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The live period of summer recruiting will kick off this Wednesday, July 8 at 5:00 p.m. and last for five days until Sunday. It will follow this pattern for the next three weeks as many teams will look to sure up their 2016 recruiting class and begin building their 2017 class.
At one point, which seems so long ago now, Pitt looked to be in great shape for 2016 with elite recruits Mustapha Heron and Maverick Rowan committed to the class. However, as things seem to be going for Pitt, the class fell apart with both players decommitting.
Heron claims to still be considering PItt, but we all know that is extremely unlikely. The talented slasher has deep family ties to former Pitt coach Barry Slice Rohrrsen who played professionally with Heron's father. Heron is a consensus five-star recruit and looks to be a favorite to follow Rohrrsen to his new gig, his third in three years at St. John's.
The same goes for Rowan, although he has made it no secret that he is not even considering Pitt. While the forward is in a battle to reclassify himself to the class of 2015, the favorites appear to be Louisville and St. John's, most likely St. John's.
With that coach Jamie Dixon has quite a bit of work to do with shaping the 2016 recruiting. It would surely be nice to have a class of incoming freshman, not three graduate transfers.
Pitt already has one solid piece of their recruiting class in Corey Manigault, a three-star forward from Virginia who is committed to the Panthers.
Recently the Panthers offered four-star guard Charlie Moore from Chicago, who also has offers to Iowa and Illinois, among others.
Some guys to keep an eye on are a pair of Philly players, Roman Catholic standouts Tony Carr and Lamar Stevens, who have said that they are looking to play at the next level together. The two have offers to many big time programs such as Indiana, Maryland and Temple, as well as Pitt.
As was reported last week by City of Basketball Love, Stevens is looking visit Pitt in the near future.