R.J. Barrett, who helped Canada knock off the U.S. en route to winning the gold medal in the recent FIBA U19 tournament, has decided to leave high school earlier than expected, making him available to his college suitors for the upcoming 2017-18 season and the NBA draft as early as July 2018.
The Mississauga, Ontario, native revealed the news on his blog for USA Today, saying, "I can’t say that there was one thing that tipped my decision to reclassify; but it was more a collective decision based on the whole year. My family and I feel like this will be beneficial for me because I’m ready to move up and to be in college a year earlier. Obviously, I was ranked No. 1 in the 2019 class and now that I’m moving up to 2018 my goal won’t change."
Barrett's father, the assistant general manager and executive vice president of Canada Basketball, watched his son abuse every U.S. defender sent his way en route to scoring 38 points in the headline-grabbing 99-88 semifinal win over the U.S. R.J. tossed in a team-high 18 points in the title game against Italy, concluding the tournament with a 21.6 points per game average.
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In regards to his college prospects, Barrett wrote on his USA Today blog, "the schools that are showing the most interest are Arizona, Duke, Kansas, Kentucky, Michigan, Oregon, Texas and UCLA. A few more have reached out and those schools are Illinois, Indiana, Michigan State, USC, UConn and UNLV. Not too much will change with my approach to the recruitment; we’ll just do the visits a little sooner than we probably would have if I stayed in 2019."
Mike DeCourcy contributed to this report