Indiana Basketball: What to know ahead of Lester Quinones announcement

2019 four-star guard Lester Quinones’ announcement takes place on Friday, May  10 and will decide between the Indiana basketball program and Memphis Tigers.

On Friday, May 10, the Indiana basketball program will find out it’s fate when it comes to 2019 guard Lester Quinones.

Just recently, the four-star guard eliminated Maryland, Michigan and LSU from his list, deciding between his top two of Memphis and Indiana.

Noticeably a Memphis lean for almost the entirety of his recruitment, as of the last month and a half, the Hoosiers have made up a lot of ground.

In an interview with Adam Zagoria, he spoke on his and his family’s relationship with the staff and Indiana program in general.

“Coach Miller and my family are very close and my family loved the visit there,” Quinones said. “I really like their strength trainer and feel he’ll help me get to where I want to be. They have great tradition and I really connected with the returning players on my visit.”

Conducting an in-home visit with the four-star prospect last Thursday, the Indiana coaching staff is the last school to be able to put any finishing touches on their pitch before he announces.

Also last week, Indiana’s recruitment of Quinones may have also received a boost, with top 10 guard R.J. Hampton reclassifying from the class of 2020 to the class of 2019. Memphis is in Hampton’s top five, and he is expected to visit with the Tigers within the next couple of weeks.

Overall the Tigers are involved with five prospects right now, and currently have just four scholarships available – assuming they take Penny Hardaway’s son off scholarship if they were to receive a commitment from every single prospect.

In another interesting turn, again something that happened last week, Duke’s Boogie Ellis asked out of his letter of intent, and reopened his recruitment. To no surprise, Memphis – who was involved in his original recruitment – amped up the pressure again, and lead in his recruitment too.

Ellis and Quinones play a similar position and with a few other guards on the roster and in the 2019 class, there is very little playing time to go around, compared to that in Bloomington.

One of the biggest risers in the new 247Sports rankings, Quinones now sits at No. 49, up 31 spots from before.

With his good size at 6-foot-5 and a phenomenal shooting stroke, Lester Quinones could prove to be an important piece to this Indiana team, should he commit.