Update on Jared Stutzman (with Highlight Video)

We’ve posted a few articles on 2014 recruit Jared Stutzman, and we recently received some footage of a recent game that we wanted to share. In the video below the 6-5 shooting guard from Bonneville High School drops 37 points and dishes out 8 assists against rival Idaho Falls.

Jared has offers from the University of Utah and Weber State University but has not committed to either one. He has also received interest from Stanford, Colorado, Washington State, BYU, Idaho, Gonzaga, and Boise State.

Jared has visited Utah State on several occasions, the most recent of which was the game against Nevada on January 7th. He attended the game with another top 2014 recruit Dalton Nixon from Orem High School. Both Stutzman and Nixon are ranked in the top 4 2014 recruits according to Intermountain Hoops Scouting Service. Jared plans to meet up with former Idaho player of the year Brady Jardine on campus this spring for a meal.

New Jared Stutzman Highlight Video

Some of you might remember an article from last summer about Jared Stutzman, a 2014 recruit. Stutzman is a sophomore this year and is contributing in a big way for Bonneville High School in a big way.

Here’s a highlight clip from a recent game against Idaho powerhouse Highland High School where Jared scores 26 points, grabs 16 boards, blocks 3 shots, and dishes out 3 assists.

2013 Aggie Recruit Eric Mika

Eric MikaLast week’s football game against Wyoming played host to several Utah State recruits (both basketball and football). While to football team garnered two new commitments in the locker room after the game, the Aggie Basketball team brought in four recruits as well.

Three of these recruits have been committed to Utah State for quite some time, specifically, Riley Bradshaw, Quincy Bair, and Marcel Davis. That trio will be joining the team for the 2012-13 season after completing their senior seasons in high school this year. The fourth basketball recruit that was on campus this weekend was 6-foot-7 junior Forward/Center Eric Mika.

Eric Mika played his first two high school basketball seasons at 2A Waterford High School, a private high school located in Sandy, Utah. As a Sophomore, Mika averaged 18 points and 11 rebounds per game, leading his team to the 2A state championship game where they came up just short in a 38-37 loss to South Summit.

Over the summer Mika decided to make the move to Lone Peak High School, a 5A public school located in Highland, Utah. Lone Peak is a powerhouse basketball school that took the 5A state crown this past year. Despite the fact that Eric lives within the school boundaries, and was moving from a private school to a public school closer to his home, a three-member panel from Utah High School Activities Association’s (UHSAA) executive committee decided (unanimously) to deny Eric eligibility to participate in basketball this coming season.

The UHSAA’s transfer rule stipulates that a player must demonstrate a “hardship” in order to be granted eligibility in athletics when transferring schools. Eric’s hardship waiver was requested due to the fact that he had to commute to Waterford, attend early morning seminary classes, and share a gym with the girls team after school leading to later, and longer practice times. His school days were regularly 12-15 hours long. This was apparently not enough to convince the three-member panel to grant him eligibility.

Eric has two D1 offers in the bag already, one from Utah State, and the other from Weber State. Unfortunately for Eric, and the teams recruiting him, it looks like he won’t be seeing any action on a basketball court this school year.

Aggies add JC Big Sean Harris to 2012 Class

Sean Harris Signing PaperworkNews broke a couple of weeks ago that Utah State received a commitment from a JC power forward Sean Harris. Now, I know you may be thinking: “The Aggies recruit LDS missionaries? I thought that was just BYU!!?” but before you get too far, the image to the left may not be what you think it is.

After completing one year of Junior College at Yuba College in California, Harris left to Honduras on an religious mission. While on his mission he committed to Bradley University (thus the photo to the left). However, shortly thereafter, coach Jim Les was released from his duties as Bradley’s head coach, and Harris decided to re-open his recruitment. As a member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints, Harris grew up a BYU fan, and was very interested in playing in the state of Utah. Upon returning home from his mission, Harris was recruited by both BYU and Utah State, as well as several other D1 schools including Idaho, UC Santa Barbara, and UC Davis. After taking an official visit to Utah State to take in the Utah State vs. Weber State football game on September 10th, Harris decided to look no further, and committed to the Aggies.

Sean graduated from Rocklin High School in Rocklin, CA as a 6-6 forward. He was named the team MVP his senior year averaging 16.6 points, 8.6 rebounds, 2.6 steals and 2 blocks per game. He then moved to Yuba College leading his team to a 32-4 record while averaging 14.9 points and 11.7 rebounds per game. Harris was once again named team MVP, and was the runner up Bay Valley Conference Player of the Year as a freshman.

Since then, Harris has grown a couple of inches and is now listed at 6-8, 200lbs.

Parsing The WAC put up a good article on Harris with the following quote from his head coach at Yuba College, Doug Cornelius:

Sean hasn’t played in three years but is an extremely hardworking kid with a high motor. I call him a skilled four, someone skilled and strong who really runs the court. He has put on 15-20 pounds of muscle and is going to be a really hard matchup but first he needs to get his legs back.

In an interview with Aggieville’s Tony Jones, Cornelius had the following to say:

“He loves that Utah State is a top-25 team almost every year,” Cornelius told the Tribune. “He visited there, and he thought it was a great fit. He got along well with the guys and he loved it there. He’s a big forward, the ultimate four man. He’ll be about 220 pounds by the time he gets to Utah State. The fans there are going to love how hard he plays. He’s relentless.”

“I think he can be really successful there,” Cornelius said. “He can challenge for a starting spot right away. With his skill set and how hard he plays, he can be really good for them.”

With Brady Jardine graduating after this year a lot of playing time will become available down low for the 2012-13 season. It appears that Sean will be competing for time in the post with highly touted Oklahoma State transfer Jarred Shaw, Ben Clifford, Kyisean Reed, Igor Premasunac, and likely redshirt freshman Jordan Stone, none of which have yet to play a minute in an Aggie uniform. Shaw, Premasunac, and Stone will play more of a true center position while Clifford and Reed will most likely be Harris’s main competition for playing time at the power forward slot. It should be very interesting to see how it all shakes out next season. By this time next year, things will likely be much more clearly defined.

Here’s our updated roster for 2012-13 (with a few redshirt assumptions mixed in):

2012-13
1 – Antonio Bumpus (Sr.)
2 – Kyisean Reed (Sr.)
3 – E.J. Farris (Sr.)
4 – Igor Premasunac (Sr.)
5 – Preston Medlin (Jr.)
6 – Mitch Bruneel (Jr.)
7 – Jarred Shaw (RS Jr.)
8 – Sean Harris (Jr.)
9 – Danny Berger (RS So.)
10 – Ben Clifford (So.)
11 – Steven Thornton (So.)
12 – Adam Thoseby (So.)
13 – Jordan Stone (RS Fr.)
14 – Marcel Davis (Fr.) (Verballed 6/19/10)
15 – Quincy Bair (Fr.) (Verballed 7/3/10)
16 – Riley Bradshaw (Fr.) (Verballed 4/28/11)

On Missions during 2012-13 season: David Collette, Casey Oliverson, Sam Orchard

Riley Bradshaw: The Best Player in Montana

Riley BradshawESPN has recently confirmed what we here at USUStats.com have already known for months. When it comes to high school basketball players in the state of Montana, there is no one better than Corvallis High School’s Riley Bradshaw. After completing his senior year at Corvallis, Riley will be joining the Utah State basketball program for the 2012-13 season.

ESPN recently created a recruiting profile for Riley ranking him as the #1 player in the State of Montana. On a scale of 100 Scout has given him a rating of 86. While these grades are usually given based on limited knowledge and actual observations (usually at AAU events around the country), here is the explanation ESPN provides for this grade:

83-88: Mid-major prospect
Player is a multi-year starter at the mid-major level.

Bradshaw also ranked as the #53 overall prospect in the west region of the 2012 recruiting class and #50 in the nation at the Point Guard position.

For those of you without ESPN Insider Access, the write-up on Riley talks about his excellent abilities on the offensive end. He can hit the three, drive and pop for the mid-range jumper, or take the ball to the hole with good body control and finish with either hand. Scout.com reviews from Las Vegas earlier this year also talked about Riley’s cross-over dribble completely devastating opponents over and over again. ESPN mentioned that he also has excellent all around skills and a good understanding of the game. Things that Riley needs to work on (according to ESPN scouts) are his stength and speed to be able to compete with stronger and quicker guards at the next level.

At the end of the ESPN Insider write-up, it was mentioned that Riley has a lot of upside. With one more year left to play at Corvallis, Riley’s rating may very well move up the scale.

While Riley has played PG in high school, it is yet to be seen what position he will play for the Aggies. He may come in sharing time with Marcel Davis at the PG slot, or Stew may opt to put them both on the court at the same time, moving Riley to the 2-guard. Either way, Utah State’s backcourt for the next several years is looking very, very strong.

Utah Pump-N-Run continues to win in Anaheim

Utah Pump-N-Run LogoThe Utah Pump-N-Run squad has continued their recent success this week at the DoublePump Best of Summer Tournament in Anaheim, California. The team went 3-0 in pool play games, and has since won their first two games in the tournament bracket.

The first tournament win came yesterday against EBC Elite, a team from Seattle, Washington. Leading the way for the Pump-N-Run was David Collette with 17 points and 9 rebounds. Jordan Loveridge chipped in with 12 points and 6 boards. Collette and Loveridge have seemingly been taking turns as scoring leader. In pool play Loverdge dropped 26 and 10 boards on GroundUP while Collette dropped 23 and 12 on Houston.

Today the team pulled out a nail biter against the Minnesota Select winning 69-66. Up 67-66 with under 30 seconds remaining in the game, Marcel Davis came up with a big deflection, knocking the ball to Jordan Pryor who was subsequently fouled and made two clutch free throws. Pryor and Quincy Bair have both been suffering from flu-like symptoms.

Some stats from today’s game:

Loveridge – 22 points and 7 boards
Collette – 18 points, 3 boards, 5 blocks
Davis – 11 points
Pryor – 10 points with two timely 3’s

There are reports that all of the major universities from around the state are represented at the tournament including Utah State, BYU, Utah, Weber State, SUU, UVU, and Dixie College.

This Salt Lake Tribune writeup had a couple of interesting quotes from Jordan Loveridge:

When asked about how his three Utah State bound teammates pushing him to commit to Utah State he said:

“It’s all good, they don’t bug me too bad about it, but they don’t have to,” he said. “They know that they want me to join them up there real bad, and they know that I know, so they don’t say much. I really like Utah State, but I like a lot of schools right now.”

Regarding his current offers and prospects for more he said:

“They can’t contact me when I’m playing, but I definitely know that they’re there,” said Loveridge. “I want more offers. That would be great. We’ll just have to see what comes my way after we’re done with all of this.”

With the limited internet coverage of this tournament, usustats has received limited news on the rest of the Aggie recruits who are participating. The only news we have heard is that Jalen Moore’s Cache Valley Elite squad won their first game behind an impressive scoring performance by Jalen.

Aggie recruits lead Pump-N-Run to Final Four

Utah Pump-N-Run LogoA lot has been said about the Utah Pump-N-Run’s epic run to the semi-finals of the Adidas Super 64 Tournament this week in Las Vegas Nevada. I figured I better chime in with my two cents as well. I’ve focused more on Adam Thoseby’s recent play for the Great Britain National Team and Riley Bradshaw’s play in the Adidas 64 Tournament mainly because there was little to no coverage out there for them. That doesn’t mean that this blog wasn’t paying attention to the Utah Pump-N-Run Squad.

In a lot of ways the Utah Pump-N-Run may as well be named the Utah State Aggies Pump N Run. The squad consists of three commits in David Collette (2011), Marcel Davis (2012), and Quincy Bair (2012). It also has two other Aggie recruits in Jaden Jackson and Jordan Loveridge. Jackson has not received an offer as of yet, but Loveridge is Stew Morrill’s top target to finish off a stellar 2012 recruiting class that also includes top prospect out of Montana, Riley Bradshaw.

The run to the semi-finals was very unlikely for the Pump-N-Run crew, especially considering that they had to get through four national powerhouse teams on their way there. After going 3-0 in group play, the Utah Pump-N-Run tried on the glass slipper… and it fit. At least until the semi-finals.

On Sunday morning they faced off against the Florida Rams and one of the top national recruits Joel James. They made quick work of the Rams winning the game 71-52. Marcel Davis led the way with 12 points and 12 assists in the game and Jordan Loveridge chimed in with 18 points of his own. Hitting double digits in assists was not a rarity at this point for Davis who had done so in three of his first four games up to that point. In fact, in the last game of group play Davis nearly pulled off a triple double with 15 points, 10 boards, and 9 assists. Quincy Bair had two points in the game, and David Collette chose to sit that one out due to his LDS faith.

As if beating the Rams wasn’t enough the Pump-N-Run came up with another huge victory over the Compton Magic, winning the game 83-72. Loveridge once again led the squad in scoring dropping in 25 points. Marcel David scored 7 and dished out 13 assists.

Next up on the chopping block were the Atlanta Celtics. The Celtics were the overall #1 seed in the tournament, their squad packed with top elite prospects. And did I mention that they were also the two-time defending champions of the Adidas Super 64 event? As if that wasn’t intimidating enough, they also had NBA star Josh Smith sitting with the team on the bench. If they were intimidated, the Pump N Run didn’t show it, pulling off possibly the biggest upset of the tournament and perhaps the biggest upset in the history of their AAU program. They pulled out a 69-68 victory with a potential game winning bucket coming after time expired for the Celtics. Loveridge led the way again with 23 points, and Davis overcame an elbow to the face requiring four stitches to the tune of 8 points and 11 assists. David Collette had a huge game as well scoring 20 points facing off against some of the best post players in the country.

With the win (already their second of the day) The Pump-N-Run were played their third contest of the day, facing off against the Michigan Mustangs. By now the Pump-N-Run Squad had become accustomed to the same old story, showing up as the huge underdog, being scoffed at, and then taking the opponent out to the woodshed for a serious beating. Check out this Marcel Davis quote from an Aggieville Blog entry (Tony Jones):

“They look at us, they see Utah on the front of our jerseys and they think they’re going to have an easy game,” Davis said. “They’re playing and joking in their lay-up lines, and we’re serious and here for business. Then we hit them with an 8-0 run to start the game and they’re calling timeout.”

The Pump-N-Run beat the Mustangs 71-62 once again getting big contributions from Jordan Loveridge (26 points) and Marcel Davis (10 points, 12 assists). David Collette dropped in 10 points and Quincy Bair had two. West Jordan guard Jordan Pryor had a great tournament as well, and was unconscious from downtown through the first seven games. Jaden Jackson also contributed with 8 points and 6 boards.

Earlier today the Pump-N-Run faced off against the Texas Assault. It was a game of runs and the Pump-N-Run squad went into halftime with a 31-25 lead. The Texas Assault came roaring back in the second half, only to see the Pump-N-Run make another run. Then everything changed. With 5 minutes remaining Jordan Loveridge committed his 5th foul and was subsequently whistled for a technical foul which disqualified him from the contest. From that point on the Pump-N-Run squad only managed to score two more points which wasn’t enough. The Assault finished off the game on a 16-6 run winning it 65-57.

Next up for the Utah Pump-N-Run? They have no time to rest. In fact, team members have already been tweeting from the west coast tonight. They have arrived is Southern California for the Double Pump Best of the Summer Tournament in Anaheim.

Also joining them will be Aggie commits Jalen Moore (2013) and Riley Bradshaw (2012) with their respective teams, the Cache Valley Elite, and the Idaho Select Black.

Hopefully we will see some more great performances from our future Aggies. I, for one, can’t wait to see them all suit up in Aggie Blue.

Riley Bradshaw gets national attention in Vegas

Riley BradshawRiley Bradshaw got some national publicity from his recent performances in the Adidas Super 64 Tournament in Las Vegas, NV.

In a premium article on Scout.com, recruiting analyst Josh Gershon mentioned Riley along with a handful of big name 2012 recruits.

Josh mentioned that Utah State got a real steal in Bradshaw, who stood out to him in the games he watched, even though he wasn’t initially there to see Riley play. Bradshaw’s crossover was apparently devastating for defenders and he could hit from downtown, get to the hoop, or get past defenders for the mid-range shot.

I can only assume that the writeup was in response to Riley’s 29 point performance against Utah’s “The Factory” team featuring top BYU prospects Nick Emery and TJ Haws.

To give you some perspective of this praise, the other players covered in the article (for those of you who don’t have Scout.com subscriptions) were the following:

2012 Recruits
Ranked:
Shabazz Muhammad – #1 prospect in the nation
Robert Upshaw – #11 ranked C
Winston Shephard – #14 ranked SF
Xavier Johnson – #16 ranked SF
Prince Ibeh – #21 ranked C
Javan Felix – #23 ranked PG

Unranked:
Joe Rahon – PG (on same AAU team as Muhammad, Upshaw, Shephard, Johnson)
Matthew Willms – C (raw 7-footer from Detroit)
Riley Bradshaw – PG (Utah State commit)

Keep up the good work “Red”!

Riley Bradshaw impresses at Adidas 64 Tournament

Riley Bradshaw2012 Aggie commit Riley Bradshaw scored a combined 48 points in a pair of clutch victories on Sunday for his AAU squad, the Idaho Select Black. The Black are playing in one of the most prestigious AAU tournaments in the country, the Adidas Super 64 Tournament. Early in the day, the Black were faced a do-or-die play-in game against the Dallas Mustangs. Bradshaw came up big, leading all scorers with 19 points as his squad came away victorious, 67-55.

Riley has been playing the point guard position for his team, and from all reports has been doing it very well. The win over the Dallas Mustangs gave the Black an entry into the “Adidas Super 64 17u Gold Bracket” and a shot at a very good team from Utah, “The Factory” later that night. The Factory squad includes two top BYU recruits: Nick Emery (2013), and TJ Haws (2014).

Riley came up even bigger against The Factory, scoring 29 points and leading his team to a 94-83 victory. The Idaho Select Black are scheduled to play the Arizona Sting today at 1:00 p.m.

Adam Thoseby scores 17, GB takes 13th

Great Britain FlagAdam Thoseby came up with his second straight good outing, this time scoring 17 points in a win over Romania. Great Britain obliterated the Romanians 104-50. Thoseby went 5-11 from the field and 2-4 from downtown. He also tallied a rebound, an assist, three steals, and a blocked shot.

With the win Great Britain had won six straight games in the tournament and advanced to their final contest meeting up once again with Iceland for the #13/14 spot.

The Brits made it 7 straight wins in their final game against Iceland on Sunday locking up the #13 spot in the tournament despite going 7-2 overall. Thoseby scored 5 points (2-3 from the field) and grabbed 2 rebounds while dishing out two assists in the win.