Michigan State's 2023 Recruiting Class Climbs to No. 2 in the Nation
Michigan State men's basketball has put together one of the best recruiting classes in program history for 2023, which has a chance to be the best ever for head coach Tom Izzo.
The Spartans' class recently moved up to No. 2 in the country, according to 247Sports' team composite rankings. The move up comes mostly due to ESPN finally updating their player rankings, which resulted in a big boost for Michigan State.
Power forward Xavier Booker is now a consensus five-star player, after ESPN boosted him from outside the Top 100 all the way up to the No. 3 player in 2023. Booker is considered the No. 1 player in 2023 by Rivals, the No. 6 player by 247Sports and the No. 12 player by On3 Sports.
The 247Sports composite has Booker ranked No. 3 in the country, with a player rating of 0.9991 — if that were to hold through 'Signing Day', Booker would be Michigan State's highest-rated signee in the history of the recruiting rankings.
After Booker's updated ranking, the Spartans' 2023 class jumped Kentucky for the No. 2 spot in the country. Michigan State now only trails Duke, which has four five-star commitments in its '23 class.
In addition to Booker's big boost, MSU's other 2023 commits received ranking boosts as well. Four-star point guard Jeremy Fears is now the No. 31 overall player in 2023, four-star small forward Coen Carr is ranked No. 61 and four-star small forward Gehrig Normand comes in at No. 70 in the country.
Michigan State's class has an average player rating of 98.32, which trails only Duke (99.59), Kentucky (99.50) and Oregon (98.93).
If the Spartans finish with the No. 2 class in 2023, it would be MSU's highest-ranked recruiting class ever, eclipsing its 2016 class which finished ranked No. 3 in the nation. That Spartan class included Miles Bridges, Joshua Langford, Cassius Winston and Nick Ward.
