Jayden “Juke” Harris was fully aware that his summer circuit goal was as cliché as it was complex.
Every spring when the circuit season commences, droves of players around the country, whether by way of social media or otherwise, proclaim that this will be the summer everything changes: when the college offers begin to roll in and their play will catapult them from underrated to the top tier of the class rankings.
“You see it every year, I know,” Harris says. “But I only had one offer and I knew I wanted more. I had to make it happen, that was the bottom line. I had to go get it.”
Three months later, Harris has added 23 more offers, including heavyweights like Illinois, Virginia, Tennessee, Houston, NC State, Georgetown and Virginia Tech. Minnesota, LSU, Arkansas and Xavier are the latest schools to reach out.
“I’m a really confident player, but I’ll be honest, it’s still crazy to me that I’m in this position,” Harris says. “I know I put the work in, but it just feels good to have all of these options headed into my junior season.”
Harris pumped in 17 points, six rebounds and four assists a game for Team Loaded in the grueling Adidas 3SSB circuit. The breakout performance was a carryover from a stellar high school season, when he averaged 23.7 points, 7.5 rebounds and 3.2 assists a game for Salisbury (N.C.).
“I’m from a small town, so I knew I would have to take advantage of being in front of the coaches this summer,” Harris says. “I wanted to show them everything that I could do.”
Phenom Hoops
At 6'5", Harris is super agile and quick with shifty ball-handling ability and efficient scoring at all three levels, making him a headache of a defensive assignment for the opposition.
Contrary to popular belief, Harris’s alias, “Juke,” didn’t come from his propensity to trip defenders up with his creative ballhandling ability; his mother, Ebony Harris, gave him the name because of the ease of his birthing process.
“She said she only had to push once with me,” Harris says. “Most people think it’s about my game, but that’s the real story. I guess it ended up working out though.”
He’s hoping the ascension of his stock will bring about another full circle moment, too. Harris grew up a “big fan of Duke” and said he hopes the Blue Devils reach out.
“The assistant coach followed me, but I haven’t heard anything yet,” Harris says. “We’ll see what happens, but I have a lot of great options and I still have another year. I still have a lot of reasons to stay motivated.”
Chief among those is that his impressive production in the Adidas 3SSB and inordinate list of Power 5 offers hasn’t translated to respect in national rankings.
The SI99 ranks only the top players in the senior class and will drop later this year, but other national recruiting rankings have kept Harris outside of the top 100.
“I think like anyone would, I want to be considered one of the top players,” Harris says. “On the other hand, I don’t care like that. The college coaches are the ones that we need to care about and that shows me that I’m on the right path. What I try to do is to focus on what I can control; that’s how hard I go every day. If I do that, all of the other stuff will work itself out. It all falls into place eventually.”
