Polee to Choose St. John’s or UGA Saturday; Duke Hosting Rivers, Miller at Banquet

St. John’s hired a West Coast coach in Steve Lavin and now he’s hoping to land a West Coast player as his first recruit.

Dwayne Polee, a 6-foot-7 forward out of Los Angeles (Calif.) Westchester, will announce his college choice at halftime of Saturday’s Collision all-star game at El Camino College.

“St. John’s and UGA,” Polee wrote Thursday in a text, referring to his final two choices of  St. John’s and Georgia.

A source close to Lavin said Polee was the “best athlete” he’s ever recruited.

Polee led the Comets to their second straight CIF State Division I title and averaged  21 points, eight rebounds and two blocks per game.

“He’s made tremendous strides in understanding the defense, where to be, blocking out, taking charges, doing a lot of the little things that he never, ever was concerned about doing [before],” Westchester coach Ed Azzam told the Los Angeles Times.

While in California this week meeting with Polee, Lavin also huddled Wednesday with Remi Barry, a 6-7 French-born senior forward from Del Oro High in Loomis, Calif.

Barry is a skilled swingman with impressive athleticism and versatility at both ends, according to one Division 1 head coach.

Also at St. John’s, Derrick Wrobel will join Lavin’s staff in an operations/administration spot in the next few days. Wrobel had been Mike Montgomery’s director of external relations the past two seasons at Cal.  The news was first reported by Ibabuzz.com.

DUKE HOSTING STUDS

Duke is hosting 2011 recruits Quincy Miller, Austin Rivers, Amir Williams, & Michael Gbinije at Thursday’s banquet.

The 6-4 Rivers, a junior out of Winter Park (Fla.), decommitted from Florida and is now looking at Florida, Duke and North Carolina.

“Florida is still the front-runner and Duke, it’s those two,” Celtics coach Doc Rivers told me about his son. “He’s just looking around. I think he wants to really look at other schools to get a bearing on what he likes and I like what he’s doing.”

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