It took some time, but Kevin Willard has finally tapped into New York City’s vast array of prospects. On Wednesday the Seton Hall head coach landed one of the five borough’s brightest basketball talents.
Bishop Loughlin shooting guard Khadeen Carrington verbally committed to Willard, picking the Pirates over Cincinnati, Texas A&M, Vanderbilt and a host of others. St. John’s recruited Carrington over the winter, but seemed to back off.
“I can go in there and play right away and be an impact player,” said Carrington, who visited Seton Hall last week and averaged 24.7 points per game as a junior. “That’s what I was looking for. There was no reason to look anywhere else.”
Seton Hall is also involved with Lincoln star Isaiah Whitehead, the city’s top prospect, and is scheduled to host him on an unofficial visit on Saturday.
Carrington, a consensus three-star recruit, said associate head coach Shaheen Holloway, a Queens product, did the heavy lifting on his recruitment along with Willard. Carrington is the second player in less than a month from the New York Lightning AAU program to pick Seton Hall, joining highly ranked forward Angel Delgado.
The 6-foot-3 Carrington is a left-handed slasher, at his best going to the basket. His perimeter jump shot has improved, but remains a work in progress, one college coach familiar with Carrington said.
His mother, Lima DuFont, was impressed by the Seton Hall staff.
“The head coach is very down to earth, humble,” she said. “He gets right to the point, what he expects. I like what they’re about.
“[Willard] started there three years ago. From three years ago until now, it’s a huge difference.”
Carrington will join freshman Jaren Sina and sophomore Sterling Gibbs, a Texas transfer, in a loaded backcourt that figures to be one of the best in the new-look Big East when Carrington gets to campus.
“We’ll complement each other well,” he said. “We can do big things. I’m going there to work hard, turn the program around.”
Carrington enjoyed a huge junior year, leading Bishop Loughlin to the CHSAA Class AA intersectional championship game and saw his recruitment take off. He followed that up with a solid summer on the AAU circuit.
Seton Hall was one of many programs pursuing Carrington at this time last year, and when the July recruiting period came to an end, the Pirates began recruiting him harder. The dogged effort paid off, with the Pirates’ highest-profile city recruit in several years.