Hoosiers Recruit Jeremy Hollowell: Making Them Pay

"Now everybody's gonna have to pay for it on the court."

Those were the first words out of 2012 Forward Jeremy Hollowell’s mouth to the media after he wasn’t selected to the McDonald’s All-American game. Hollowell had been coming on strong in his AAU and senior campaign and forced his way into a discussion that wasn’t realistic a year ago. Unfortunately for him and IU fans, he fell just short of the mark. Those also being forced to pay for this crime against humanity? Broad Ripple, Southport, Mt. Vernon, Noblesville, Warren Central, Cathedral, Meridian and Franklin Central.

Hollowell has been on an absolute tear over his last eight games especially. Sure his whole season has gone really well, but the last eight games have been something pretty special. Since the start of February up until this week he hadn’t scored less than 27 points in a night. In the last week his scoring has come back to earth with "only" a 21 point night in a 60-42 win. Then last night he struggled to score more points than he had rebounds. Oh but wait, he had 19 rebounds (18pts) in a win over Ron Patterson’s (23 pts 6 rebounds) Broad Ripple.

Yes indeed, you read that right. In the last month (8 games), Hollowell has recorded 4 double-doubles, including a 34 point/16 rebound game against Noblesville and a buzzer beater for the win at Devin Davis’ Warren Central. Over the last eight games Hollowell’s Lawrence Central is 6-2 with Jeremy averaging over 27 points a game. The kid is locked in to say the least.

The 6’8" senior has a similar playing style to current Hoosier, Christian Watford. They both excel the most when they are facing the basket. However, Hollowell at this stage, is much more developed as a post player and rebounder than Watford was. The questions of Hollowell’s motor have all but dried up recently as he has improved his ball handling, explosiveness and jump shot. Jeff Rabjohn’s of Rivals.com has said that he is one player that should no question make a jump in the final rankings for the 2012 class.

At only 17 years of age (well 18, by March) he still has some time to physically develop as well. So there is a chance he can add some height and length still. If that happens then I can’t imagine that he isn’t a super star at the college level. He already has the most NBA potential of any of the recruits coming in sans Trey Lyles and he appears to only be getting better. When all is said and done when it comes to the rankings and performance on the court, I would imagine Hollowell is/will be the best of what IU already has locked up. Not too shabby for a guy that was a bit of an afterthought (see Gary Harris saga) when he verballed in March of last year. If he isn’t listed as a five star in May, he’ll be damn close.