Karl Towns Jr expected to commit to Kentucky Wildcats today
By Paul Jordan
photo credit: 24/7 sports
It’s been about a while since Marcus Lee has committed to the Kentucky Wildcats and John Calipari is expected to make some more noise on the recruiting trail today. Karl Towns, the top player in the 2015 class, will make his announcement at 10AM today, and from all indications, he will be a Wildcat. For the record, Duke, Florida, Michigan State, N.C. State, Rutgers and Seton Hall and others are in the running, but multiple sources have told the WBN that Towns will pick Kentucky. It is virtually impossible to find an outlet that thinks it may be otherwise. The big question for now is whether Towns will reclassify into the 2014 class:
"Towns is the consensus No. 1 player in the Class of 2015, but could reclassify to 2014, putting him closer to the 2015 NBA Draft. “I don’t know about reclassifying up,” he told USA Today. “You’re talking about losing an extra year of education and being with my teammates and not winning another state title ring in high school. I don’t know about that. I’ve got to beat my dad with the ring count. Right now we’re tied 1-1. I don’t know what I’ll do as far as moving up. I’m not ruling it out, but we’ll just have to see what happen.” Towns told USA Today he plans to study kineseiology in college. “I definitely want to play in the NBA, but that’s not my only goal,” Towns said. “Kinesiology is basically about being a scientific trainer. I’ve done a lot of studying on it and I’m really intrigued by it, so I want to keep my grades very high. That’s one of the big reasons I decided to get this out of the way.”"
Photo credit: Josh Kays for the WBN, All rights reserved
While one top rated player announces today, another will be visiting another school. Andrew Wiggins, the top rated player in the 2013 class, will be visiting Florida State today and tomorrow. Xavier Rathan – Mayes, Wiggins HS teammate, is doing his best on Twitter to get FSU students to “pack the Tuck” for FSU’s game against Florida and is heavily pushing Wiggins to join him. Knowing how basketball is in the state of Florida, I can guarantee you that the scene at FSU will pail in comparison to Rupp … although FSU will give UK a good fight for Wiggins. In the end, its hard to imagine Wiggins not being a Wildcat though.
Nov 29, 2012; South Bend, IN, USA; Kentucky Wildcats head coach John Calipari reacts in the second half against the Notre Dame Fighting Irish at the Purcell Pavilion. Notre Dame won 64-50. Mandatory Credit: Matt Cashore-USA TODAY Sports
Kentucky finds themselves out of the AP poll this morning but will get back on the winning track against Samford tonight. According to Calipari, his team needs to develop that “will to win” that his past three teams have developed:
"“We needed a competitive spirit and we needed more of a will to win,” Calipari said. “We are trying to find it.” The lack of understanding showed when Kentucky fouled the Bears best free throw shooter — Pierre Jackson — not once but twice down the stretch. It also showed when Nerlens Noel blocked a shot and didn’t get the rebound when the Cats were trailing by three late in the contest. The back-to-back losses were the first for the Wildcats since dropping a pair of consecutive fashion against Ole Miss and Florida on the road during nearly two years ago. That squad, which lost nine games, got its act together down the stretch and reached the Final Four before losing to eventual national champion Connecticut in the national semifinals. Although Calipari doesn’t want his team to get into a habit of losing games, he wants to players to develop a will to win, a process that freshman guard Archie Goodwin says takes time. “It’s a learning stage and a learning process,” Goodwin said. “It’s better to lose early than late and we can do all of this now, but it really doesn’t matter in March. We’ve got to learn certain situations and how to react in them.”"