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Kentucky Recruit DeMarcus Cousins

Demarcus Cousins when discussions arise regarding the 2009 Kentucky Wildcats Men’s basketball recruiting class. There’s plenty of material on point guard prospect John Wall, but the remaining recruiting class articles I see discuss Coach John Calipari’s team as a whole without getting into much depth on each player other than what their Rivals, ESPN, or Scout.com rank is for each player. So, after writing a bit about Darnell Dodson yesterday, this article is an attempt to fill you in a bit on star post player, DeMarcus Cousins that we’ll see playing for the Wildcats in the 2009-10 season.

2009 Kentucky Basketball Recruiting – DeMarcus Cousins’s Background

DeMarcus Cousins is ranked as high as the number 2 overall player in the 2009 NCAA recruiting classes. His trail to Kentucky was a bit more complex than home-grown, Jon Hood’s. Coursins originally committed to UAB (University of Alabama at Birmingham) verbally because he was close with their head coach, Mike Davis and it meant he could stay home and play college basketball. Demarcus Cousins kept this commitment for a good part of the year, but when he asked UAB to formally agree to let him out of his commitment if Mike Davis left the head coaching position, the University declined, so he re-opened his recruitment in the fall of 2008. He then committed to Memphis after visiting campus. Then, of course we all know that Coach Calipari left Memphis for Kentucky, and Cousin’s took advantage of the clause in his LOI with Memphis to follow Cal north to Lexington.

2009 Kentucky Basketball Recruiting – Demarcus Cousin’s Skill-Set

Demarcus Cousin’s is 6’9”260lbs. He is a beast of a player who is going to be scary playing alongside Patrick Patterson and Daniel Orton. He’s already assessed as a solid passer and is adept in the low and high post and can dominate a game when he is focused. Since no player is perfect except for MJ right? The only knock you really read about regarding Demarcus Cousins is that his focus can sometimes waiver during a game if not playing a strong opponent. Is this going to matter when he’s playing good competition at the NCAA level? Who’s to say. With Kentucky’s front court depth and leadership of Patrick Patterson though, its unlikely we’ll see many visible issues of this that aren’t immediately handled by Patterson or the coaching staff. It is going to be fun to see Patterson-Cousins-Orton next season though!

View the Demarcus Cousins Fan Site

Refs:

http://www.binarybasketball.com/2009/03/the-demarcus-cousins-recruiting-saga/, http://sports.espn.go.com/ncaa/recruiting/basketball/mens/news/story?id=4051615, http://www.zagsblog.com/2009/05/22/calipari-lands-top-ranked-class/, http://insider.espn.go.com/ncb/recruiting/tracker/player?page=onthetrail&recruitId=43924&action=login&appRedirect=http%3a%2f%2finsider.espn.go.com%2fncb%2frecruiting%2ftracker%2fplayer%3fpage%3donthetrail%26recruitId%3d43924#, http://www.demarcuscousins.org/,

Kentucky Wildcats Home, Rupp Arena

Coach Cal has been in Lexington for two months and already has built the best college basketball recruiting class for 2009. After two disappointing seasons under former Coach Billy Gillespie that came after two mediocre years (for Kentucky fans) with Tubby Smith, Kentucky fans have been hungry for something to be happy about. The first bit of good news was that star postman Patrick Patterson would return for his junior year instead of making a go at the 2009 NBA draft. The second was the signing of number 2ranked big man Daniel Orton after Coach Cal joined the Wildcats. Since then, Calipari has been busy with building what may just be the best NCAA basketball recruiting class ever with the recent signing of star point guard prospect, John Wall.  With some massaging of his roster still to do, Coach Calipari has become the perfect fit for a Kentucky Wildcat program that has had an identity crisis since the 1996-98 seasons that found the Wildcats win 2 National Championships and play in the NCAA Tournament finals for three consecutive seasons.

Kentucky’s 2009 Men’s Basketball Recruiting Class

#1 Kentucky Basketball Prospect – PG – John Wall
Rivals.com - #1
Scout.com- #1
Ht: 6′4″
Wt: 185 lbs
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