With one top-100 basketball recruit already in the fold, the University of Dayton may be close to getting a commitment from another prospect who has managed to crack that exclusive list.
Senior-to-be Brandon Spearman of Chicago Simeon High School — who is ranked by Rivals.com as the 71st-best player nationally in the 2010 class — visited Marquette this week and has offers from DePaul, Bradley, Baylor and Iowa State. But the 6-foot-3, 185-pound shooting guard said he favors Dayton and plans to make his college choice at the end of the AAU season in July.
Spearman visited UD earlier this month and was impressed.
“Man, wow, I couldn’t believe it,” he said. “I love it down there — everything from the campus to the people to the city. I just love it.”
Spearman is described by Rivals as “a physical guard who can dominate defensively.” And he could give UD its second four-star recruit (out of five) in the 2010 class.
Dayton native Juwan Staten, a point guard ranked 59th overall by Rivals, committed to the Flyers last year.
A late bloomer who’s just now attracting the attention of the top schools from BCS conferences, Spearman played pick-up games with the Flyers during his visit and came away impressed.
“They were real good,” he said. “C.J. (Chris Johnson), Marcus (Johnson), everybody was good. They’re fun to play with, real fun to play with.”
UD will have five scholarships to give after this season and has committed two of them to Staten, who will spend his senior year at Oak Hill Academy, and small forward Ralph Hill of Westerville, Ohio. Although they’ll be losing four guards, the Flyers are planning to bring in just two other backcourt players with Staten.
