It sounded like a conquering hero had landed inside the Carrier Dome, but it was just the Quasi-Flat Top Prince. The (recently re-classified) top basketball prospect in the class of ’12, Nerlens Noel, was met by a huge ovation when he strolled courtside to his seats yesterday¬†afternoon for Syracuse‚Äôs spanking of UConn.
The Tilton (NH) High star was making¬†his official visit to the Hill this weekend, along with teammate¬†Goodluck Okonoboh (center/class of ’13), who also has Syracuse on¬†his list. The Fizz caught up with Nerlens, who said the visit couldn‚Äôt¬†have been going any better.
“The trip has been great so far. I’m enjoying my time down here. The atmosphere and the campus are great. There is a good variety of majors, they have a great communications program here, and I like the campus a lot.”
The 6’10” 215 lb. power forward looked like he was having a blast inside the Dome, chatting with fans, signing autographs, and taking pictures with hopefuls that wish to see him in Orange next season. Nice that he also got to watch SU roll over the defending national champs.
“This is a great game, and they have a great atmosphere here. There are a lot of people [inside the Dome] and it just gets crazy.”
UConn, Kentucky, Georgetown, Florida and Providence, have also offered the big man. He came up for the right game. Noel is a tremendous shot-blocker, and has a great reach on the defensive side of the ball. If Fab Melo stays another season, SU fans would be drooling over one of its deepest front courts ever.
Melo, incoming DeJuan Coleman and¬†Noel? Not to mention Rakeem¬†Christmas and Baye Keita. Jim Boeheim could go really, really big with a “Transformers Lineup.”¬†All five guys on the court would be over 6’8″ (C.J. Fair and James Southerland are also listed at 6’8”). The scene would look like Optimus Prime and co. descending upon a hapless city. It would be the most dangerous lane in college basketball to try and venture into. Nerlens was excited about the possibility as¬†well.
‚ÄúThat would be a crazy frontcourt to play in. It would be a real good,¬†deep team if I were to come here.”
DC 2.0 also showed up to the beatdown of the Huskies yesterday and sat right next to Noel the entire time. Hopefully Coleman did his part and gave N2 the hard sell. It’s reassuring that Nerlens picked Syracuse as his first official stop, but the process of landing him is just beginning. Boeheim is battling the likes of John Calipari, John Thompson III and Billy Donovan in landing the Maine native.
Noel spent time with his good friend and former AAU teammate Michael Carter-Williams after the game, just like he did after Midnight Madness in October. He is eager to bring his freakish athleticism onto the same floor with his buddy MCW. It shouldn’t be a debate of how limited Nerlens’ minutes might be in a stacked frontcourt, but how much they could accomplish together. Syracuse fans did their job in giving the “Fresh Prince” a warm welcome into its community this weekend. Now we’ll see if he wants to join what would become the nastiest paint in the nation.
Posted: Kevin Fitzgerald
11 responses to “Nerlens Noel Visits Dome, Talks to Fizz About Potential “Transformers Lineup””
Great article. It was also good to have Okonoboh here as well as Tyler Ennis. Okonoboh and Ennis are the heart of our 2013 efforts. I suspect Fab is gone after this year and Noel knows it. That means his only real competition for PT at center will be Rakeem. As I’ve posted before, if SU has Rakeem, Coleman and Nerlens on board, Baye will be redshirted. We need Ennis as MCW is so tall he might be forced to play more of the two guard by then. I just hope MCW took the chewing out he got during the game in stride, and it doesn’t come back to bite SU during Noel’s recruitment. He certainly came for the right game, and the students delivered. The flat top heads were big. SU couldn’t have done more to show the school at its best to Nerlens. Let’s hope loyalty and the chance to play close to home trumps the payoff that Calipari will offer to Nerlens through an assistant.
If you look at how our recruiting has gone in the last couple years its remarkable, we’ve gone from getting Flynn’s(highly rated and Orngeanats(lowly ranked) to getting a class where we redshirt a espn 100 player. I wonder how many years Boeheim has left
Supposedly Nerlens and DC did not speak to each other, despite being separated by only three seats. Hopefully that was due to them being in different parties and not realizing each other’s proximity, and not because of any discrepancies. This front court could be so scary very soon. Let’s hope we still know how to shoot the three with all these big guys coming in!
I still think Nerlens will go to Providence to play with dunn and ledo. plus it’s even close to home than it is from cuse.
The front-court would be scary. Noel, Rak, DC 2.0. And that’s without Fab. It’s going to be an interesting decision for Melo. It’s easy to declare after all that happened for the big guy this season with the academic issues. But he is still raw. Raw, and still so dynamic. One more year, and he’s a lottery pick, no doubt. Hope Melo can come to that conclusion, but right now, I think it is up in the air, 50/50.
And yes Daniel, I didn’t see any interaction between DC and Nerlens. Coleman walked in late to game; can’t say that these guys wouldn’t know who each other are.
Valdmir, I have to think Providence is still the long shot with the guys like Boeheim, and Calipari coming at him. He is not leaning to any school right now, but that is obviously expected from the #1 overall recruit of this class. He had a great time in Syracuse, and seeing SU outplay Conn in front of close to 34k is clutch. Everything went well, let’s hope it all ends well.
Fitz- I understand where you’re coming from with boeheim and calipari going after noel but dont underestimate ed cooley’s recruiting ability. you seem to forget he has the local advantage. There’s report that nerlens was on the providence campus this past thursday and he was also there watching the superbowl last week sunday. cooley pull in ricky ledo shortly after visiting cuse and i got a feeling he’s going to pull in noel as well.
There also reports on golocalprov.com that noel “leaning toward providence”. dont know if it’s true or not as noel never confirm or denied it. guess we’ll see.
If Nerlens does come to Syracuse next year, what a team that would be. Syracuse would be the onside favorite to take the ACC in their first year on competiton.
Sitting court side and watching 33,860 orange dressed Syracuse fans chanting his name and going crazy has to weigh on his decision as to where he should be playing.
Nowhere else in the nation is he going to be able to play in front of that large of a crowd. And remember it can get larger.
Let’s stop the speculation now and let’s let the coaches do their jobs and bring him home to Syracuse.
GO CUSE!!!!!
Hearing him mention degree programs a big plus for SU in revcruiting war. I think Prov would be HUGE sales job and seems unlikely.Potential for 2 and done (unlikely 1 and done at 215lbs) not enhanced at lesser school like Providence.When was last time they developed big man? As UK has center coming and UConn a mess, feel likely between SU and GT
It will be a horse race and his friendship with MCW is a plus even though MCW and JB got into it when he yanked the young point guard for basically nothing. JB is the man but he does thinghs sometimes that make me wonder.
GO CUSE
One has to think this through – should Noel stay local, play with a friend in Ledo, and probably crack the top 25 OR go to Syracuse where Noel will also play with a friend in MCW and be in the best position, as a freshman, to win a National Championship.
Factor in SU’s academic reputation, the national exposure the basketball team enjoys, playing for a HOF coach and in front of the largest on-campus crowds in college basketball…. you lay things out that way, it’s really a no brainer.
went to the Brewster game on Monday, off game offensively for Noel, a ton of talent on the floor