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More and more often now, the Oregon basketball team is catching the eye of elite high school prospects around the nation, ones like Jarred Vanderbilt, a 5-star power forward from Houston, Texas. Yesterday afternoon, Vanderbilt announced his top nine schools on Twitter, and the Ducks made the cut.
I would like to thank every school who has ever recruited me. After deep evaluations, these are my final 9 schools‼️ pic.twitter.com/gb5CwVD3z2
— Jarred Vanderbilt (@JVando_) July 22, 2016
Vanderbilt, who is 6-foot-8 and 200 pounds, is ranked No. 20 on the 2017 ESPN 100 and is the No. 5 power forward on the list. He’s also the No. 2 player on ESPN’s Midlands regional rankings behind P.J. Washington, who is ranked No. 16 overall.
As a sophomore for Victory Prep Academy, Vanderbilt averaged 26.6 points, 15.4 rebounds, 5.2 assists and 2.1 steals per game.
Getting Vanderbilt to come to Eugene won't be a cakewalk with so many other elite programs on his top nine, such as Arizona, North Carolina, Kansas and Kentucky. But considering where this Oregon program was just half a decade ago, it’s still amazing to see them attracting recruits of this caliber.