Two articles on Marquette men’s basketball recruiting in two days after nothing for a month! What a time to be alive.
Anyway, today’s entry is a lot more fun than yesterday’s, which was “only” a scholarship offer. This is an actual recruiting update, as Class of 2021 top 40 prospect DaRon Holmes has included the Golden Eagles in what he is calling his final four schools. Marquette is joined in the grouping by Arizona, California, and Dayton.
2021 four-star DaRon Holmes is down to four schools.
— Tipton Edits (@TiptonEdits) September 24, 2020
Top-50 Prospect.
Story: https://t.co/QI1lWEPULS pic.twitter.com/qBKf8ItyGu
Holmes is listed as a 6’8”, 195 pound power forward by 247 Sports. He’s currently ranked #39 in the country in their Composite system, which makes him a four-star prospect. Holmes is the #10 power forward in the Class of 2021, and the #8 prospect in the state of Florida.
We should probably talk about that last part a little bit. 247 lists Holmes as a Florida prospect because he attends Montverde Academy just outside of Orlando. However, back when Marquette first offered Holmes a scholarship back in June 2019, he was attending Millennium High School in Arizona. So if we wanted to be That Guy, we could point out that Holmes would be the #2 prospect in the state if he were still at Millennium. In fact, because the top prospect in Arizona is noted Milwaukee native Michael Foster (#10 in the country), then we could go so far as to say that Holmes might actually be the best player in the Class of 2021 that actually grew up in Arizona.
There has been some variance in what to think about Holmes’ abilities since MU offered him a scholarship. At the time, Holmes was #49 in the country in the 247 Composite. Four months later, when he was taking a junior year official visit during Marquette Madness 2019, Holmes was all the way down to #119. And now he’s at #39. Wild, huh? At the very least, we can say that 247’s internal system has been pretty consistent on Holmes, as he was #40 on the internal rankings when he was #119 in the Composite.
You’ll notice the link to the article from Tipton Edits in the tweet above, so we should probably drop in the actual notes on Marquette from Holmes from the article, eh?
“Marquette has a great support system; the students really come and support the basketball games. The coaching staff is cool and have a great culture.”
Well, let’s talk about the “coaching staff is cool” item in there for a second. First of all, as an Arizona guy, it’s not crazy to suggest that now former Marquette associate head coach Stan Johnson did a lot of the heavy lifting when it came to doing the early work on Holmes’ recruiting. In fact, Millennium High actually tagged Johnson in their tweet announcing Holmes’ offer from the Golden Eagles. However, Johnson is now the head coach at Loyola Marymount, and Holmes is still saying this about the staff. As we’ve talked about in the past, it’s a regular occurrence to see prospects talking about the personalities of the coaching staff at Marquette, which obviously includes head coach Steve Wojciechowski. I don’t think it’s a stretch to say that we as fans struggle to see this “cool” Steve Wojciechowski on a regular basis, and I don’t think it would be a bad thing if Cool Steve started turning up when interacting with fans as well as with recruits.
Anyway, where were we?
Oh, right, DaRon Holmes.
Amongst the squads that Holmes ruled out here, at least according to the 247 Sports list of offers, was Virginia, Arizona State, LSU, Ole Miss, Tennessee, Texas Tech, UCLA, and USC. That is a pretty strong list of contenders. Of course, we also have to point out that 247 didn’t even include Dayton on their list, and yet the Flyers are in the final four here. Don’t trust everything you read on the internet is what I’m saying...... here on the internet. Dammit. Stupid logic loop.
Can I interest you in a 7 minute junior year highlight reel of Holmes?
Let’s head to the scholarship chart!
Holmes is a Class of 2021 prospect, and as you can see, Marquette is presumably looking at having three spots still available for that class even after the commitments of Kameron Jones and Stevie Mitchell. Jones and Mitchell are both guards, though, so adding a tall guy like Holmes would definitely work out well in terms of positional balance in the class. However, at right around 200 pounds, Holmes is definitely more of a wing than a big, and with Theo John playing his senior season in 2020-21, the Golden Eagles are in serious need of a rim protecting big. Maybe Dawson Garcia or Oso Ighodaro or Justin Lewis turn into that guy over the upcoming season, but even if they do, the Golden Eagles can not rely on having just one defensive anchor on the roster.
Luckily, Marquette will have space to add someone like that for 2021-22 even if they get a commitment from Holmes. Quite honestly, if you can get a commitment from a top 40 prospect who can help your team, you do it and then you figure out how to paper over your remaining flaws after that. With scholarships still available to work with after theoretically adding Holmes — hello, Micawber Etienne? — MU can do exactly that.