No Blakes this season
As bright an early signing period as it was for the Hawaii men’s basketball team, news on the personnel front wasn’t all positive.
Morningside (Calif.) High graduate Gerry Blakes will not be able to join the Rainbow Warriors over the upcoming semester break, as he continues to focus on academics at Citrus College in California. UH coach Gib Arnold was previously optimistic he could arrive midway through the season.
Right now, the combo guard is greyshirting and is not playing for Citrus’ basketball team. An option is having him redshirt next season at Citrus in working toward an associates degree and joining UH down the road. It’s believed UH is still at the top of his list, but he’s been tantalizingly close to coming for what seems like a year and it’s not happened yet. He could theoretically still arrive at Manoa with all or most of his years intact, but it will be more “wait and see” on this one for the foreseeable future, it seems.
If there’s a silver lining, it’s that even had UH managed to get Blakes in during December, it would have been extremely unlikely that he’d play in games this season.
It also seems that would-be walk-on Tyler McDaniels, the son of associate head coach Benjy Taylor, will not join the team at semester break, either.
However, UH is attempting to get early period signees Orel Lev of Israel and Isaac Fotu of New Zealand in at the semester break, Arnold said, though neither is a sure deal to be admitted by then. If one or both makes it in this season, they would redshirt the rest of 2011-12 as they get accustomed to UH’s system.
Thanks for the update Brian. I can’t see Blakes sitting out two seasons. Hope he still comes here.
Bummers, we really need a scorer like Blakes, his NCAA clock has started, this year is a red shirt, then four to play four.
Blakes’ clock hasn’t started because he is Greyshirting. I think this means that he is going to Citrus part-time and not playing for them.
Gib,don’t forget to visit Gerry up at his cali JC while you’re there in SoCal
Thanks, Brian …
The “Need” for the Associates Degree sounds like Blakes didn’t have things fall in place fast enough to pass the NCAA Clearinghouse Before enrolling @ Citrus …
Then, Technically became a Non-Qualifier … and Not Available before AA Degree (unlike Garrett Jefferson) … probably need Higher GPA under new rules for coming season…
Similar with Tyler Mc… Sounds like our coaching staff believes they “can” overcome whatever Personal Challenges are in their paths preventing them getting here ‘ready to play’ and work … some are Bigger than others …
For All of Us — We (and our self-discipline and self-perceptions) are our own biggest obstacles ….
Before any one “judge” — RE: Look at the Great Success Examples on our own team: Any of us could have worked on our quickness, shooting, ball-handling and passing, as hard as Miah or Shaq, to be D-1 Team Impact Players …
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Agree that one or two shut-down unstoppable scorers [DeShawn? Joston?] could have turned one or two of the more recent and maybe future losses … EX: Trevor Ruffin, almost by himself, almost knocked off current media-magnets Boeheim & Syracuse in NCAAs…
Expect Coach & Staff to find and sign one or two this and/or next year …
OR If Coach and Joston had agreed to play ball (on the same page) one or two weeks earlier … or if Hauns had already started playing “D” and hitting his shots … [several opportunities already within reach or grasp …]
Disappointing news about Blakes and McDaniels. Blakes, Biggs and Stevens were the ones I really wanted here, but so far it hasn’t panned out. I hope Blakes takes care of business and hasn’t lost his desire to come here. I look forward to seeing Lev asd Fotu play. I like the progress the players are making. Hope Josten continues to work on his discipline and self-control; think he’d see more playing time if he could.