As you know, Julius Randle was in Lexington this past weekend for an official visit and he has written about it in his recruiting blog for USA Today.
I have copied the part he spoke about the visit to Lexington, and as you can probably guess, he had a great time.
It was a lot of fun there. Me and my mom got there about 5 p.m. on Friday. The coaches picked us up and took us to the players’ dorms and they were crazy nice. Everything was brand new and they even have Tempur-Pedic mattresses in the rooms. That was the most comfortable mattress that I’ve ever slept on too.
Everyone has their own room and there’s a lot of space in the rooms so that was great. Then the bathroom is designed for 7-footers so you don’t have to worry about having enough room.
I hung out with Alex (Poythress) and Archie (Goodwin) and got a little food then we all went to Coach (John) Calipari’s house to eat dinner. We ate great the whole trip. We had filet mignon, chicken, everything. It was great. My mom was happy because they had red velvet cake especially for her because that’s her favorite. She said it was really good so they got on her good side there.
Coach Cal’s house was really nice too. The backyard was huge; it had a full-court in the back and everything. Put it like this, I’d love to live there.
I went and hung out with the players that night and we had a good time. The whole team hung together and there’s so much love from the fans there it’s crazy. People were shouting my name everywhere I went and asking for pictures and autographs.
The players didn’t come at me too hard trying to get me there. They were telling me that I’ll work hard there, but in the end I’ll get to where I want to be. They were chill so that was cool.
The next day we had breakfast with all of the coaches then my mom and I met with the academic advisor and toured the campus. We rode on the golf cart and so everywhere we went people were yelling my name. It was crazy. The whole school was really impressive.
We went to the Alumni Game after that and it was really live. I was sitting behind the bench and then Drake walked in and the whole place went just crazy. I mean they just went wild for Drake.
Then throughout the game they started chanting my name. It was just crazy how loud they were. I’m a pretty laid back guy so I felt a little awkward at first. Drake and the players turned around smiling because it was just such a loud chant. I just kind of waved and they went crazy. That was definitely the loudest chant I’ve ever heard.
The BBN (Big Blue Nation) fans are great. It’s hard to describe how that makes you feel. It’s pretty unreal.
The game was fun too. Mostly all of the players from the last three years or so were there. Some of the old heads were there too, but I didn’t know as many of them. I couldn’t talk to the NBA guys because of rules, but just seeing them there was cool. It’s definitely one big family.
After the game my mom wanted to get a picture with Drake so he came over and took a pic with us. He wished me luck with my decision and he said that he was looking forward to seeing me play too. That was really cool because he’s definitely in my top three as far as favorite rappers. Jay Z is on top for me.
That night we went to dinner and had another great meal with the coaches. My mom told me the first day that it’s OK to cheat on our diet since the visit is supposed to be all about fun. We usually watch what we eat, but it was cool to just enjoy all the food they had.
That night I just hung with the players. And later, around 2 a.m. me, Archie and Julius (Mays) ended up going to gym to get some shots up. We stayed for about an hour. I loved that because I’m a gym-rat and the gym is about 10 steps away from the players’ dorm. Julius Mays left a little earlier than we did. I told Archie he didn’t have to stay if he didn’t want to, but he said that he’s always working and he hardly ever sleeps.
That’s just like me. Sunday we had breakfast with the coaches and then watched a practice. It was great.
There wasn’t any pressure the whole weekend. They know I’m gonna take my time with it so no one asked if I wanted to commit. I liked that.
This was my first official visit and it’s definitely gonna be a tough act to follow. It’s easy to understand why so many elite players go there.
After reading about Julius’ weekend, I am starving!!
Time to get some food.
