5-star center James Wiseman keeps KU in final 5

By Matt Tait     Oct 3, 2018

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Kansas basketball recruits, from left to right, Jeremiah Robinson-Earl, Cassius Stanley and James Wiseman, take in the scene at Late Night in the Phog on Friday, Sept. 28, 2018.

His visit to KU for Late Night and subsequent good time made Wednesday’s news less surprising.

But it is official nonetheless.

Class of 2019 five-star center James Wiseman, of Memphis, narrowed his list to a final five on Wednesday and Kansas made the cut.

Joining the Jayhawks in Wiseman’s final five were: Kentucky, Memphis, Vanderbilt and Florida State.

It’s still too soon to know when a final decision might come. And, yes, most recruiting analysts out there believe this one is destined to come down to a showdown between the hometown Memphis Tigers and John Calipari’s Kentucky Wildcats.

But Kansas is still putting in plenty of work and would not be doing so if the coaching staff did not believe they were still in the mix.

In addition to welcoming Wiseman to town for Late Night, KU’s coaching staff made a visit to Memphis to see Wiseman in early September.

To date, Wiseman has taken two of the three official visits he had scheduled (Kentucky on Sept. 13 and KU last weekend) and he is expected to be at Vandy this weekend.

Naturally, the 7-foot, 210-pound prospect has made several unofficial visits to Memphis but may add an official trip to both his hometown program and Florida State in the future.

Wiseman recently spoke with Pat Lawless of PrepCircuit.com about the status of his recruitment and he talked a lot about Late Night, some big picture stuff about the process in general and even hinted at a time table for a decision.

“I’ve been thinking about it and I think it will probably be around the end of this year or maybe the beginning of next year,” Wiseman told Lawless. “It’s a really hard decision so I have to be cautious, but I still make sure to trust the process. I pray every night that I go to the right school. I think it’s going to be soon and not too far down the road.”

As for his trip to Late Night, as if the joy on Wiseman’s face was not enough to prove how much fun he had, his words to Lawless certainly backed that up.

“I went to Late in the Phog and it was amazing,” he told Lawless. “It was a really fun atmosphere, I had a great time and I just created a great relationship with Bill Self right away. As soon as I walked in the gym everyone was screaming my name from the student section. (Class of 2019 SG) Cassius Stanley was on the visit with me and I thought we connected pretty well. We just had a great time and I thought the players were great to talk to. They spoke about everything including things that would be helpful behind the scenes. I interacted with the coaching staff and the players so I had a great time over there.”

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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.