Louisiana Class of 2019: Top Players Breakdown
Now that we have finally released our initial rankings for the 2019 class, it’s time to give everyone a little breakdown on each of the top players that Louisiana has to offer, especially with only one player in the top 5 coming from a traditional basketball powerhouse.
This has been, and will continue to be the most competitive race to be the top player in Louisiana since we first started in 2016. Every other year, there has been a clear cut top player, but for 2019, there is a dual for the top spot, and right now there isn’t a wrong answer. Right now, we have 6’3 G Mylik Wilson of Rayville at the top, but if we would have released these rankings four months ago, 6’5 G Jordan Wright of Dunham would have been at the top. However, Wilson has been absolutely killing it this spring, playing for the Arkansas Wings of the EYBL. He has had multiple games scoring 30+ in the EYBL, and as a result was recently invited to Nike’s Elite 100 Camp. Wilson is a rangy scorer, and he can put the ball in the bucket as well as anyone in the state. Up until a few months back, the presumed best player in the state was Jordan Wright, and you can make a strong argument for him being the top player. He can control the game in every facet, and will excel no matter the situation. He has a fantastic all around game, but has been hampered this spring and summer by a nagging ankle injury, and that injury is one of the biggest reasons he has fallen a bit in the rankings. However, when he is at full strength, he will impress a ton of people next summer, and I expect to see him on the national recruiting radar before long.
Right behind the two top dogs is 6’5 F Larenz Williams. He first burst onto the scene after attending one of our Prep Hoops Top 250 camps in the fall of his freshman year, winning the dunk contest and showing off his tremendous athletic ability. At the time, he was still very raw, but he has a tremendous work ethic, and has been working hard on his jumpshot and transitioning to more of a 2/3 tweener rather than a 3/4. But don’t get me wrong, he still has all the athletic ability that originally put him on our radar, as seen by this video by our own Josh Preston: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZPmzetgiPYw
Behind those three, we have Dy’Wan Griffin, a 5’11 G from Landry-Walker. Griffin is next in line as the point guard at Landry-Walker, and so far those guys have done pretty well. Since the school merged between O.P. Walker and L.B. Landry in 2014, there have been three point guards. All three have gone on to play D1 basketball (Tyree Griffin to Oklahoma St. in 2014, Lamar Peters to Mississippi St. in 2016 and Lamont Berzat to UNO in 2017), and I don’t see that ending any differently for Dy’Wan Griffin. I think he is the best pure point guard of any of these four, and has been playing at the highest level of AAU since a sophomore. Once again, if you want to see some of his highlights over his high school career, Josh Preston has you covered. (Also, on a side-note, everyone go show Josh some love on twitter. He works as hard as anyone in the state to get Louisiana guys exposure.) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x488jnyiryM&t=152s
The final member of the top five is 6’5 F Charlie Russell of Sophie B. Wright. Russell is another player that first popped up on our radar at the Top 250 camp last year, showing polish that you don’t often see from a young player with his size. He can stroke it from deep, and has a motor as high as anyone in his class, going after loose balls and offensive rebounds with a vengeance. I look forward to seeing all of these players continue to grow over the next couple of seasons.