Syracuse basketball putting on full-court press for 4-star big man from D.C.

Syracuse basketball coaches appear to be going all in on 2024 four-star power forward Donnie Freeman from Washington, D.C.

Per a tweet from the terrific SyracuseOnSI publisher Mike McAllister, the entire Orange coaching staff was meeting with the 6-foot-9 power forward in D.C. on Wednesday.

As I noted in another column earlier this week, the ‘Cuse is receiving buzz on recruiting Web sites in Freeman’s recruitment. Might he verbally commit to Syracuse basketball in the near future? Well, I’d love that. Many other Orange fans would love that. But that remains to be seen.

I’ll say this. Syracuse basketball coaches are clearly recruiting the top-30 national prospect extremely hard, and he seems to be one of the top targets for the Orange in the junior cycle, if not the No. 1 overall priority for Syracuse basketball coaches in this class.

When I penned this column on Wednesday night, two predictions on Rivals.com and one on the 247Sports Web site had arrived in the direction of the ‘Cuse for Freeman.

Syracuse basketball has strong momentum with 2024 four-star power forward Donnie Freeman.

The Orange coaching staff has pursued Freeman for a while now. In fact, when the ‘Cuse offered a scholarship to him back in August of 2021, I believe it was the first offer doled out by Syracuse basketball coaches in the 2024 class.

More recently, as Adrian Autry has taken over as head coach of the ‘Cuse, replacing Hall of Famer Jim Boeheim, Autry and his assistants have been quite active in their pursuit of Freeman.

In late March, Autry traveled to our nation’s capital to meet with Freeman. Toward the beginning of April, Freeman took an official visit to the Hill.

Last weekend, amid a live period on the AAU circuit, both Autry and new assistant coach Brenden Straughn watched Freeman in person as he suited up for the Washington-based Team Takeover in Nike’s EYBL league. Freeman played well as the EYBL held its first session of the spring and summer circuit at the LakePoint Champions Center in Emerson, Ga.

Previously, Autry and Straughn each served as an assistant coach with the Team Takeover program.

Freeman had a stellar junior term for St. John’s College High School in D.C., which was a nationally ranked squad in the 2022-23 campaign. He guided St. John’s to the 2023 Washington Catholic Athletic Conference (“WCAC”) tournament title, and Freeman picked up numerous honors during the most recent high-school stanza.

He was named to both the WCAC All-League first team and The Washington Post’s All-Met first squad. Freeman also received an honorable-mention nod to the MaxPreps 2022-23 All-America teams for the 2024 cycle.

Throughout his recruitment, he has landed more than 15 scholarship offers, including one from fellow Atlantic Coast Conference member Georgia Tech that he disclosed via Twitter on Wednesday.

Over the course of his junior year, Freeman has taken official visits to Syracuse basketball, Alabama, Texas and Iowa.