Recent EYBL AAU event featured plenty of notable KU targets

By Matt Tait     May 14, 2018

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Kansas University basketball recruiting

While much of the weekend in Lawrence was about former KU basketball players moving on — Devonte’ Graham, Svi Mykhailiuk and Clay Young all walked down the hill at graduation — a handful of potential future Jayhawks were busy trying to put their best foot forward elsewhere.

With Nike’s EYBL event in Atlanta taking place over the weekend, a lot of top prospects in the Classes of 2019 and 2020 were evaluated and talked to about their futures by the gang on the recruiting beat.

Not surprisingly, KU was a program that came up quite a bit with some of the best players in both classes.

Here’s a quick rundown of who said what over the weekend, as the push for prospects in the 2019 class started to heat up even more.

**• PG Jalen Lecque – 6-foot-4, 180-pound, 5-star prospect in 2019 class ranked No. 9 nationally by Rivals.com**

It seems as if the big decision for Lecque at this point is whether he will stay in the 2019 class or try to reclassify and join the 2018 crew.

In an interview with Eric Bossi, of Rivals, Lecque said he was more worried at the moment about getting back home and working on his game this summer while discussing his options with his family then.

Asked specifically about KU, Lecque, who hails from Arden, N.C., said simply: “It’s a nice school. I like their school and the facilities, as well, from the videos they send me of the facilities. They are a nice school and I would love to visit there.”

**• PG Tre Mann – 6-foot-4, 170-pound, 4-star prospect in 2019 class ranked No. 37 nationally by Rivals.com**

The rising point guard from The Villages, Fla., has recently visited Florida and Tennessee and, according to Bossi, appeared to be zeroing in on making a decision between those two programs and maybe one or two more.

But a recent offer from KU inspired Mann to tap the brakes and now Mann is very interested in checking out what Kansas has to offer.

He currently considers KU, Florida and Tennessee as his top three and told Bossi that he was “going with the flow,” regarding his recruitment, adding: “If I feel like I’m confident about a certain school then it will be done. Right now I have three schools that are like my top three, really.”

Asked specifically about KU jumping into the mix, Mann made it clear that he was interested.

“They’ve had great players in the past and a great coaching staff,” he told Bossi. “I haven’t been on a visit, so I don’t know the campus yet. But I want to see it.”

**• SF Samuell Williamson – 6-foot-7, 170-pound, 4-star prospect in 2019 class ranked No. 44 nationally by Rivals.com**

There is no shortage of interest in the smooth wing from Rockwall, Texas, whom Bossi said made the game look very easy during the recent EYBL event in Atlanta.

KU, Baylor, TCU, Oklahoma and Texas are all showing heavy interest in Williamson, and that’s just in the Big 12. Outside of the region, Michigan, Ohio State, Louisville, LSU and others also have shown heavy interest.

While it remains early in the process, Williamson shared with Bossi a tie to KU that might keep the Jayhawks in it as long as they want to be.

“My mom is a (KU) graduate and my brother just graduated last year,” Williamson told Bossi. “They (the KU coaches) say that I could come in and play multiple positions and do a lot of different things in their offense.”

According to Bossi, Williamson hopes to pin down a final five by the end of the summer so he can start taking visits and make a decision sometime in the fall.

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Written By Matt Tait

A native of Colorado, Matt moved to Lawrence in 1988 and has been in town ever since. He graduated from Lawrence High in 1996 and the University of Kansas in 2000 with a degree in Journalism. After covering KU sports for the University Daily Kansan and Rivals.com, Matt joined the World Company (and later Ogden Publications) in 2001 and has held several positions with the paper and KUsports.com in the past 20+ years. He became the Journal-World Sports Editor in 2018. Throughout his career, Matt has won several local and national awards from both the Associated Press Sports Editors and the Kansas Press Association. In 2021, he was named the Kansas Sportswriter of the Year by the National Sports Media Association. Matt lives in Lawrence with his wife, Allison, and two daughters, Kate and Molly. When he's not covering KU sports, he likes to spend his time playing basketball and golf, listening to and writing music and traveling the world with friends and family.