BY JOE LAURICH, STAFF WRITER
Following a fantastic 2019 recruiting class, Travis Steele and company struck gold again in 2020 adding three of the top 150 players in the class.
The 2020 Xavier recruiting class was ranked 24th in the country by 247 Sports and was ranked third in the Big East.
One of the big themes of the class was players with winning pedigrees who could help bring a winning culture to Xavier.
The first player that committed to Xavier was Dwon Odom out of Saint Francis School in Alpharetta, Ga. He was ranked the 48th best player overall and the ninth best point guard.
After losing point guard Quentin Goodin last season, Xavier was looking to add a playmaking point guard that could create space and run a controlled fast tempo offense.
Odom brings exactly that: fantastic court vision, unmatched explosiveness and a great basketball IQ to run a fast offense while being able to maintain control.
The next player to commit to Xavier was CJ Wilcher out of Plainfield N.J., where he attended Roselle Catholic.
Wilcher is 6-foot-5, 195 lbs and was ranked as the 107th best overall and 15th best shooting guard in the class.
One of the big problems that Coach Steele’s teams faced in the first two years was a complete lack of perimeter shooting. Last year’s team only shot 31.2% from behind the arc and something needed to be done, so Xavier brought in one of the best three point shooters in the class in Wilcher.
He has the ability to take over games and catch fire very quickly.
One example of this was in the New Jersey North Non-Public title game. Roselle Catholic was down 10 midway through the 4th quarter and Wilcher proceeded to drop three straight three-pointers to get them right back in a game that Roselle Catholic ended up winning by one point.
The final player that was added to the class was Colby Jones from Alabama, where he attended Mountain Brook High School.
Jones is 6-foot-5, 195 lbs and was ranked the 119th best overall player and the 17th best shooting guard in the class.
Jones can do a little bit of everything, and he will likely play the small forward position for Xavier, but he has the abilities to play point guard and shooting guard as well.
Jones has the ability to be a talented shooter, and he also brings fantastic basketball IQ and the ability to find the open man.
Expect Jones to be in contention to start at small forward for the Musketeers.