UConn got the news it was hoping for about midnight Friday. Daniel Hamilton, a top-shelf recruit in the Class of 2014, made public his intention to join the Huskies. He told Eric Bossi and Jerry Meyer following his AAU game in Dallas, and then tweeted his commitment.
“Ya boy, just committed to Connecticut,” Hamilton tweeted at 12:06 a.m. Eastern Time. “#huskyguard can’t wait.”
Hamilton, a 6-foot-7, 175-pound swingman, is considered an elite recruit, ranked 27th in his class by ESPN. He played at St. John Bosco High in Bellflower, Calif., where he averaged 14.5 points, 7.1 assists and 7.2 rebounds per game. He figures to fit perfectly into the small forward spot.
“Congrats to my little bro [Hamilton] committing to UConn,” tweeted DeAndre Daniels, who is also from the Los Angeles area.
UConn coaches cannot comment on a recruit until he signs his letter of intent, and that cannot come until November.
Hamilton’s brother, Jordan, plays in the NBA for the Denver Nuggets and was also recruited by UConn, but eventually chose Texas. His other brother, Isaac, plays at Texas-El Paso. Daniel Hamilton visited Storrs with his parents last weekend and program insiders felt good about the visit, anticipating he might make a quick decision.
He arrived in Dallas with his AAU team to play in the Nike EYBL tournament Friday and told reporters after his game he was going to UConn.
Hamilton will join guard Rodney Purvis, who transferred from NC State and will be eligible to play in 2014-15, to give the Huskies two very highly regarded players to form the core of the team with much of the current team finishing eligibility or expected to depart after next season.
For coach Kevin Ollie, who grew up in Los Angeles, it’s a break-through in that area as a recruiting base. All in all – a big night for the UConn program.
STORRS – R.J. Evans’ year at UConn is complete. He has reached his goals, and developed a few more.
Evans will receive his master’s degree in educational psychology on Saturday in UConn’s graduate ceremony, having completed the 30-credit program in 12 months – as he was playing basketball for the Huskies.
“I tell coach [Kevin] Ollie, ‘if R.J. were a mutual fund, I’d be buying him right now,’” says Scott Brown, Evans’ academic advisor, “because he’s going to be doing something.”
Evans, from Salem, Conn., arrived at UConn last summer with a degree in economics from Holy Cross and one year’s playing eligibility. Once he accepted a scholarship to play basketball, he asked Brown, who is UConn’s NCAA faculty representative and a professor of educational psychology, about the program.
“R.J. said he wanted to be a basketball coach,” Brown said, “and I told him a lot of famous coaches have
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Way back when, Ricky Moore was a high school player making an official visit to UConn, and Kevin Ollie was one of the team leaders that showed him around.
Now Moore, 37, is a full assistant on Ollie’s coaching staff and in July he will be taking to the road to help re-create the positive UConn experience for recruits.
I sat down with Moore this week for some of his thoughts on his new role, his career at UConn, including the 1999 title and how it shaped him, and his years playing overseas. Here is what he learned from watching OIlie last season:
“What I saw, it wasn’t about wins and losses. Guys came to practice, competed in practice. He wouldn’t let you [get by] if you were having an Okay practice, he wanted to get the best o ut of you in
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Omar Calhoun had two off-season surgical procedures to address discomfort in both hips, a UConn spokesman confirmed.
Calhoun had surgery to address femoral acetabular impingement (FAI) on his left hip in March and his right hip in April. The surgery involves shaving bone to alleviate discomfort, and hopefully avoid future discomfort. Recovery time is three to four months, so Calhoun, who will be a sophomore next season, should be 100 percent by mid-August. If he was considering trying for Team USA this summer, this injury would eliminate that.
Calhoun averaged 11.3 points and 3.9 rebounds last season, playing at small forward in all but the last game. He was hampered by a wrist injury late in the season.
Word of Calhoun’s surgeries was first reported via twitter by Hearst Connecticut Newspapers.
Q: Dom, what is the news on the recruiting front? Who are KO and UConn targeting? And what are realistic chances of the Huskies landing these prospects?
Jeff
Cromwell
A: Hi Jeff. The main development this week was Daniel Hamilton’s visit. Hamilton, 6-foot-6, the brother of Jordan Hamilton and a very highly rated shooting guard from the Los Angeles area, visited last weekend, as was scheduled a while ago. Daniel came with his parents. This visit went well, by all accounts, including Hamilton’s quote to Adam Zagoria (read here).
UConn is still limited in the number of official visits it can host, so the
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UConn has lined up another powerful non conference opponent: Florida.
As we mentioned here on April 24, when the Huskies were at the State Capitol, a series with the Gators has been in the works, as UConn looks to upgrade its out-of-conference schedule. There were scheduling conflicts to be worked out on both ends.
Apparently, they have been. Gatorzone, Florida’s official website, has listed UConn among Florida’s non-conference opponents next season, reporting the game will be Dec. 2, and “Florida’s first trip to Storrs.” (Not sure if the game is at Gampel or XL, though.)
UConn usually waits until all paperwork is complete to announce these things.
The Gators, perennial contenders under Billy Donovan, were 29-8 last season, reaching the Elite 8. It figures to be the start of an exciting series for UConn, assuming it includes a reciprocal trip to Florida. The Huskies and Gators last played in the 1994 NCAA Tournament, a painful OT loss for UConn in the Sweet 16 in Miami.
The Huskies need to beef up their non-conference schedule, to offset the loss of high-
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Kevin Ollie played 13 years in the NBA, so he knows what it takes to make it there and, having played for 12 different teams, he has lots of contacts. The credibility is there. But he is now the head basketball coach at UConn, and certainly wants to have as much talent on his roster as he can.
So when one or more of his players are weighing whether to stay in Storrs or go leave early for the NBA Draft, how does he handle it?
We talked about it this week:
“First thing I want is kids to come back and get their education,” Ollie said. “It’s not like I want a kid to come back, if they’re ready to go to the NBA. I’m not saying ‘I just want you to come back for my sake.’ If you’re ready and I really think you’re ready – like Kemba, after his junior year. I wasn’t the head coach then, but we were all on the same page. That kid was ready because he is able to handle it if he gets drafted by the best team or by the worst team. I keep coming back to that because you’ve got to be able to handle it. You’ve got to be able to handle going down to the D League if that opportunity presents itself, you have to be able to handle that mentally and have that toughness.
“The process is, I want kids to get their degree. I want you to come back. I don’t care if you go to the NBA for five or six years, I want you to come back and get your degree. That’s the only thing I really want.
“Now, I definitely want this basketball team to be the best basketball team possible and to have that, you have to
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STORRS – Had the chance to sit down and do some interviews at Gampel on Monday and I’ll be offering parts of them through the week here …
DeAndre Daniels’ first year at UConn was a struggle. He appeared in 31 games and started many, but didn’t play starter minutes. He averaged just three points, 2.1 rebounds and frequently drew the ire of coach Jim Calhoun. Before his sophomore season, when asked about the new coach, Kevin Ollie, Daniels often said he “wasn’t as mean.”
Daniels had a break-through during this past season, and it was a break-through in many ways. For instance, he now understands what Calhoun was trying to do and their relationship has become a solid one.
“I talk to coach [Calhoun] every day,” Daniels said, “every time he comes in we have a conversation about life and basketball. He’s had confidence in me since day one. He tries to instill it in me. My freshman year, when I didn’t have confidence in myself, he was just trying to make me tougher, trying to tell me what to do, how to carry myself.
“It’s tough love. But everything he does, he means it with love. He really cares about all the guys on the team.”
Calhoun, at the State Capitol last week, was raving about the change in Daniels, how he no longer “slumps his
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STORRS – Was up at Gampel today doing some interviews and had a chance to ask Kevin Ollie about Jason Collins’ revelation. On Monday Collins, 34, in a essay for Sports Illustrated, became the first active athlete in one of the major American team sports to reveal he is gay.
Ollie played 13 years in the NBA for 12 different teams; he and Collins both played for the Timberwolves during the 2008-09 season.
Ollie was supportive:
“I imagine it will impact other people’s decisions,” Ollie said, “if you have one person come out, it helps other people who might have a question in their mind – should I go out or should I cover it up? – to live their life and be who they are. You can’t live a double life. If this gives other athletes an opportunity to come out, I think that’s a good thing.
“… I have no idea [how it will be received in the NBA]. There’s probably going to be some resentment [at first], like with anything else. When Magic Johnson came out with the [HIV], people just didn’t know, there were people
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