Local class of 2021 prospect and KU target Tamar Bates heading to IMG Academy for senior season

By Matt Tait     May 5, 2020
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Kansas University basketball recruiting

KU recruiting target Tamar Bates, a standout senior-to-be at nearby Piper High outside of Kansas City, announced Tuesday that he will play his senior year at IMG Academy, one of the biggest stages in prep basketball.

Bates, who is rated as a four-star prospect in the class of 2021 by Rivals.com, posted the news Tuesday on his Twitter page.

“I would like to announce that I will be attending IMG Academy for my senior year,” Bates wrote. “Huge thanks (to the IMG coaches) for this opportunity.”

Bates, a 6-foot-4, 175-pound, left-handed combo guard, also thanked his friends, family and coaches at Piper for the “unconditional love I’ve received the past three years.”

“I’m very grateful to have been part of such a family environment,” he said.

IMG, which won the 2019 GEICO High School national championship, has produced eight McDonald’s All-Americans since 2017. Nine alumni of IMG have been selected in the NBA draft since 2005.

The most notable IMG alumnus for Kansas fans is senior forward Silvio De Sousa, who attended IMG for his final season of high school ball and left a semester early to join the Jayhawks in December of 2017.

The summer following his first season at Kansas, De Sousa talked about what the move to IMG meant for his career.

“I loved being at IMG,” De Sousa told reporters at Brett Ballard’s Washburn basketball camp in June 2018. “At IMG, I could improve my game, and I spent a lot more time in the gym than I used to at my old high school. IMG just helped me develop my skills and stuff, my shot.”

According to the Rivals database, Bates currently holds offers from Kansas, Alabama, Creighton, Kansas State, Missouri, Missouri State, Northwestern, Oklahoma State, St. Louis and Abilene Christian. Other programs listed to be showing interest include Butler, Colorado, Illinois, Nebraska, North Carolina, Purdue, Stanford and Wake Forest.

Bates currently is ranked No. 94 nationally in the 2021 class — up 33 spots from the previous Rivals rankings — and is listed by Rivals as the 25th-best shooting guard in his class.

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54713Local class of 2021 prospect and KU target Tamar Bates heading to IMG Academy for senior season
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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.