy coach Mike McCleary agrees.
“We’ve always been very high on him,” the coach said. “He was great as a freshman and then last year as a starter on the varsity, he was a kid that we never took out of games. We had seniors on that team and here was a sophomore that we couldn’t take off the floor.
“He defended the best player. He would make everything on offense. You tell him something once, you never have to tell him again He’s smart, he’s under-rated in how tough and strong he is. He makes plays that are like, ‘Jesus, how does that kid get that rebound?’ But he does.”
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