Louisville basketball: Can Cards land top 10 guard this weekend?

Louisville basketball is still in on a number of key pieces in the 2020 class. Why Jalen Terry could be a centerpiece in Chris Mack’s third year.

After much was made of Louisville basketball’s 2020 recruiting class blunders over the summer and into this fall, the Cardinals are right on track to once again land one of the country’s top 10 recruiting classes.

In head coach Chris Mack’s second full recruiting cycle, he has landed commitments from four stars D’Andre Davis and JJ Traynor as well as No. 1 JUCO player and likely one-and-done Jay Scrubb. Those three commits have catapulted the Cards into the No. 8 spot in the 247Sports 2020 recruiting rankings.

There’s potential for Louisville basketball to climb up in the rankings, and more importantly, find some key pieces in this class.

The Cards are likely going to lose five, and potentially six, players from this year’s team, which means that the coaching staff still has at least two scholarship spots to fill.

One name that has surfaced is 2020 point guard Jalen Terry.

After committing to Tom Izzo and Michigan State in April, Terry appeared locked in to replace star guards Cassius Winston and Joshua Langford alongside 2019 stud Rocket Watts. However, last month, Terry de-committed from Sparty citing that he was “re-thinking it” with his family.

Since re-opening his commitment, Louisville and Chris Mack have perhaps been on Terry the hardest.

A position of need

In a class that is thinning out quickly as early signing day approaches, Louisville is running out of options in a year where they are going to need to land a guard.

The Cards do have a pledge from Scrubb, who would be a starter from day one, but the Louisville native is not a primary ball-handler and is still eyeing a shot at jumping straight from JUCO to the league.

Louisville will more than likely return Darius Perry and current freshmen David Johnson and Josh Nickelberry round out the backcourt going forward.

Outside of that, Louisville loses current starter Ryan McMahon and grad transfer Fresh Kimble- two players who figure to eat up a ton of minutes in 2019-20. This means that the Cards are going to need another body to help supplement their losses while adding versatility and depth.

An untraditional skillset

Enter Terry. The Cards have a real chance to land one of the top remaining primary ball handlers in the class, but he is not what we’ve grown accustomed to seeing from a Chris Mack recruit.

Mack seems to love long guards who are more effective in his pack-line style of defense.

However, in the past, Mack never really had a shot at landing a player with the talent and athleticism of the 5’10,” 160 pound Terry.

Still, Terry has shown that he is adept at stopping the ball on defense and poking away at shifty offensive players in the lane.

Cards fans are used to watching Rick Pitino-coached guards jump into passing lanes and hound defenders mercilessly. Under Mack, however, we are learning that there’s more than one way to skin a cat on defense and Louisville has still been effective at forcing turnovers and bad possessions.

That’s what Terry clearly understands based on the tape that we have to work with. Terry demonstrates the ability to keep the opponent in front of him with his quickness and get the ball handler uncomfortable.

On offense, Terry is clearly a point guard and willing distributor, but he can also get to the bucket.

Terry has the speed to blow by guys, but he demonstrates patience in doing so, making his moves at the right time rather than trying to score in a crowd.

Terry’s got some room to learn and grow, but overall, his game is more than worthy of his No. 56 overall composite ranking via 247Sports.

Here’s what analyst Jerry Meyer had to say about a player he projects at a Power 5 Starter:

"Slight of frame and sub six feet, but extremely quick and fast. Has the ball on a string as a handler. Adept penetrator. Needs to improve shooting percentage inside and outside the arc. Is a good distributor, but at times needs to be stronger with the basketball. Not a physical defender but has a high steal rate with his quickness and anticipation."

Can Louisville land Terry?

At this point, it appears Louisville has as good of a chance as anyone to land Terry’s services. Terry is a Michigan native, but he hasn’t scheduled a visit to the Wolverine’s to this point, and it feels like he wouldn’t rescind his commitment from an in-state school to play for their rivals.

Terry is a Nike affiliated player. He spent the last two summers on the Nike EYBL circuits, and most recently took a visit to LSU, a Nike school.

Terry walked away from that visit without committing, which is a great sign for Louisville. He also appears to be visiting Louisville last, which bodes well for the Cards hosting an uncommitted player with some of the best facilities in the country.

It looks to be down to Louisville and LSU, and when you compare the overall momentum of the two schools, the Cards are a no-brainer.

247Sports recruiting expert, and writer for The Devils Den and The Athletic, Andrew Slater is one of the most knowledgable among the site’s recruiting experts. Slater, who has accurately predicted 66 out of 71 commitments in the 2020 class, placed a Crystal Ball prediction for Terry to Louisville on Thursday night.

Terry will be in Louisville on Sunday when they host Youngstown State. At this point, all signs point towards Louisville being the favorite for his services.

If they can land Terry, the Cards will quietly have established a class just as deep and perhaps even more effective than their heralded 2019 class.

If Terry were to commit, Louisville’s class would jump from 57.4 to 63.24 team score and the Cards would go from 8th to 5th in the overall rankings. That would be just three points behind last year’s class- one that was seen as a huge success.

Once again, Chris Mack and Louisville are continuing to build something great for years to come.