Report says Syracuse basketball may have interest in FSU center transfer

Quincy Ballard, a 7-foot big man in the 2020 class, had Syracuse basketball among his finalists before picking fellow Atlantic Coast Conference member Florida State a couple of years back.

In his two seasons with the Seminoles, Ballard has played sparingly, and he recently entered into the NCAA’s transfer portal, according to media reports and recruiting-information provider Verbal Commits.

Ballard, a sophomore center, took an official visit to Wichita State several days ago. A report by Taylor Eldridge on kansas.com said that besides the Shockers out of the American Athletic Conference, “Syracuse and Maryland are also in pursuit of Ballard.”

That’s interesting. We’ll certainly monitor whether the Orange coaching staff is, indeed, showing any sort of serious interest in Ballard, who is from the Syracuse area.

Syracuse basketball recruited big man Quincy Ballard in high school.

Ballard attended Henninger High School in Syracuse but finished up his high-school playing days at the Quality Education Academy in Winston-Salem, N.C.

He was a late riser in the 2020 recruiting cycle, ultimately choosing FSU over other finalists the ‘Cuse and Maryland in April of 2020. Cincinnati and N.C. State had rounded out his top five.

The industry-generated 247Sports Composite had ranked him as a three-star prospect, No. 336 overall and No. 59 at center in the 2020 class.

According to his bio on the ESPN Web site, Ballard only averaged 4.7 minutes a game in the 2021-22 season, and 3.3 minutes per contest in the 2020-21 campaign.

Orange junior Jesse Edwards, the team’s starting center in 2021-22 until he got injured in February, is expected to return for his senior year. We’ll have to wait and see regarding sophomore center Frank Anselem and redshirt sophomore big man John Bol Ajak.

The ‘Cuse also has two big men among its five commits in the 2022 cycle. They are three-star power forward Maliq Brown, who put forth a tremendous senior stanza for the Blue Ridge School in St. George, Va., and three-star power forward/center Peter Carey, who most recently competed for the Northfield Mount Hermon School in Mount Hermon, Mass.

I’m not a recruiting analyst, so I don’t know how much of an interest level there is among the Syracuse basketball coaching staff and Ballard.

That being said, if all of the big men on the current Orange roster return in 2022-23, along with factoring in the incoming freshmen, it would surprise me if ‘Cuse coaches make a significant run at Ballard.