Brandon Ingram's basketball commitment to Duke is a huge recruiting victory for coach Mike Krzyzewski, but possibly an equally significant blow to arch rival North Carolina.
Ingram is the third-ranked high school player on the ESPN 100 list and the top recruit in the state of North Carolina. The six-foot-eight, 198-pound small forward also appeared likely to choose between Duke and North Carolina, in addition to Kansas, UCLA and Kentucky.
According to ESPN, Ingram indicated he preferred Duke because of North Carolina's "paper class" scandal and potential NCAA sanctions that could come as a result.
"We wanted to see something on paper," Ingram's father Donald told the Charlottesville Observer. "We wanted to hear it on television. We wanted to know that they're not going to fall into the same situation like Jim Boeheim with Syracuse. So you don't want to go into a (situation) that's already hot. And it played a factor in it."
Coming off a National Championship victory, Duke is losing a trio of freshmen vital to their title run: center Jahlil Okafor, forward Justise Winslow and guard Tyus Jones. Adding to Duke's subtractions is senior guard Quinn Cook, but Ingram adds to an already impressive recruiting class for Krzyzewski.
Joining Ingram in Durham next fall will be five-star center Chase Jeter, five-star point guard Derryck Thornton and four-star shooting guard Luke Kennard. Ingram seems to be the biggest asset of the class, as ESPN's evaluators called him a "wing with great size and skill" whose "upside is off the charts."
