Syracuse basketball 4-star target scores player of year, eyes Kentucky visit

The big awards and honors keep pouring in for Syracuse basketball recruiting target Jerry Easter II from Ohio, who is a four-star guard in the 2025 class and had a tremendous sophomore year during the recently completed 2022-23 stanza.

Over the weekend, the 6-foot-4 Easter earned high praise from national analysts and scouts as he competed in a USA Basketball junior national team minicamp being held in Houston in conjunction with the 2023 NCAA Tournament’s Final Four.

On April 1, he was named the 2023 All-Blade player of the year by the Toledo Blade. During the 2022-23 season for the Emmanuel Christian School in Toledo, Ohio, Easter averaged 32.3 points, 7.5 rebounds, 2.1 assists, and 3.5 steals per game.

Easter helped guide Emmanuel Christian to a 21-4 overall record this past season, and the team captured its first Toledo Area Athletic Conference (“TAAC”) championship dating back to 1998, according to the Toledo Blade.

Syracuse basketball 2025 four-star recruit Jerry Easter II was electric as a sophomore.

The ‘Cuse coaching staff made its first scholarship offer to a high-school prospect in the 2025 cycle when it offered Easter last July. Even though his recruiting process likely has a way to go, his offer sheet already is extensive.

His list of offers includes St. John’s, Illinois, Southern California, Louisville, Memphis, Michigan State, Ohio State, Mississippi State, Mike Hopkins-led Washington, UCLA, Cincinnati, Vanderbilt, South Carolina, Arizona State, Missouri, New Mexico State, Bowling Green, Morgan State, Northern Illinois, Oakland, Toledo and Cleveland State.

Easter is also garnering interest from blue-blood programs Kansas and Kentucky. To that end, Rivals.com national analyst Travis Graf said in a recent article that Easter “is looking to visit Kentucky in the near future, but a date hasn’t been set.”

In late January, college basketball insider Adam Zagoria wrote that Easter was eyeing various potential campus visits, and Syracuse basketball could have been one of them. Since then, I haven’t seen anything regarding Easter locking in a visit to the Hill.

Easter earned All-America honors as a freshman for Emmanuel Christian. In 2022-23, as a sophomore, Easter just received the All-Blade player of the year honor. Per his high school, he was named the District 7 Division III player of the year and the TAAC player of the year.

Furthermore, Easter recently got selected to the Division III All-Ohio first team and was a finalist for the 2023 Ohio Mr. Basketball award.

Rated as a top-50 national prospect and a top-10 point guard in the sophomore class according to several recruiting services, Easter this past season collected “30 or more points in 16 of his 24 games, including 40 or more three times,” per the Toledo Blade.

In late December of last year, he also recorded a ridiculous quadruple-double consisting of 40 points, 13 rebounds, 12 steals and 10 assists in an Emmanuel Christian victory.