Mitch McGary
Center/Power Forward 6’10”-245
Brewster Academy (Wolfeboro, NH)
National Rank: ***** Position Rank: 1
Coach Beilein said this (Wed.) evening: "Mitch possesses a unique blend of size and skill with a motor to run, rebound
and compete, which will serve him well at this level of college basketball,"
said Beilein. "He initiates contact inside while being very comfortable on the
perimeter with the ball. Mitch loves the University of Michigan and loves
playing basketball and will bring energy and enthusiasm to our team."
McGary's Recruiting Story
Maybe no other prospect in the country enjoyed such a meteoric rise to
prominence as Mitch McGary. Going from a raw product that could produce on
the Division one level with coaching, McGary put in the work to rise to a
five star product that was rated as the number two prospect at any position
by Scout.com.
"I saw Mitch quite a bit as a sophomore and I would have never guessed he
was going to be this good," said Scout.com national recruiting analyst Evan
Daniels in a September Detroit News article. "It has been a heck of a rise
for him. His whole game has changed. He has really developed his skill set.
He plays so hard and brings so much energy to the table that he has been
able to be really effective. It has been a pretty unbelievable rise for
him. He is a terrific player that continues to get better.”
Part of that rise to stardom was the fact McGary took an extra year to
attend a prep school, his current institution at Brewster Academy, to get
his academics in order and commit to becoming a top prospect on the
hardwood.
“It was my main purpose to come here and get my grades,” McGary told
scout.com in November, 2010. "Back at home I didn’t
have any grades and I didn’t think I was going
anywhere except for a JUCO or something.
“Mainly I think it was the transition moving out to Brewster,” McGary told GBW in June. "I did it mainly
for academic reasons. But it helped out from a basketball standpoint, being
that it was the best school in the country the year before and won the
national championship. So just playing against that level of play, and
playing in practice, was another level up from what it was at my local high
school.”
Helping Michigan’s cause was one of McGary’s best friends, and fellow AAU
teammate Glenn Robinson III, who committed to the Wolverines long before
McGary’s process played out.
“Me and Mitch have been best of friends for a while now,” Robinson told
GBW in June. "I'm trying to
recruit him a little I guess, okay a lot, we talk about it all the time. I
know it is his decision, because I mean everybody knows him now. He is
probably the best big man in the country. I got great respect for him. He
is a good guy on and off the court.”
McGary saw his star rise even further in the month of July, 2011, by
receiving offers from the top of the top dogs in college basketball, as
Duke, Kentucky and North Carolina extended offers to the rising star. After
that slew of offers from the elite, McGary took an unofficial visit to Ann
Arbor shortly after, and told GoBlueWolverine about his initial
impressions.
“It went great,” said McGary. “I really like the coaches. The coaching
staff was real with me and I know people that are going there and that are
there now. I can trust them in their decision as to whether a coach is cool
or not.”
Later that summer, McGary had trimmed his list to a who’s who of basketball
prominence, including Michigan in a list of Duke, Florida, Kentucky,
Maryland and North Carolina. About a week after that, he was back in Ann
Arbor on an official visit, which kick started a frenzy of visits for the
five star prospect. The Michigan visit and subsequent non stop recruiting
effort put forth by the Wolverines proved too much for basketball’s elite
to overcome and in November of 2011, McGary pledged to the Wolverine’s on
national television (ESPN) in a recruiting coup that John Beilein hadn’t
previously seen.
GoBlueWolverine Commentary
McGary is certain to be an instant star the second he steps on campus for
the Wolverines. Michigan has waited over a decade to land a recruit of
this hype and prominence, and hasn’t seen such since LaVell Blanchard and
Jerod Ward.
"To put it bluntly — (at Michigan) he'd be the starting center and the best
player on the team the moment he walks on campus," Brian Snow of Scout.com
told GoBlueWolverine’s Sam Webb in a Detroit News article. "I really
don't see a scenario in which that isn't the case. He is probably the
hardest playing kid in the country. There's absolutely no prima donna to
him at all. He'll run through a wall for you, he'll dive on the floor. Then
he is a pretty good athlete. He can really face the rim and handle the
ball, especially against centers. He also scores down low, blocks shots,
and he is one of the better rebounders in the country.
"We're talking about a kid that can do it all from the low post," said
Scout.com’s Evan Daniels in the same Detroit News article. "He can run, he
has good hands, he plays hard and with energy, he rebounds, blocks shots,
and he can score. Whatever school gets Mitch is getting a heck of a player
and a major impact-type guy as soon as he sets foot on campus."
McGary is an extremely likely one and done candidate, a talent which
Michigan hasn’t seen in quite some time, and will step on the court as soon
as he arrives and if he lives up to his billing, will be a talent likely
remembered amongst the greats to wear the Maize and Blue.
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