Makai Ashton-Langford is off the board to UConn following a weekend official visit to the school.
The 6-foot-2 Brewster Academy point guard was down to UConn and Providence, and was slated to visit Providence later this month, a trip that’s no longer necessary. He is UConn’s first 2017 commit.
“With PC, it was building up, but with UConn, they’ve always been a school that all guards wanted to go to,” he told Dave Borges of the New Haven Register.
“I definitely have utmost respect for [Providence coach Ed] Cooley, what he’s been doing last couple years. It was a very tough decision.”
Ashton-Langford and his Mass Rivals AAU squad went 21-0 in four tournaments in July, culminating with the adidas Summer Championships in Las Vegas.
“Makai is a dynamic type of guard and he’s elite on both ends of the floor,” his AAU coach, Vin Pastore, said on The 4 Quarters Podcast. “He can get by anybody on the offensive end but he can cover the best player on the other team on the defensive end. And that’s what he did all summer. And that’s difficult to do. He scores around the rim like no other guard in grassroots basketball.”
On July 27, Ashton-Langford announced on Twitter that he was transferring from Cushing Academy to Brewster. He then participated in adidas Nations in Los Angeles.
Ashton-Langford’s Brewster team will be loaded, including St. Raymond’s of the Bronx wing Sid Wilson, who reclassified to 2018. Class of 2017 wing Aaron Wheeler, a Stamford, Conn., native who formerly attended St. Andrew’s School (R.I.) and is Ashton-Langford’s Mass Rivals teammate, is transferring in, as are fellow-2017s Thomas Allen (Garner Road High School) and Michael Okauru, (Ravenscroft School).
UConn remains in the mix for several big-time Class of 2017 players, including Mohamed Bamba, Hamidou Diallo, D.J. Harvey, Josh Carlton and Tyler Polley.
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