St. John’s Lands Four-Star Recruit Brandon Sampson

The Red Storm landed their second recruit for this fall’s incoming freshman class in top 50 SG Brandon Sampson. The 6-4 Baton Rouge (LA) native chose St. John’s over hometown LSU, USC and California. Head coach Steve Lavin’s other class of 2015 commit, Samir Doughty, is also a shooting guard.

More from the NY Daily News:

St. John’s scored a big recruiting coup on Monday morning when 6-5 Brandon Sampson of Baton Rouge (La.) Madison High announced he would be joining the Red Storm next season.

 

Sampson is rated among the 50 best high school recruits by several national recruiting websites. The shooting guard opted for the Johnnies over California, USC and LSU, according to Madison High coach Jeff Jones. This season, he is averaging about 17 points per game.

 

“New York is getting a big-time player,” Jones told the Daily News in a telephone interview. “He’s Stephen Curry-ish with his jump shot… a real good shooter.”

 

Sampson is the highest profile recruit to pick St. John’s in two seasons, but continues the succession of high level talents that have been opting for the Storm since Lavin arrived.

 

Jones said Sampson “wanted to go somewhere where he would be a major impact player right away” and at the moment that’s what he’d be for the Johnnies. The team will lose seniors D’Angelo Harrison, Jamal Branch, Sir’Dominic Pointer and Phil Greene after this season. Junior Chris Obekpa and sophomore Rysheed Jordan are certain to examine the landscape for the jump to the NBA after this season.

 

Sampson joins Philadelphia guard Samir Doughty in the current recruiting class.

 

“St. John’s was involved very early with (Sampson),” Jones said. “Coach Lavin showed him that bringing him in was a top priority. He won over the family and he won over Brandon… In recruiting, it can be a crapshoot but Lavin was genuine the whole time.”