Recruiting Report: Parker Badding (2018)
A stock-riser in Iowa’s 2018 class, Kuemper Catholic’s Parker Badding has gone from good to very good in a hurry, and could have some D2 offers by summer’s end because of it.
Right now, the 6-foot-1 guard is seeing a lot of NAIA interest, but has seen some D2 interest trickle in that correlates with his vastly improved skill-set.
“It’s a lot of the NAIA schools like Briar Cliff, Morningside, Dordt, some of the school like that. And I have recent interest from a D2 school, Nebraska-Kearney; that’s a goal of mine is to get an offer from them,” said Badding.
“My best case scenario is to get an offer from somewhere like Wayne State, I’m hoping I can get an offer from somewhere like that after July. They’ve sent me a letter, so hopefully we can keep in touch as the summer goes on.”
A slick ball-handler with the ability to lose his man and hit jumpers off the bounce, Badding mentioned during a recent phone interview what exactly he’s been working to improve of late.
“Obviously the basic things like shooting and dribbling is what I’ve been working on, and one of the specific things I wanted to work on was shooting off the dribble, like a 10-15 foot pull-up,” said Badding.
“And then the intangibles, like being coach-able, being an extension of the coach on the floor. I’m really working on the communication aspect of my game.”
Iowa’s 35th-ranked 2018, Badding was the starting point guard for the Knights last season, and helped guide them to the state tournament while averaging 10.7 points and leading them in assists.
“My role, being the point guard as a junior with already having a year of varsity under my belt, was to be a leader,” said Badding. “And then I just needed to hit open shots, like a point guard should, and just getting the offense set up and things like that.”
He added: “This year I’ll be a senior, so I’ll need to lead them to come and step into a varsity role.”
In the meantime, he’ll spend the next two live period weekends with with Kingdom Hoops Elite.
“The next two weekends and I’m hoping to get some college looks with them,” said Badding, who had previously been with Tryon Gym. “I saw that as a good opportunity for me, and I took it.”