A very impressive performance this past week at the Nike Peach Jam in North Augusta, South Carolina paid some very high dividends this weekend for Clarksville (TN) Northeast four-star power forward Alex Poythress. Poythress spoke with me on my Lexington radio program this morning and discussed getting an intriguing phone call on Saturday night
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“Yeah, Coach Cal (UK head coach John Calipari) called and talked to my mom last night,” Poythress said. “But I wasn’t here then. She told him I would call him back, and when I got home I did. He told me I had a good tournament and that he watched me every game we played. He also talked about Kentucky basketball and what they have coming up for the next couple of years and how I would fit in with that. He said he wanted me at Kentucky and extended an offer to me.”
Poythress had 18 offers on the table from high major basketball programs, like Texas, Uconn, Vanderbilt, Florida, and Georgia before his Peach Jam performance, so the word was already out on the 6-foot-8, 220-pounder. But he was a major reason that the Georgia Stars were able to get all the way to the semifinals. And Calipari and UK assistant Kenny Payne were front and center for a lot of those contests.
So how does Poythress feel about the UK offer? “Oh, they are definitely in the mix now,” Poythress answered. “It’s hard to ignore the tradition of Kentucky, and how passionate their fans are, and what Coach Cal has been able to do the past couple of years. Being in Tennessee, and close to the state of Kentucky with Fort Campbell and Hopkinsville just down the road, I was able to watch a lot of Kentucky games last season. It’s hard to ignore what they stand for.”
Next up for Poythress will be trying to figure out when and to whom to give official visits. “Kentucky will also definitely be a school that I want to visit. I will probably start setting those up very soon.”
