Recruiting Report: Kendall Brown (2022)
2021 Kendall Brown has the skill package at a young age to be a five star guard/wing prospect. Over the weekend the D1 Minnesota 17 and Under team won the Battle at the Lakes event in Minneapolis pushing their season…
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Continue Reading2021 Kendall Brown has the skill package at a young age to be a five star guard/wing prospect.
Over the weekend the D1 Minnesota 17 and Under team won the Battle at the Lakes event in Minneapolis pushing their season record to 17-0. Brown is a central figure on the local AAU team that has earned the rank of #1 in the country from PrepHoops.com.
So far Coach Al Harris is delighted with how Brown has fit in to a group that includes nationally ranked players Dawson Garcia, Ben Carlson, and Kerwin Walton.
“Kendall is a fun kid to coach,” Harris said. “He’s very active and definitely young (Brown just turned 16 last weekend). You have to be patient with him because he is so young.
“At times you see him on the floor you get so excited to see the flashes of greatness from him, but we also have to understand that Kendall still needs to be nurtured as both a basketball player and as a young man.
“With Kendall it’s fun but we also have to sometimes give him basketball spankings and then put him back on the floor and let him evolve as a young man too.”
Those “basketball spankings” have been coming to Brown for years as he’s grown up in a basketball family. His father Courtney Brown Sr was an all conference player in 1988 at St. Paul Highland Park and then continued his career at Missouri Valley College, Barber Scotia College, and at Southwest Minnesota State followed by professional stops in England and Switzerland (and with the Harlem Globetrotters).
Brown Sr has had the blessing of watching his two sons Courtney Brown Jr and Kendall Brown play two years together at East Ridge High School. In two years on varsity together the Browns produced a 51-10 record and a trip to the state tournament.
More importantly Kendall and Courtney shared a basketball experience that included a lot of teachings and even more memories.
“It means a lot to have played with (Kendall) you know,” Milwaukee signed forward Courtney Brown Jr explained. “We have something that nobody else can really have and that’s that brother to brother connection. It’s not something you can really explain we just know where each other is on the court.
“It’s something really unique that I was glad to experience during my high school career.”
Kendall competed on the Raptors junior varsity as an 8th grader while Courtney was a sophomore leading the team in scoring. Two years later the Browns pushed a balanced team to 28 wins but it was Kendall’s 17.3 points a contest that led the way for East Ridge.
“I have definitely seen Kendall get that killer instinct in him as a 6-foot-7 point guard, dunking on everybody,” Courtney Brown Jr said. “I have definitely seen him go from the 8th grader/freshman who is playing kind of timid to a sophomore that is one of the state’s more dominant players.”
Whatever lack of aggression may have been in Kendall’s game is no longer present and the Browns competing with one another played a big part in the maturation.
“I learned (from Courtney) that you can’t be soft,” Kendall said. “Because I played with he and his friends a lot so, even though you are the younger one you can’t go in there soft. You have to go in there with an older mentality every game.”
Overall the chance to take the court brother to brother was both a learn experience and a cherished memory.
“It was a really great opportunity because a lot of brothers growing up are not able to say that they’ve been able to play together,” Kendall explained. “My brother have been playing together since we were young in in-house basketball, so it’s meant a lot from a brotherly basketball standpoint in high school.”
Who would win the one on one battle in the Brown driveway?
“It’s been awhile since we played but I got him, he can’t beat me yet!” Courtney Jr said with a smile.
Oh but Courtney the day is fast approaching! Despite playing in the backcourt Kendall shot a team high 59 percent from the floor as a sophomore for the Raptors also making 70 percent of his foul shots. Add in a team high of nearly three steals a game and a 2 to 1 assist to turnover ratio and you have one of the elite sophomore prospects anyplace in America.
The Raptors won 28 of 32 games in 2018-19. Most of the rotation has graduated and moved on by East Ridge still has nationally ranked players in Brown and Ben Carlson returning in addition to a slew of young talent ready to earn roles.
“We don’t have to change too much to be successful next year, we just have to clean up things all around,” Kendall said about the 2019-20 year. “We have to sharpen up our defense like talk more defensively.
“Overall we did pretty much everything we could to win this year, we just need to improve our talking, improve our overall team defense, and knock down a few more shots and we should be good.”
The 247 sports rankings have Kendall at 30th in the nation with the national composite ranking slotting Kendall at 23rd with a five star ranking. And at the young age of 16 years and one week, this is only the tip of the iceberg.
Bryce Tesdahl was Kendall’s coach throughout his underclassmen years on varsity and while Coach Tesdahl has moved on to Minnetonka, his words about Kendall’s future should have local high school fans excited.
“He’s unique, he’s special,” Bryce said over the winter. “He’s got a chance to be a blue blood type player. But I tell him everyday you can’t by into that mentality. He’s receiving strong offers and a lot of national attention but there can be no stop of working. We want continued improvements daily.
“Kendall has aspirations of playing at the highest level of high school, college, and probably past that which he will have the opportunity to do so if he continues to develop and keeps working hard.
“For him, Kendall is just a human highlight reel. I would like him to gamble a little less on the defensive end but he’s always getting deflections and running out so it’s hard to tell him that because he just makes so many plays in transition.
“Kendall’s strides are so much bigger than everybody else’s that he can get ahead with or without the basketball. His physical maturation from last year to this year has become really better. Kendall just needs to shoot a higher percentage at the arc and be able to guard positions one through four but his length and athletic ability really set him apart from all others at his position. We could play him at the five if we needed to, he is one of those kids that you can trust with or without the ball.”
As Coach Tesdahl said, Kendall Brown is versatile. We’ve seen him play four different spots on the floor and at 6-foto-7/6-foot-8 you could likely have him defend a center at times if need be. Brown could certainly face-up a five-man and go at him. So where does Kendall like to play?
“I like to play the guard/wing spot: you can put me wherever on the perimeter because of my size, but I like to get to the ball and push it because I can make things easier for everybody.
“I look forward to getting better on the outside with my shot. As long as I get my outside perimeter game going then I am going to be a really hard match-up for bigs, smalls, really everyone. “
I got news for you Minnesota and America, Kendall is one of the hardest players in the country to guard right now. Improvements to his game would be an even scarier thing to game plan for. Just ask the eight Adidas opponents that D1 Minnesota has played so far this year (8-0).
Six weeks and four events in the switch to D1 Minnesota has went well for Kendall.
“It’s been really fun to play with these guys, I feel like we are the best team in the nation the way we play,” Brown said. “We share the ball, nobody is selfish on our team, everybody plays hard on defense, and it’s just really fun to be a part of. “
Brown will have numerous college options when it comes time to make a decision as an upperclassman. Baylor, Texas, Nebraska, Creighton, Iowa, Iowa State, Minnesota and Saint Louis have all offered plus a number of schools are showing interest.
“I hear mostly from Midwest teams, I’m starting to get more looks from teams around the country but for now I hear mostly from the Midwest teams.”
Another wave of interest and offers is about to hit Kendall Brown really fast, really soon. His mix of basketball feel in the backcourt and his explosive rim finishing ability are rare.