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SoCalHoops Recruiting News

We Get Quoted: Brunner & Stokes,
Chandler, & Other Stuff--(Aug. 3, 1999)

From time to time we attend various tournaments, especially big-time national level tournaments during the July open-evaluation period, and when we do, we sometimes get to see our friend Clark Francis who puts out the HoopsScoop Online. Clark has been at this scouting thing for close to twenty years, and he's got a pretty good eye for talent (even if he does tend to speak in "headlines". . . Us: "Hi Clark, how are you?" Clark: "Big Time player. Number one on my rankings. Eddie Griffin." ), and so it's always fun to sit next to him at games to pick his brain about who he thinks is really good. What we didn't realize though is that sometimes he's also picking ours. Not that there's much there to pick, but occasionally we hear something worthy of reporting. So we were not too terribly surprised when we read the Hoop Scoop the other day and found this:

"The Editor & Publisher of SoCal Hoops, tells us that he thinks USC will end up getting both 5'9 Kenneth Brunner from Southern Idaho (JC) ID and 5'9 Wesley Stokes from Long Beach (Poly) CA. This could be big for the Trojans, because Brunner is still a tremendous talent and, although there are some question marks about Stokes, he is extremely popular among players in Southern California and some think that landing Stokes could be enough to sway some of the great juniors to pick the same school next year. However, don't look for it to make much of an impact with 7'1 Jr Tyson Chandler from Compton (Dominguez) CA, 6'6 Jr Josh Childress from Lakewood (Mayfair) CA, 6'11 Jr Jamal Sampson from Santa Ana (Mater Dei) CA, and 6'4 Jr Cedric Bozeman from Santa Ana (Mater Dei) CA. Yesterday we asked Pat Barrett, who is the AAU coach of the Southern California All-Stars, where he thought Chandler would go to college. Obviously things can change, but Barrett did confirm that right now UCLA is the strong leader. Barrett also confirms the rumor about the possible package deal with Childress, Sampson, and Bozeman to Kansas. And this makes even more sense when one sees Kansas head coach Roy Williams at every one of their games. We couldn't talk with Bozeman yesterday, because he'll be out for at least four or five months with an injury. But when we asked both Childress and Sampson about schools and Kansas is right at the top of their list. Childress also mentioned Utah, Arizona, and Stanford. Sampson, who is the second cousin of former NBA star Ralph Sampson, also mentioned UNLV and North Carolina. Chandler also gave us a list, but nothing has changed since we talked with him two months ago when he gave us UCLA, Kentucky, Arizona, and Kansas. Although Kansas isn't in the lead right now, he could be part of the Jayhawk package with Sampson, Childress,and Bozeman. However, all that could change if Tar Heels head coach Bill Guthridge retires next spring and Williams gets the North Carolina job. Remember, we've been hearing that rumor since early March. Don't you just love all the speculation!"

Of course, from our perspective the Sampson-Bozeman-Childress package is just speculation, but it's interesting that two of the three guys confirmed that they're interested in the same school. Likewise the Brunner & Stokes thing to USC (which has also been reported at BibbyBaby's USC site), is something that comes from some "deep background" among our sources within USC. Seems that the USC coaches were really interested in getting him for this fall, but as we all now know, the Dominguez grad, who first committed to Fresno State, then went to Georgetown where he started in 16 games before transferring back to Fresno where he and Avondre Jones got into a little trouble over a samurai sword which led to Brunner being back in LA where he was accused of putting a gun to the chest of a local JC coach and as a result spent all of last summer as a guest of the County of Los Angeles before the case was thrown out, will be at the college of Southern Idaho after taking some classes this past year at Santa Monica City College.

As for Wesley Stokes, it seems clear now that he is no longer being recruited by UCLA, much to the chagrin of Wesley, but we have no idea if Stokes is at all interested in USC. If he's not, he should be. At least from what we hear, USC is interested in him. When last we saw Wesley in San Diego, he was not too pleased with his own performance last Thursday night against Bloomington Red, nor with the performance of his teammates, and it was SCA's (actually they are using the name "So.Cal Hoops" now, with a period after the "So" and with spaces in the name, unlike "SoCalHoops" the website) fourth consecutive loss in the Nike Summer National Championships. Wesley is a very talented point guard, who really stepped his game up in the early summer, displaying some talents with his passing, driving and shooting that we hadn't really seen before, but it seems from what we saw in San Diego, that his consistency was hurting, as it was for most of these guys late in the summer season. Is he a truly "national" talent on the order of an Imari Sawyer, Andre Barrett or Chris Duhon? Probably not. Is he a good point guard capable of running a Pac-10 offense? Probably. But only time will tell if he ever gets the chance.

Likewise, we know that Brunner was interested in attending USC following the conclusion of all of his legal troubles, but was reportedly turned away, not by the basketball coaches, but by the administration who was looking for him to demonstrate some stability and maturity before they'd consider admitting him. So, we've been told that if he completes a full season at the College of Southern Idaho (JC), without trouble and with a good academic record, that USC will let him in. Stay tuned.

As for the Tyson Chandler-UCLA mutual affection society, we also agree that UCLA is probably still number one on his list, at least from everything we've heard from him. On several occasions we've visted the locker room at Pauley after a game, we've seen Tyson in attendance, and he's made no secret of his fondness for the Bruins. Now if the Bruins can only convince Josh Childress, who was really the only bright spot for SCA in San Diego, to come with Tyson to Westwood, that would be a great package deal.. . .