Cal Basketball: Elite 2023 Prospect Jalen Lewis Begins Summer Blog on SI.com

The Bishop O'Dowd HS big man is being pursued by the Bears and a long list of schools.

Jalen Lewis, about to begin the biggest summer of his basketball life so far, has agreed to share his experiences with readers in a blog he will write for SI.com.

We’ll have access to his periodic reports, and that should be of interest to Cal fans because the Bishop O’Dowd High rising junior is at the top of recruiting lists for most of the top college programs in the country, including Mark Fox’s Bears.

A 6-foot-9, 215-pounder, Lewis is rated as the No. 2 overall prospect in the class of 2023 by ESPN. Rivals has him at No. 6, while 247Sports rates him as the 12th-best prospect in the class.

These are just opinions, but you get the idea: He’s very good.

I talked with Bishop O’Dowd coach Lou Richie about him a year ago, when Lewis had just turned 15, and Richie compared him favorably to another O’Dowd player who wound up at Cal: Ivan Rabb.

“I never would have said somebody has a chance to be better than Ivan,” Richie told me. “But he’s bigger, faster, stronger.”

Here’s how Lewis begins the first installment of his of blog:

Hey, what’s up world, Jalen Lewis here and I’m kicking off my new blog with Sports Illustrated just to give you guys an inside look at my life and what I do on a day-to-day basis.

Well, like every summer since the eighth grade, this summer is gonna be pretty crazy!

I have multiple tournaments with my summer team, Team WhyNot, and we’re practicing and getting ready for Peach Jam. That runs from July 12-25.

Right after that I go to USA Basketball for tryouts, and if I make that team that will last from July 27 until early August when we go to compete in Argentina!

I’m pretty packed! No time for relaxing like most kids my age, but that’s what comes with the grind of basketball.

Lewis noted that June 15 was the first day college coaches could directly contact players in the 2023 class. And his began ringing at the earliest possible time —midnight.

“It was a lot of fun! It definitely lived up to the hype!” he writes.

Lewis says Cal was the first to call. The Bears have been tracking Lewis since he was a freshman, perhaps earlier, and two older O’Dowd players are on the Bears’ roster this season — sophomore Monty Bowser and freshman Marsalis Roberson.

Following the Cal call, Lewis says, “It just went crazy after that.”

Lewis says he heard from 15 schools that first day, including Texas Tech, Arizona State, Kentucky, Duke, Stanford, Michigan, Gonzaga, Florida State, UCLA.

“I was constantly picking up the phone. I’d end one call and hop right on another one. It was a lot!”

Lewis understands what’s at stake this summer as college coaches check him out. He talks about what he wants to accomplish in a sidebar story you can read here.

“A lot of the coaches say that they’re coming out to see me play in July, so I’m looking forward to that,” Lewis said. “I’m just turning things up in every way this summer. I just have a different mindset and I feel like my game has grown a lot over the last year. I’m excited to be able to show what I can do.

“I score and all that, but I also wanted to show my playmaking ability,” Lewis said. “I feel like I’m really versatile and I can create for my teammates; I feel like that’s what makes me standout the most.”

Lewis said he will hold off until after the summer before cutting down his list of potential college destinations. He hopes to visit a couple of the local campus -- Cal and Stanford, presumably -- sometime this summer, time permitting.

Lewis has a full calendar, which started with him attending the four-day USA junior national team mini-camp at Houston in late May.

“Everyone there is one of the top players in the class and they’re all bringing their A game,” Lewis said of the camp that brought together 24 top young players. “I’m the kind of player that loves competition so it’s fun to me. Everyone here can fill it up all over the court.”

Here’s how the various recruiting services currently rate Lewis:

ESPN: No. 2 overall in the class of 2023, behind point guard DaJuan Wagner of Camden, New Jersey, who is the consensus No. 1 prospect. ESPN lists Lewis as a center.

Rivals: Lewis is considered a power forward by Rivals, which ranks him No. 6 overall.

247Sports: Pegs him as a center and has at No. 12 in the class, No. 2 among centers, behind Baye Fall, a 6-10, 205-pounder from Parker, Colorado.