Christmas coming?
In yet another sign of the apocalypse, an athlete who has yet to begin his junior year in high school has sent out a press release.
Mind you, this is no ordinary high school sophomore. This is Northeast Philly big man Rakeem Christmas, rated by Rivals.com at the top center in the Class of 2011.
Christmas listed Florida in his final eight school choices in the release, a list that includes Baylor, Georgetown, Indiana, Ohio State, Texas, Oklahoma and Villanova.
The 6-foot-9, 210-pound Christmas is considered an excellent shot-blocker and will probably fill out before stepping foot on campus. FYI, he is no relation to former Temple standout shooting guard Dionte Christmas.
A future one-two punch of Christmas on the inside and top 2011 point guard and Florida commit Austin Rivers on the outside would be intriguing. But there’s too much time and too many schools involved to make any assumptions yet.
Still, at least Florida remains on the radar.
Kevin Brockway gave up on his dream of becoming a lefty starting pitcher for the New York Mets when he walked four straight batters, then hit one in a middle school game in Suffern, N.Y. Since graduating college in 1993, he’s worked as a sports writer at daily newspapers throughout the state of Florida, beginning with the Key West Citizen. He then moved on to the Northwest Florida Daily News and Naples Daily News before becoming the men’s basketball writer for The Gainesville Sun in 2003. Brockway has won multiple state and national writing awards during his 16-year career. Favorite pastimes include karaoke and watching baseball. Favorite college hoops team growing up was St. John’s.
[...] from Northeast Philadalphia High School is already receiving plenty of attention. Florida is the only SEC school in the running for Christmas. That could obviously change, but the Gators seem to be in good [...]
by Florida Going After 2011 Basketball Standout | MrSEC.com