London Johnson Pushes Back Announcement, and The Portal Claims Another Hoo
(Featured Image Credit: Matt Riley)
It's been an eventful morning. Freshmen Igor Milicic became the second Virginia player to enter the transfer portal. And then we were thrown a curveball, as top Class of 2023 recruit London Johnson pushed back his commitment announcement that was planned for this afternoon.
The Wait Continues
Norcross (GA) point guard London Johnson had set his commitment announcement for today, to be shown live on CBS stream. Those plans are no more. As first reported by 336Edits on twitter, he'll push back his announcement. Our own sources confirm that delay. It's unclear if the newly reported date of April 14th is firm.
London released a final six of Virginia, North Carolina, Clemson, Alabama, Georgia, and Southern Cal back in December. It's not the first time his commitment has been pushed back. He alluded to it coming over the winter as well. But this is the only time he had set a date, and then retracted.
While Virginia should still be considered the favorite. This is a concerning curveball. What I'm hearing is that two schools have asked him to pause while they make another pitch. It's not clear who they are. Alabama seems to be a candidate. And I would guess Georgia is the other. New coach Mike White had previously recruited London while at Florida.
It's not ideal obviously. His announcement today was widely expected to go Virginia's way. But the odds still seem to be on our side,. Hopefully we'll eventually get good news from him yet. But we'll see. Next weekend's live period certainly just got a lot more interesting.
Igor Enters The Portal
Virginia freshman Igor Milicic is the second Virginia scholarship player to enter the transfer portal, joining sophomore guard Carson McCorkle. Igor was the potential transfer we had been most concerned about losing, as I alluded to in the VIP Intel Reports. While he wasn't quite as ready to contribute as hoped this season, the coaching staff was very high on his long term potential.
That leaves the Hoos with two open scholarships. As we're seeing evidence of with early reach-outs, they're going to be aggressive in pursuing incoming transfers. It's a little too early to pinpoint which of those could become serious targets. Look for them to replace Milicic with a frontcourt addition, and potentially add shooting in the backcourt with the spot vacated by McCorkle.
Not a good day of news for Virginia fans unfortunately. Definitely not what I hoped for when I checked in this morning. If nothing else, it adds to the intrigue of spring. As always, we'll have it covered every step of the way on Locker Room Access.