5-Star Small Forward Commits to Louisville!

The Louisville Cardinals just got some great news as V.J. King, a 6’7 5-star small forward in the class of 2016, committed to the Cards. King is a 5-star player on all four major recruiting sites. I posted about a month ago that King was a “recruit to watch” for Louisville fans, which means there was a good chance he would commit. If you read that, you got to know a little more about him. If not, I will list some things below about where he ranks on different sites.

Words cannot express the feeling. All the glory and praise goes to the man upstairs…This is only… https://t.co/YR5pLzWpvu

— Vincent Jr. (@vjking_) June 12, 2015

Needless to say, this is a GREAT start to the class of 2016 for Rick Pitino. Not to rush this season at all, but the 2016-17 team for Louisville has a chance to be very special. I may dig into that at a later time. For now, the focus is on King.

Scout.com’s Evan Daniels broke down the story in this post, and here are some quotes from King from that story:

“I think probably the main reason I picked that school was the conference,” King said. “I’ve always wanted to play in the ACC, the top conference in the country. Plus with the roster they have, I fit right into that system. They have a bunch of bigs and guards and not really that scoring factor and I can fit that.”

“After the UConn visit, I knew it was between them and Louisville,” King said. “I told coach that I had an idea of where I wanted to go. It was after the UConn visit after I came back. I went back and talked to people I needed to talk to and I kind of assessed everything.”

“I could tell as the visit went on, he (Rick Pitino) started to grow to me,” King said. “He would ask me to ride with him even when we had drivers. He would have side conversations with me and tell me stories and tell me about his relationship with Russ Smith. I could tell there was something different between us.”

“I talk to Kenny (Johnson) almost everyday,” King said. “Out of everybody he was on me the hardest. We talked the most and most of the time it wasn’t about basketball. I formed a really good relationship with him and I can really trust him. He was one of the driving forces in this commitment.”

Jerry Meyer is a national recruiting analyst for 247 Sports, and he had some things to say about King:

“I think he’s getting better and he was already pretty good,” 247Sports national recruiting analyst Jerry Meyer said. “The No. 1 thing he’ll bring to Louisville is versatility and talent. He’s at that size and athleticism he can guard multiple positions on defense and offensively he does everything really well. I like his passing, court awareness, he rebounds his positions and I think he’s getting more assertive and aggressive as a scorer. That’s where I’ve seen the most improvement.”

“What stands out about his game is everything he does other than being an alpha scorer,” Meyer said. “I don’t know if he’ll ever be an alpha scorer in college but he’ll be a steady scorer. He might play a similar role that Earl Clark played, a jack of all trades. He’s a real versatile guy you can trust with the basketball in a variety of situations.”

“He’s a legit 5-star prospect — a great get for the Cardinals,” said Meyer. “He’s a great get to start it out for Louisville’s class. Any team would be delighted to have VJ as their first commitment in 2016.”

247 Sports

5-star player

#16 overall player in the class

#2 SF in the class

Crystal Ball: 92% Louisville

Rivals

5-star player

#11 overall player in the class

Scout

5-star player

#18 overall player in the class

#5 SF in the class

ESPN

5-star player

#25 overall player in the class

#6 SF in the class

#1 player in Virginia