Four-star 2022 center Dylan Anderson intrigued by hometown hoops program

The success of ASU basketball under Bobby Hurley hasn’t gone unnoticed by prospects all around the country, and in some cases overseas as well. The Sun Devils’ three consecutive Top-20 ranked recruiting classes point to a bright future and have resonated with some elite recruits in the school’s backyard, such as 7’0 Gilbert Perry center Dylan Anderson a Top-75 prospect in the 2022 class.

“From the time he was in eighth grade when Bobby first offered him, they’ve been very supportive of his development,” said Dylan’s father Rob Anderson, “and they came to watch a lot of his games. We’re are communicating more with them now that they’re allowed to text him and call him. They’ve invited us to several home games, and we’ve had the ability to go into a locker room after some good team wins. They’ve made it very clear that Dylan’s a priority for them.

“The interesting thing is Dylan and Bobby’s son, Bobby Jr., played together one summer on an AAU team and so I got to know his son, and we talk a lot about that. This has been very interesting this last year. We like Bobby ad the way he’s recruiting Dylan. Obviously, ASU being in our backyard and mom and dad are both alumni and mom was No. 1 high jumper in the country when she was at ASU, it’s been interesting.”

Anderson said that a program’s scheme and its ability to present a good fit for his son would undoubtedly present a significant aspect in their ultimate decision. The ASU style observed by the Andersons checkmarks that box, and you can count them as enthusiastic as any other Sun Devil fan these days eagerly anticipating Hurley’s most talented squad in Tempe that will feature a pair of five-star prospects making their debut with the team.

“Hopefully we have basketball this year,” Anderson commented, “but we’re more excited to watch the guys coming in this year, how they gel and how they play together. Dylan is big into a fast-paced game, and he runs the floor well, and we’re more interested in that style of play as opposed to a set offense. We’re really excited to see how they use Marcus Bagley and Josh Christopher and how everybody plays together. I think these are great additions, and they brought coach (Anthony) Coleman back, and he recruited Dylan when he was here.

“We’ve been watching ASU, and they haven’t had a player at his position that stretches the floor like Dylan. It’s hard to compare to what they’ve done in the past. I’m really excited to see how they use Marcus Bagley this year to see how they do that. They also brought in the 6’9 guy from Ukraine (Pavlo Dziuba). I want to see how they utilize him too and how it all comes together. We got two years to figure all that out and have big decisions ahead, but there’ll be multiple factors that play into where he goes to school.”

“Dylan is a matchup nightmare for the other team,” Anderson described, “because he not only can post up but he can also face up and shoot the three. He passes really well out of the double team, and he can play the three through the five (positions). So, however, they want to design a system around that I think it gives the coaches a lot of options having a player like that and what he’s going to be in two years.

“Right now, we’re focused on improving his ball-handling. And we’re always working on his foot speed. He’s blessed naturally with athleticism, and for a kid wearing a size 19 shoe, he moves like he’s a size 13. We always joke that once he grows into his body, he’s going to be unstoppable.

Dylan’s actually had the chance over the last couple of months to work out with Eric Jacobsen, who played at ASU. We wanted to get him in the gym with him because Eric is about 250lbs he’s had a good career playing overseas. So, I just wanted to show Dylan what it’s like playing against older and stronger players, so he can see where he needs to be.”

Rob Anderson runs the Arizona Supreme, an Arizona-based Nike AAU club. These days were supposed to be his peak time during the live evaluation period traveling across the country to various gyms and playing some of the top competition in the country. Any such recruiting period may have to wait now until September/October, but even that scenario is still entirely unknown due to the COVID-19 pandemic.

And while Anderson is understandably disappointed with the prospect of having this live period canceled all together this year, he’s cognizant of the fact that it will have lesser of an impact on his son who has nine offers with the vast majority coming from high-major programs.

“Nobody wants to miss out on a live period,” Anderson remarked, “but I think given the current situation, and what the coaches would have to go through, I’m just not sure if that’s something these guys are wanting to do. I’m not so sure AAU (club games) is in the cards this year. I just don’t see how you can have that many teams come from that many different states to play.

“Dylan, he’s in a little bit different category (recruiting wise) compared to some of the other guys on our team. We’ve taken film and sent it out to college coaches, and we have 15 Division I offers for our players so far. We’ve just made the most of this downtime. We were lucky that even though with the closing of the gyms (in Arizona), we were able to use a private gym, so Dylan’s getting his workouts in every day in a safe environment. Our goal is just to get him stronger and quicker, and we always joke if we can turn him into a seven-footer with a better handle, he could have a very promising future. A seven-footer with a jump shot. How about that?”

Another barometer of where a player stands in comparison to his peers is playing for one of the several basketball academies, institutions that in the last decade have increased in number in the Phoenix-area metropolitan. As enticing as that avenue could be for a coveted recruit such as Anderson, his father said that he has no intention of having his son transfer out of his current high school. The feedback he is getting from various suitors does support that decision.

“That’s the No. 1 question we get,” Anderson said, laughing. “I mean, in the last three months, we’ve been contacted by prolific Oak Hill. I’ve spoken to a lot of coaches that are recruiting him, and they all have commented that they would rather have him have a normal high school experience before it becomes all business for him. I do appreciate having to practice against that level of competition every day. But he’s still so young basically what they’ve (college coaches) said is when you have talent, your future’s good. You don’t have to go halfway across the country to a prep school to make a difference in your college career.

“Dylan already has a lot of good offers. North Carolina, Kentucky, Duke …they’ve all reached out. So, we’re focused on his development right now. And all that stuff is going to work itself out. Dylan’s not a big social media guy. He doesn’t get caught up in the hype. His goal is to be the best player he can. He puts in the work, and it will eventually pay off.”

ASU and Arizona are the only colleges to date that the 2022 center has been able to visit in-person, and needless to say that the extended dead recruiting period has prevented trips to other colleges in pursuit.

And when the Andersons do see the Sun Devils up close and in-person, they have certainly

taken notice of the team’s growth and can definitely appreciate that trend concerning a program that they are quite familiar with.

“Every time we get invited to a game we go and definitely take mental notes,” Anderson described, “and I think they’re doing a great a great job with the program, and as I said, we’re extremely excited to see what happens this year. And if Bobby can get himself a seven-footer, he might make a difference. It could be Dylan or someone else, but if he could get some more size in the program, that would be great.

“We’ve always talked about Dylan having his basketball career in Arizona since this is the only place he’s ever lived at. We haven’t really given that much thought of playing out of state. Hopefully, we’ll get a chance to go on some official visits so he can get the full experience and make an educated decision on where he’d like to continue his career. But obviously, mom and dad sure would appreciate being able to see all of his games. Demographics sure make it easy.

Granted, as a 2022 prospect Dylan Anderson and his family are in no rush to make a decision, especially when the opportunity to take trips to all the schools who offered the center as well as some programs which may extend a future offer, is not present at the moment.

“The decision might be delayed slightly if we’re not able to go on some visits this year,” Anderson said. “We were hoping to be able to do some of that. And we’ll see because you only five (official) visits. I don’t know if they’re (NCAA) is going to make that change because of the pandemic or not. The way we’ve handled his recruitment is we’ve turned down a lot of schools. We kind took a different approach and said, ‘okay, which school’s style of play fit Dylan?’ And those are the ones that we have focused on. And I think he has some really good options. And now it’s just a matter of watching these programs over the next year, year and a half and see what they’re doing and the personnel they have and their style of play.

“The biggest thing for us is the history of the program as far as what they’ve done with guys in Dylan’s position. Basically, how they’ve developed them. Because you hear about all the time or guys go to a school, and they get over recruited, and they don’t get developed. And so that’s a big thing for me. When a player comes into your freshman year, how are you going to develop him on and off the court and what are the opportunities that there are for him to make an impact for the team right away. We have good schools to choose from If it’s only basketball-related. Some coaches tell me that Dylan ‘is a pro.’ He has an opportunity to be a pro, yes. How are we going to develop him to get him there? I’m very realistic. I’m in the gym with him every day, and we’re focused on certain things, and I think he has a very good opportunity to have a very bright future in basketball, but he’s got a long way to go still.”

Jesse Morrison contributed to this article.

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