LSU likely won’t top their 2015 recruiting class of Ben Simmons, Antonio Blakeney and Brandon Sampson any time soon, but Johnny Jones and company continue to reel in top-100 high school prospects with ease.
On Sunday morning, the 91st ranked recruit on ESPN’s top 100 for the class of 2017, Galen Alexander, committed to the Tigers over a host of major schools, including Alabama, Oklahoma, Marquette, Texas and USC.
Blessed to announce that I will be attending Louisiana State University! #GoTigers pic.twitter.com/A2pWG7XUWg
— Galen Alexander (@Waterboyg1) July 17, 2016
Alexander is a 6’7″, 220 pound small forward from Lafayette, LA who is currently rated as a four-star recruit. He attends Lafayette Christian Academy, and is labeled as the number two player in the entire state of Louisiana.
“[I] just felt LSU was the best fit for me,” Alexander said to Scout.com. “Also, a big part of it was my relationship with coach Jones and coach [Robert] Kirby, and also them believing and trusting in the player I am and the player they can make me. I trust that they can turn me into that player.”
The wing prospect is a powerful player who can face up and score, while also maintaining the ability to beat a defender off the dribble. He’s not a great outside shooter, as his bread-and-butter comes from inside the three point line – particularly in the mid-range.
Alexander is a good defender because he has the size, strength and aggressiveness to defend numerous positions.
This is the second recruit LSU has added in the class of 2017, with shooting guard Cedric Russell being the other. Russell is also a local prospect who attends Peabody Magnet High School and is currently a three-star recruit, according to ESPN.
While their 2016 class does not feature one top-100 talent, LSU has recruited at a very high level under Jones. Now comes the results part of the business, something that Washington head coach Lorenzo Romar is also currently dealing with.
But unlike Romar at Washington, Jones’ coaching has held the Tigers back and his teams have greatly underachieved the past couple of seasons. They had the number one player in the country and a generation talent, in Ben Simmons, yet they failed to make the tournament and turned into a disaster at the end of the season.
Simmons checked out before the SEC Tournament, Blakeney seemed to be playing one-and-one basketball far to often, and Sampson fell out of the rotation mid-season.
Alexander is a talented player, but now it’s about player development and fitting him into the puzzle before the 2017-18 season tips-off.