Former Midlands basketball standout makes college choice
Julian Phillips will be his playing college basketball in the Southeastern Conference.
The Midlands native announced Friday afternoon LSU would be his college choice. Phillips picked LSU over Florida State, Southern Cal and Tennessee. He made the announcement on the Field of 68 podcast sitting next to his parents.
Phillips is ranked as a five-star prospect and one of the top players for the Class of 2022. ESPN has him as the 14th-best player in the Class of 2022 and 247Sports Composite as No. 15.
“Long, skilled, high level talent,” ESPN recruiting analyst Paul Biancardi said. “The thing you got to like about his game is he can play inside and out with effectiveness. His foot speed is excellent and is loaded with potential because of his versatility to blend many different facets into his game He has so much upside. He could take it to low post and then the mid-post like Carmelo Anthony.
“The next thing for him is to be a more active rebounder and live out more on the perimeter.”
Phillips is a versatile forward who could handle the basketball. He spent this summer working on his shooting skills while playing on the AAU circuit playing with Upward Stars.
“We worked on my shooting and that is something I took very seriously,” Phillips told The State this summer “Coming into July, I shot the ball really well this summer. Hats off to coach Savage and coach Curt Wheeler (AAU coach) and coach Leonard for helping me.“I try to play as hard as I can and don’t take any plays off. I think I am a versatile forward and can play inside and out.”
South Carolina and Clemson were two of the first schools to offer Phillips in June of 2019. Clemson made his top eight schools but neither the Tigers or the Gamecocks factored in during his decision. He is the second commit for LSU in Class of 2022, joining small forward Devin Ree.
Phillips played his first three years at Blythewood High School and was a three-time all-state selection before announcing in August that he will play his senior season at Link Year in Branson, Missouri. Link Year has three teams, including Link Year Academy, an elite high school squad that travels and plays a national schedule. Link Year currently has 38 alums playing Division I basketball and two play professionally.
Link Year has the top four players in Missouri from Class of 2022, including Phillips. Jordan Walsh, Michigan commit Tarris Reed and Ohio State commit Felix Okpara also are on the roster as well as Omaha Billew, the fourth ranked player in the country for the Class of 2023.
Link Year is scheduled to play at Battle at The Rock in Rock Hill on Dec. 2-4, one of nine tournaments outside of Missouri on the schedule.
“He will be around like-minded talent and I think he will have a good year developing,” Biancardi said of Phillips playing at Link.
This story was originally published October 8, 2021 at 4:04 PM.
