Three JUCO standouts from Idaho interested in Hawaii
The Hawaii basketball team took one win out of the state of Idaho last week. Now the Warriors are working on taking some players from that state.
Three guards from junior colleges in Idaho are showing interest in playing for the Warriors next season: Pierre Jackson and Darius Smith from College of Southern Idaho, and Michael Hale from North Idaho College.
Jackson is the left photo here, and Smith is the right photo. Hale’s photo is below.
Jackson is a dynamic 5-foot-10 point guard who is averaging 17.2 points, 5.0 assists and 2.2 steals per game. He is the leading scorer for a talented CSI team that has a 22-3 record and is ranked No. 6 in the national junior college poll.
Current Hawaii sophomore forward Joston Thomas played with Jackson last season at CSI.
“I’ve been talking to Joston Thomas a lot; he was my teammate last year, so he told me Hawaii was a great place to play,” Jackson said. “There’s some other schools calling me, but I definitely would consider Hawaii.”
Jackson’s current teammate, Darius Smith, is an intriguing recruit. He was a highly-rated prospect as a high school player in Chicago, and signed with Connecticut. He saw limited action as a freshman at UConn during the 2009-10 season, and decided to transfer.
He is averaging 9.1 points and 5.3 rebounds per game this season for CSI. As proof of his talent, the 6-2 Smith leads the Scenic West Athletic Conference in assists with 5.3 per game, and in steals with 3.0 per game.
“I love playing with Darius,” Jackson said. “We talked about maybe playing together somewhere next year.”
North Idaho’s Hale is battling Jackson for top point guard honors in the Scenic West conference this season. Hale is averaging 16.6 points and 4.0 rebounds and 4.1 assists per game. As a freshman last season, he was named to the junior college All-America second team.
DeShawn Mitchell – the high-scoring guard at Snow College who is also interested in playing for Hawaii – said he talked to Hale about Hawaii when their two teams met earlier this season.
“He’s not that big, but he plays big,” Mitchell said of Hale. “He knows how to get in the lane and make things happen. He’s so quick.”
Here are video highlights of the three players when they were in high school:
Pierre Jackson (No. 5 in black jersey):
Michael Hale (No. 11 in blue jersey):
Darius Smith (No. 31):
think darius smith looks the best based on the videos but might be a me first type guy. all three look good and hopefully we get the best one. are they all the same age and how much years would they have of eligibility?
All three are sophomores and would thus have two years of NCAA eligibility.
Any of these guys would be good, but the only would have 2 years, plus we already have some good point guards for next year. I think we need to look at either another young shooter or some big men.
Next year we have Blakes and Tavita new, along with Miah, Barnes, Miles, and Johnson.
For the big men we only have Joaquim, Thomas (who’s not really 6-7 c’mon), Brumfield, and Rozitis. All will be juniors next year with only Stevens coming in as a young big man. If we can find a way to get a few more big men then it’d be that much better. Brumfield’s recovery has been really slow and it’s hard to tell how much he can contribute next year. Thomas is undersized so we’re left with a question mark with Rozitis to go along with Joaquim who will be even better next year.
I just keep thinking these 3 guys might end up being like Salter and so going with younger big guys might be better for our team next year, especially since all our big men now will be gone after the next 2 seasons.
Excellent!
Good to know that some of these good looking prospects are interested in Hawaii. Darius Smith looks good on video.
Gib needs a really good power forward, that can score from 18ft in, and REBOUND and BLOCK ! That’s what this team needs for next season, so far no replacement for Amis.
Rozitis gonna be a good replacement for Amis
if i were to pick one guard, it would be darius smith.
if i were to pick two then the second would be jackson.
then with the last scholie available i’d go get a big.
So these three are interested in Hawaii, is Gib interested in them as well?
Good point Josh. Guess we won’t know for sure until signing day.
However, one of the Southern Idaho coaches said that the Hawaii coaches have showed up to watch games, so there must be some interest.
But it also seems like Gib and his staff are watching games all over the country, so they are apparently interested in a bunch of others as well.
Instead of coming home with the rest of the team from Idaho, Gib made a recruiting stop in California, so there’s got to be some he’s looking at over there for sure.