UCLA Men's Basketball Offers High-Scoring Class of 2023 Forward TJ Power
The Bruins are officially in the race for another East Coast recruit.
Class of 2023 power forward TJ Power earned an offer from UCLA men's basketball, the Worcester Academy (MA) prospect announced Tuesday on Twitter. The 6-foot-8 big man has started to emerge on the Nike EYBL circuit as of late, and his recruitment has gone national as a result.
Power's first offers came during his sophomore year, and most of them were local schools – Bryant, Holy Cross, Iona, Providence, Boston College, UConn, UMass, Penn State, Brown and Harvard.
Marquette, Miami (FL), Iowa, Creighton, DePaul and South Carolina also offered Power that year, then Oklahoma, Georgetown, Georgia Tech, Virginia Tech and Wake Forest offered that summer. Power went most of his junior year without adding another offer, but Xavier extended one after the first evaluation period, followed by Penn, Notre Dame, USC, Indiana, Virginia and Stanford over the next month.
Ohio State, Kansas, UCLA and UNC have sent Power offers over the past two weeks, giving him 31 total Division I offers. Wake Forest and Indiana are among the schools Power is apparently trying to set up visits with at the moment, and he has already taken officials to Virginia and Iowa.
Power is a consensus four-star recruit and top-100 prospect in his class. 247Sports is the highest on him out of the major recruiting databases, slotting him in at No. 53 overall, while ESPN has him ranked the lowest at No. 99.
In the 247Sports Composite, Power is the No. 13 power forward in the country, the No. 1 recruit in Massachusetts and the No. 65 player in his class.
Power showed out for the Boston Amateur Basketball Club in Kansas City last weekend on the Nike EYBL circuit, opening the week with 24 points and eight rebounds against Team Thad. The big wing followed that up with 23 points and six rebounds versus City Rocks and 33 points, 10 rebounds and six assists versus Seattle Rotary.
Closing out the week against Houston Hoops, Power strung together one of the top performances of the weekend when he dropped 45 points with 15 rebounds and five assists. Power shot 51.6% from deep and 83.3% from the line in Kansas City, attempting 7.8 triples and 10.5 free throws per game.
Power received his offer from associate head coach Darren Savino, who has plenty of recruiting ties in the Mid-Atlantic and Northeast. Center Isaiah Miranda – who is moving out to California for his senior year – is another Massachusetts prospect with an offer from the Bruins. The staff has also offered two recruits from New Jersey, one from New York and one from Pennsylvania.
Of the eight class of 2023 guards UCLA has offered, six have already committed elsewhere, but only three of the 21 wings and bigs with offers are off the board. The frontcourt will need reinforcements next season – guard/forward Jaime Jaquez Jr. is projected to move on from the college game in 2023 – and Power is yet another top prospect who could fit the bill.
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