7/19/2014 football Edit

Haley emerges at Best of Summer

Eric Bossi

Rivals.com Basketball Recruiting Analyst

THE RIVALS150: Class of 2014 | 2015 | 2016

ANAHEIM, Calif. -- After spending Thursday near the beach, Rivals.com moved down to Orange County for the Double Pump Best of the Summer at the American Sports Centers, just a stone's throw from the land of Mickey Mouse. Rising Canadian junior point guard Jermaine Haley intrigued while 2015 wing Matisse Thybulle continued his move onto the high-major radar and hulking big man Ted Kapita showed that his play from last weekend's LeBron James Skills Academy was no fluke.

Haley an intriguing talent

We aren't going to go calling him Michael Carter-Williams just yet. But, 6-foot-6 point guard Jermaine Haley from the class of 2016 is one intriguing prospect.

Playing with Drive Elite at Best of the Summer, Haley was able to give college coaches and evaluators a pretty good window into who he is and can be as a player.

Haley is a legitimate point guard and he runs his offense, based on Friday's play. He has tremendous quickness for his size and can lose defenders pretty easily off the dribble. At times, he is a bit passive when looking for his offense, but that is just his nature.

"I try to be a facilitator," Haley said. "I know that I can get to the rim and score if I need to, but I'm going to look to get it to my teammates first."

Bottom line, Haley is a high-major talent. The product of British Columbia in Canada will play his junior season at the Canarias Academy in the Canary Islands. He is heading there to work on getting stronger and will leave in September.

On the recruiting front, a small pack of programs have separated themselves.

"Memphis, Oregon and Gonzaga," Haley said when asked what programs were recruiting him the hardest. "Those three are on me the hardest and up there right now."

In addition to those programs, Haley also rattled off offers from Louisville, Maryland, Illinois, Clemson, Washington and Oregon State.

Thybulle arriving as high-major prospect

On the West Coast, there looks to be a pretty solid group of sleeper mid- to upper-end mid-major wings. Now, the trick is finding which of those guys could be sleepers at an even higher level. In that regard, Matisse Thybulle is looking more and more like a player that could be a high-major sleeper.

Playing with the Northwest Express, the 6-foot-6 wing from Seattle showed a lot of upside. He is a skilled playmaker in the open floor. He has good size and is good on the defensive end as well.

"I think that I run out on the break pretty well," said Thybulle. "For the most part, I play pretty good defense and I will hit the open shot if the defense gives it to me."

So far, Thybulle says that he has offers from Gonzaga (Mark Few was in attendance), Washington, Washington State, Tulsa, Montana and Santa Clara. More offers are likely to come, but two programs are already standing out.

"It was a couple of weeks ago that Gonzaga offered and then the U-Dub (Washington) offer was about a month ago," said Thybulle. "Right now those are the top two. I like their level of play, the competition that they face and I like their coaches a lot."

Kapita is the real deal

During the first evaluation period, rising senior big man Ted Kapita made a lot of noise at the LeBron James Skills Academy. On Friday, the 6-foot-9 big man who will play his senior season at Huntington (W.V.) Prep showed that last weekend's play was no fluke.

Make no mistake, Kapita lacks some polish and it showed as he played for the first time with Team Texas. But, when he makes plays, he makes them impressively.

There's not a better set of shoulders in the class of 2015 and Kapita is an explosive athlete. When he is fully engaged and playing with energy, his brute strength, bouncy leaping and surprising touch on medium range jumpers stand out. In that way he's similar to 2016's Edrice Adebayo or Portland Trail Blazer Thomas Robinson.

A week ago, Kapita had offers from Arkansas, Connecticut, Miami, Florida, Texas and Kansas State. As of Friday, Baylor, Memphis, UCLA and Oregon had all joined the fray by handing out scholarship offers. Kapita is starting to look like the guy with the fastest rising stock in the class of 2015.