Get to Know Latest Texas Basketball 2021 Commit Keeyan Itejere
On Monday morning, Shaka Smart and Texas Basketball secured an encouraging commitment from six-foot-nine big man Keeyan Itejere. Itejere becomes the first Longhorn to commit for the 2021 class.
The North Carolina product isn’t currently rated by 247Sports, yet is averaging 9.8 points and 4.5 rebounds per game this season. Additionally, Itejere managed to block 1.4 shots per game while being the second highest scorer on the team behind North Carolina State signee Jaylon Gibson. Some of the teams that heavily recruited the big man included VCU, Utah Valley, UNCW, Little Rock-Arkansas, Radford, Rhode Island and Elon.
The rising senior answered a few questions regarding his decision to play for Texas (via 247Sports):
On his decision:
“I just really felt like it was the right fit for me. The coach [Shaka Smart] holds a lot of the values that I look up to, relationships coming first, me becoming the best version of me that I can at the end of the day even outside of basketball, I just really felt like he was the right fit for me.”
Coach Smart's pitch to him:
“The second he saw me he [Shaka Smart] reached out to me immediately and was really interested. We started building a relationship right off the bat. I would say the biggest thing was the fact that he just felt really confident in my ability and what he could do with it. I thought that I believed if he coached me and I went through what he told me to do he felt I could make it far. I believe in him a lot.”
On what he brings to the program:
What I can bring is being a pretty all-around character, very high motor, getting to the basket, making twos, blocking shots, I’d say just get things going.