Class Of 2022 Prospect Roddy Gayle Includes Marquette In His Top Six

We started our Monday off with a bit of Marquette men’s basketball recruiting news as Class of 2022 guard Roddy Gayle announced a Top Six Schools. Obviously, yes, Marquette is included in the group, and they are joined by UConn, Georgetown, Ohio State, Pittsburgh, and Syracuse.

Perhaps even more interesting than Gayle’s announcement of his top six is the fact that this is clearly a final six as he will be announcing his decision this coming Friday, November 13th. It’s a little bit surprising for a Class of 2022 prospect to be announcing this early in his recruiting cycle, sure, but it makes a bit of sense. If Gayle knows what he wants to do, then there’s no reason to hold it off any further. In addition to that, there won’t be any on campus visitations or official visits for a long, long time thanks to COVID-19, so it’s not like Gayle needs to wait to take any visits.

I will also point out that the fall signing period for 2021 recruits, the current crop of high school seniors, starts on Wednesday, November 11, and that Gayle, who is a 2022 prospect and a high school junior, is announcing two days after that signing period starts. That’s a little on the odd side if you’re trying to find a spot in the calendar that you can occupy by yourself.... but maybe not if you’re planning on announcing a reclassification in the process? That’s merely conjecture on my part, so don’t run around saying that I reported that as fact.

Roddy Gayle is listed as a 6’4”, 195 pound shooting guard by 247 Sports. According to their Composite system, he’s the #76 prospect in the Class of 2022. That makes him the #7 shooting guard in the class and the #2 shooting guard prospect that Marquette got involved with after Justice Williams at #2 in the positional rankings. Gayle is also the top prospect in the state of New York, as he attends Lewiston Porter Senior High School in Youngstown.

I don’t know about the other five schools in Gayle’s top six, but it’s been a pretty quick recruitment for Marquette, at least in terms of when the scholarship offer was made. Head coach Steve Wojciechowski and his staff made the offer back in early May of this year. Obviously, Gayle had been on MU’s radar for a while before that since you’ll be hard pressed to find a college coach that offers a scholarship to a guy sight unseen. Still, six months is a pretty short amount of time, but then again, Gayle is narrowing down the timeline by committing a full year before he can sign a national letter of intent.

As a freshman, Gayle averaged 22.0 points, 8.9 rebounds, 3.7 assists, and 2.4 steals. Last year, he gave Lewiston Porter 25.8 points, nine rebounds, three assists, and 2.3 steals per game. That’s some pretty consistent production, especially after a full season’s worth of everyone knowing that they need to defend him.

Here’s a 90 second sophomore year mixtape:

I’m not sure when the clips in this video are from, but it was posted on May 16, 2020, so hopefully that means they’re pretty recent.

And now, the scholarship chart.

With Gayle as a 2022 prospect and a guard at that, you can easily see how he fills in the Greg Elliott shaped hole left behind from the 2021-22 roster. That’s also the only hole on the roster currently projected to open up for the Golden Eagles. There’s also the issue of the three scholarships that are currently sitting unoccupied for the 2021-22 season. If one or more of those roll over to 2022-23, then Gayle would merely be a notable part of MU’s recruiting class instead of the entirety of it. Of course, we might be as long as five months away from getting full clarity on that scholarship situation.