The California Men's basketball team could be SCARY next season. With all this talk about Ivan Rabb, Jaylen Brown, and Caleb Swanigan joining forces at Cal, the word "scary" in all capital letters is about the only way I can describe this without failing to do the hype justice. If you read my write up about Ivan Rabb last week, you already got a good taste of who he is. He's a 6'11, 210 pound 5-star power forward projected to be a Top-Five pick in the 2016 NBA Draft.
As for the other two guys, they too have tremendous potential. Jaylen Brown is a 6'7, 220 pound small forward who is also projected to be a Top-Five pick in the 2016 NBA Draft and Caleb Swanigan is a 6'8, 275 pound forward, who despite not being a projected Top-Five pick in the 2016 NBA Draft, is still a five-star recruit like Rabb and Brown.
Cal is looking at the possibility of having three five-star recruits, two of which are projected to be Top-Five picks in the 2016 NBA Draft. If that isn't "SCARY" enough for you, I don't know what is. That's Kentucky and Duke kinda scary. We're not talking NCAA Tournament anymore with Cal if they get these three guys. We're talking Final Four and a possible NCAA championship.
Let's not forget that Cal already has a commit from 4-star shooting guard Davon Dillard for this upcoming season, two outstanding junior guards in Jabari Bird and Jordan Mathews, and two seven-footers in Kingsley Okoroh and Kameron Rooks. Plus, it's very likely that NBA bound point guard Tyrone Wallace comes back for his senior season.
If you add these three five-star freshmen, what's not to like about this team? This team would have it all: Size, talent, versatility, depth, and veteran leadership. Even the best of teams sometimes are lacking in one or two of these areas, but Cal would have it all. There really wouldn't be a weakness that teams could easily spot. Cal would have multiple go-to guys, the ability to beat teams inside and out, and also NBA-level talent to hang with the likes of Kentucky, Duke, and Arizona.
I don't want to count our chickens before they hatch, but I am saying that if the very best possible outcome happens for Cal, which is to land Rabb, Brown, and Swanigan, there's no reason for Cal fans to doubt that they could see their team playing in the Final Four. The only reason for Cal fans to doubt is that they've never seen a Cal team this good before. But if you strip away the uniforms and just look at the roster, this team would have Final Four written all over them. Go Bears!
---Ben Parker: follow me on twitter @nba_lord for NBA news.
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