Syracuse basketball 4-star commit Donnie Freeman into top 25 in rankings

Syracuse basketball 2024 four-star commit Donnie Freeman from Washington, D.C., who last month transferred to the country’s top high-school hoops conference, has arrived in the top 25 nationwide in new rankings for the senior recruiting cycle.

MADE Hoops recently updated its 2024 national ratings, and it has the 6-foot-9 power forward at No. 21 overall. That is higher than other primary recruiting services, such as 247Sports, ESPN, On3 and Rivals.com.

In late July, MADE Hoops had Donnie Freeman at No. 18 nationally, so the Orange pledge did drop slightly in this recruiting service’s latest 2024 refresh. Regardless, being in the top 25 is fantastic, and Freeman has earned this sort of national ranking after the AAU season that he put forth this spring and summer.

I’ll never pretend to be a recruiting analyst or a scout, but I frequently talk to these kinds of experts. The sense I get is that Freeman could make a strong push for five-star status in his senior year, assuming he shines on a big-time stage.

In mid-August, Donnie Freeman said he would transfer for the 2023-24 season to the powerhouse IMG Academy in Bradenton, Fla., which competes in the loaded 10-member National Interscholastic Basketball Conference (“NIBC”).

Syracuse basketball 2024 four-star commit Donnie Freeman is a consensus top-45 overall player.

Freeman, as a junior in 2022-23, scored numerous regional and national accolades as he starred for St. John’s College High School in D.C., which was a nationally ranked group that finished at 32-4 and captured the Washington Catholic Athletic Conference (“WCAC”) tournament title.

More recently, in early July, Donnie Freeman was a key contributor as the Washington-based Team Takeover claimed the Peach Jam’s 17U crown on Nike’s EYBL circuit. Between the EYBL regular season and the Peach Jam tournament, Team Takeover tallied a combined 22-3 record.

At Peach Jam, Freeman averaged 12.9 points, 5.4 rebounds and 1.4 assists per contest. He connected on 46.1 percent from the field, 40.0 percent from deep and 65.2 percent from the charity stripe. For those efforts, he was named to The Circuit’s All-Peach Jam first team.

Since verbally committing to Syracuse basketball in May over Alabama, Iowa, Texas and Georgia Tech, time and time again, I’ve seen comments from national analysts and scouts that speak to how Freeman is not only talented from a skills perspective, but he’s also just a flat-out winner. I hope that translates to his future tenure on the Hill.

As I’ve noted in several recent articles, Freeman is one of several highly rated prospects who have moved to IMG for 2023-24, and high-school hoops experts view the Ascenders as a preseason top-10 squad, a preseason top-four team in the NIBC, and a significant contender to return to the GEICO Nationals in the spring of 2024.

Top scout Adam Finkelstein, 247Sports’ director of scouting, recently said to me on X that Freeman could have a shot at being named a McDonald’s All-American, particularly if he gets off to a hot start early on at IMG in the upcoming term.

For some context, here are the most recent 2024 national rankings for Donnie Freeman from the main recruiting Web sites.

247Sports Composite (industry-generated)
Overall: No. 41
Power forward: No. 8

On3 Industry Ranking (industry-generated)
Overall: No. 38
Power forward: No. 4

247Sports
Overall: No. 32
Power forward: No. 7

ESPN (recently updated)
Overall: No. 38
Power forward: No. 6

On3
Overall: No. 31
Power forward: No. 5

Rivals.com
Overall: No. 44
Power forward: No. 4