The recruiting process for the class of 2016 is starting to ramp up now and one of the biggest recruits in the nation is in the news. Jayson Tatum has reportedly said that he will make his decision any day now and it is possible the decision could come as soon as this weekend, according to Ben Roberts of Next Cats.
Tatum is a 6-foot-8-inch small forward from Saint Louis, and although the recruiting rankings differ he is a consensus top five recruit in the class of 2016 (ESPN has him ranked second overall.) Those in the know believe that Tatum is also one of the top NBA prospects and is likely a one-and-done candidate.
Tatum is officially choosing between four schools: Kentucky, North Carolina, Duke and St. Louis. It was reported about a month ago, though, that he had trimmed his list down to two but he didn't say which two schools, according to Adam Zagoria of Zagsblog.
The prevailing wisdom is that the two favorites to land Tatum are Duke and his hometown school St. Louis. Tatum has said how much it would mean to his city and family if he were to stay home and play college basketball close to where he grew up. Having said that, Tatum also had glowing things to say about Mike Krzyzewski and Duke when he went there for a visit.
"I can honestly say it exceeded my expectations. I went in there wondering how crazy it was gonna be because of everything I heard about their fans and things like that and it was better than people said...I would definitely give the visit a 10 out of 10," Tatum said.
Because of these quotes and a few other factors it appears that Duke might be the favorite to land Tatum, but he did throw a little wrinkle into the discussion this week when he said he would consider becoming a package deal with Harry Giles, ESPN's number one 2016 recruit, who also has UNC, Kentucky and Duke on his list.
At this point 247Sports gives Duke a 63 percent chance of landing Giles and 65 percent chance of landing Tatum. Duke had the number one recruiting class in 2014 with Jahlil Okafor, Justise Winslow, Tyus Jones and Grayson Allen on its way to a National Championship, and they have the number one recruiting class coming in 2015. If the Blue Devils were to land both Giles and Tatum they would be well on their way to three straight number one recruiting classes.
