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Adam Zagoria covers basketball at all levels. He is the author of two books and an award-winning journalist whose articles have appeared in ESPN The Magazine, SLAM, Sheridan Hoops, Sports Illustrated, Basketball Times and in newspapers nationwide.
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Saturday / November 23.

Chris SilvaROSELLE, N.J. — Chris Silva is headed to the SEC.

The 6-foot-9 power forward from Gabon, Africa and Roselle (N.J.) Catholic committed to South Carolina on Friday, choosing the Gamecocks  over Rhode Island and local option Seton Hall.

“I have decided that next year I will go play basketball at one school, South Carolina,” he said as he put on a Gamecocks hat on his 18th birthday.

The announcement came after Silva took an official visit to the SEC school that made quite an impression on him and one day after Silva met with South Carolina coach Frank Martin.

“What he really wanted was to play against the best people in the country, not only in games but day in and day out in practice and I think he felt as though South Carolina gave him the best opportunity to do that, with the SEC schedule, the daily competition in practice, he felt like that would be a good fit,” RC coach Dave Boff told SNY.tv

“Chris is going to be a great college player,” Boff added. “His athletic ability really translates well to the next level and he is continuing to develop his post and perimeter skills which should make him a tough match-up in college.”

Tacko FallHere’s your Friday morning look-ahead to the weekend’s recruiting visits and other news:

**Chris Silva, a 6-foot-9 power forward from Roselle (N.J.) Catholic, will announce at around 3:15 p.m. today for Seton Hall, Rhode Island or South Carolina. Check back here for the story later.

**Chris Clarke, a 6-foot-5 shooting guard from Virginia Beach (VA) Cape Henry Collegiate School, visits Creighton officially this weekend. He then trips to Virginia Tech and Tennessee. He’s also been to UConn.

**Cheick Diallo, the 6-9 big man from Our Savior New American (N.Y.), takes an official visit to Kansas following Thursday’s home visit with Kentucky’s John Calipari.

Briscoe Peach Jam 2Following his in-home visit Thursday with Kentucky coach John Calipari, Isaiah Briscoe will visit the school at some point but no date has been set, Roselle (N.J.) Catholic coach Dave Boff told SNY.tv.

“The visit went great,” Boff said. “He will visit there but no date set.”

As of now, the 6-foot-3 Briscoe is set to take officials to UConn (Sept. 26) and Missouri (Oct. 10). He may also trip to St. John’s the weekend of Oct. 17, the same weekend as Kentucky’s Big Blue Madness.

After meeting this week with coaches from Seton Hall, Missouri, Georgia Tech and now Kentucky, he will meet Monday with St. John’s coach Steve Lavin.

IMG_8607By JACK LeGWIN

Sidney Wilson has picked up two offers from high-major schools, with Minnesota and St. John’s offering the rising sophomore wing from St. Raymond’s of The Bronx.

Minnesota assistant Kimani Young extended the offer Thursday through their high school coach, Jorge Lopez. Minnesota head coach Richard Pitino watched Wilson and teammate Isaiah Washington, a 6-foot point guard, this summer at the Under Armour finals in Atlanta.

“Me and one of my teammates Isaiah got an offer from Minnesota,” Wilson told SNY.tv. “[Young] said that [Pitino] had watched me since the summer, he said that he was impressed with my play and my motor.”

IMG_6016A.JPGKentucky went three deep in its meeting Thursday with 2016 guard Tyus Battle of Gladstone (N.J.) Gill St. Bernard’s, with head coach John Calipari joined by assistants Kenny Payne and Barry “Slice” Rohrssen.

Calipari had a whirlwind day in the New York-New Jersey area, with meetings with 2015 forward Cheick Diallo and 2015 guard Isaiah Briscoe also on the docket.

“He was awesome, the visit was awesome,” Gary Battle, the player’s father, told SNY.tv. Thursday evening.

“We sat down with the Headmaster of our school, it’s a very serious academic place and then Cal talked about the importance of academics. He presented some of the numbers about graduation rates and things like that. He said if kids have the opportunity to go one-and-done or two-and-done, they have the opportunity to come back and graduate. Some do and some don’t. They have a 3.0 GPA as a team. He talked about Tyus’s opportunity to be part of something special.

Coach KIn the face of a withering takedown by Adrian Wojnarowski of Yahoo! Sports, both Coach K and Jim Boeheim responded in the last 48 hours — with both saying that the Paul George hospital bed photo was not staged and that Duke does not gain a significant recruiting edge as a result of Coach K leading Team USA.

“That was a really bad thing, to bring up Paul George,” Krzyzewski told reporters Thursday, according to USA Today. “After he was injured, USA Basketball was in the trauma room — me, Jerry (Colangelo), a bunch of NBA people and whatever. There were too many people there, so they asked for only the family and the doctors. We went back. A few of the people from USA Basketball left that morning. I was staying with my family for a couple of days.

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