Recruiting Report: John Sutherland (2020)
Six-foot-6 Grand Rapids forward John Sutherland is the best 2020 big school scorer that many of you didn’t know about, until he put numbers on the board in wins over Fury Zurn and the Matrix (twice) this spring. Sutherland is…
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Continue ReadingSix-foot-6 Grand Rapids forward John Sutherland is the best 2020 big school scorer that many of you didn’t know about, until he put numbers on the board in wins over Fury Zurn and the Matrix (twice) this spring. Sutherland is the latest standout from the GR.
Dusty Rychart. Alex Illikainen. Eric Webb. Austin Pohlen. Jake Skelly. Eric Stark. John Sutherland.
After scoring 27.5 points with 11.5 rebounds a game as a junior John Sutherland belongs right there with that long list of distinguished group of Thunderhawks basketball players. Sutherland made 66 percent of his shots inside the arc and another 39 percent of the attempts he took behind it. Time to make room for another potential 30 a game guy in black and orange.
“I watched people like Alex Illikainen, Jake Skelly, Brock Schrom, all good players that went on to college and did pretty well,” Sutherland said. “I was able to learn from some of Brock’s post moves inside and Skelly moving off of screens and hitting threes. Stuff like that.”
Sutherland had a big year but the Hawks slipped to a 9 win season but when your program has made 10 state tournament appearances in the past 17 years you don’t stay down for long.
“We only lost two seniors from last year’s team although one of them was one of our key scorers, but if we can fill that gap with all the returning talent we will be just fine,” Sutherland said.
John is a team first kind of guy that would rather focus on his team but we did ask him how he worked his way to a 27.5/11.5 a game guy and the answer was “I just took what the defense gave me, my teammates did a great job of setting me up, and I made the shots that they gave me”.
There has been a lot of that with Sutherland competing with the Northern Lakers this spring. The Lakers are a top ten 17u squad in Minnesota with a record of 15-7 on the season.
“Our bond as a team comes from playing together, liking each other, and going after it to get a win,” John said after the Lakers knocked off the 23-3 Minnesota Fury. “We played very physical defense against their bigger guys as they score a lot and the other end we moved the ball around and took good shots.
“Our great shooting on the outside leading to inside scoring and then great defense is how we have been able to get things done. We just have to keep getting better and we want to win a lot of games with this team.”
College coaches have definitely taken notice of Sutherland’s inside/out, high percentage scoring abilities. A number of them have watched and made contact.
“I am hearing from a lot of D2 schools like UMD, Bemidji State, Minot State, and some others. I am going to get some visits in soon. I have heard a lot from Jamestown too.”
Johnathon Sutherland scored the ball very well from the Forward spot at Battle at the Lakes! #PrepHoopsBatL #PHCircuit
Full Video 🎥: https://t.co/o9Dom9sLC4 pic.twitter.com/Yvz6NJzCHN
— Prep Hoops Circuit 🏀 (@PHCircuit) May 21, 2019