Syracuse Basketball: Full-court press as 4-star Joseph Estrella sets date

At the beginning of September, Syracuse basketball 2023 high-priority recruiting target Joseph Estrella plans to reveal his collegiate destination, he said via social media on Monday.

The rapidly rising four-star big man, a 6-foot-11 power forward/center, is fresh off an official visit to the Hill. According to numerous media reports, his trip to Central New York went quite well.

To date, Estrella has made official visits to the ‘Cuse, Iowa, Tennessee and Marquette. While he’s secured more than 20 scholarship offers throughout his recruitment, the chatter that we’re hearing is Estrella doesn’t plan to take any more official visits.

In his Instagram post, Estrella said that he will announce his commitment on September 2 at the XL Sports World in Saco, Maine. He said that he also expects to trim down his list of contenders over the next several weeks.

Syracuse basketball should make the final list cut for four-star Joseph Estrella.

Per reports, Estrella is likely to end up picking one of the schools that he officially visited, although things can ebb and flow in the recruiting processes of top-flight prospects.

Based on reports, analyst comments and other things I’ve read in a variety of fan forums, I’m getting the sense that the top-three contenders for Joseph Estrella, in no particular order, are Syracuse basketball, Iowa and Tennessee.

As is well-documented, the Orange coaching staff was the first to offer a scholarship to Estrella, with that offer coming in August of 2021 at the team’s annual Elite Camp.

Estrella has said more than once that the ‘Cuse offering him first means something, but that alone isn’t going to seal the deal for Syracuse basketball.

He does have a strong relationship with Orange coaches, however, the same can be said, as far as I can tell, about his relationships with the coaching staffs at Iowa, Tennessee and other programs.

This spring and summer, Estrella boosted his stock about as much as anyone in the rising-senior class for his play in grassroots basketball over the last few months.

He was stellar competing for the New England-based Middlesex Magic in the Under Armour Association league, and Estrella will spend his senior season at the powerhouse Brewster Academy in Wolfeboro, N.H.

As we recently noted, one prediction in the direction of Iowa has come in on the 247Sports Web site, but I haven’t seen any additional projections at this juncture via 247Sports, the On3 Web site or Rivals.com.

In the national rankings, Joseph Estrella recently vaulted to No. 16 overall in the 2023 cycle, according to On3. The industry-generated 247Sports Composite, at the time of this writing, put him at No. 54 nationally, while the industry-generated On3 Consensus had Estrella at No. 41.

Syracuse basketball coaches have prioritized him for quite a while, and Estrella would prove a game-changer for the squad’s 2023 class were he to commit to the ‘Cuse.

One thing to monitor here is that Estrella’s teammate in the upcoming 2022-23 stanza at the Brewster Academy will be 2023 four-star shooting guard Reid Ducharme.

The 6-foot-6 Ducharme, who was terrific on the AAU circuit lately for the Boston Amateur Basketball Club in Nike’s EYBL league, took an official visit to the Orange in June.

Analysts, at least for the time being, anticipate that Ducharme will ultimately choose from Syracuse basketball, Penn State and Xavier.

https://twitter.com/LoudHouseFS/status/1556356277638504450

As I said recently on social media, the Brewster Academy to the Hill for Estrella and Ducharme certainly has a nice ring to it.