Syracuse Basketball: ESPN has disrespected 4-star commit Elijah Moore

I simply don’t get how Syracuse basketball commit Elijah Moore from New York City isn’t included in the latest 2024 national rankings from ESPN.

I mean no disrespect to ESPN and its recruiting director, Paul Biancardi. I’m a big fan of Paul. But in recent days, ESPN updated national ratings of the top-100 prospects in the rising-senior class, and the 6-foot-4 Moore wasn’t included.

ESPN does have him as four stars, with a scout grade of 80. The No. 100 player in ESPN’s 2024 rankings has a scout grade of 82, so perhaps Moore just missed the cut in these ratings.

ESPN also ranks Elijah Moore as the No. 33 shooting guard across the country in this cycle. That, to me, is comical. While I’m not a recruiting analyst or a scout, there aren’t 32 shooting guards better than Moore in the 2024 class.

In fact, as I’ve followed Moore’s recruitment and play for a long while now, I’ve seen numerous experts opine that he is one of the top shooting guards nationwide in his cycle.

Elsewhere, Syracuse basketball 2024 four-star commit Elijah Moore is in the top 60.

Moore verbally committed to the Orange in late January over other finalists Alabama, Arkansas, Miami and Oklahoma State. He is a standout for Cardinal Hayes High School in the Bronx, N.Y., and suits up in grassroots basketball for the 17U squad of the Bronx-based Wiz Kids in the Adidas 3SSB league.

When Rivals.com updated its 2024 national rankings not too long ago, Elijah Moore arrived at No. 54 nationally. As 247Sports refreshed its ratings for this cycle, he checked in at No. 56 overall, No. 11 at shooting guard and No. 4 in New York.

The other main recruiting Web site, On3, has Moore at No. 81 nationally. I acknowledge that these sorts of rankings are subjective and will vary from recruiting service to recruiting service, for Elijah Moore to be in the top 60 to the top 85 elsewhere and not make ESPN’s top 100 doesn’t make sense to me.

At the time of this writing, the industry-generated On3 Industry Ranking had him at No. 76 overall, while the industry-generated 247Sports Composite ranked Moore at No. 97 nationally. Both of these composite rating systems have him as a top-20 shooting guard and a top-five player in New York within the 2024 class.

I know that these national rankings won’t mean anything once Elijah Moore begins playing for Syracuse basketball. And I do believe he will shine on the Hill. To reiterate, I mean no disrespect to ESPN. But Moore should be in its top 100.

On the spring AAU circuit for the Wiz Kids, Moore earned a lot of high praise for his performances, including during NCAA live periods when ‘Cuse head coach Adrian Autry was in attendance. In the 2022-23 season, as a junior, Elijah Moore helped lead Cardinal Hayes to the New York “AA” Archdiocesan tournament title.

This past term, Moore was named to the 2022-23 New York state Catholic High School Athletic Association (“CHSAA”) “AA” All-League first team. Maybe he’ll contend for All-America honors as a senior in 2023-24, when some high-school hoops experts are forecasting Cardinal Hayes as a preseason top-25 squad.