5. Jarod Lucas
The final player I want Illinois to keep tabs on is Jarod Lucas. He is a guard who can knock down shots from anywhere on the court.
Shockingly, Lucas wasn’t a big-time recruit coming out of high school. He was only a three-star guard who was ranked as the No. 295 player in the class of 2019. Lucas still got solid DI attention, though. He would eventually pick Oregon State as his landing spot.
With the Beavers, Lucas developed into a great guard. His best season came last year when he averaged 13.5 points, 2.3 rebounds, and 1.2 assists per game. He also shot 38.6% from three-point range and 87.1% from the charity stripe. Those are really good numbers.
Lucas entered the transfer portal on March 29. Since then, he has heard from a myriad of programs including Illinois. His recruitment has been a little quiet over the past week or so, though.
I am always interested in someone who can shoot 38.6% from three-point range while taking 6.1 three-pointers per game. Give me that all day every day. Lucas is someone who could come into the Illinois program and, most likely, start from day one. I think he would fill a lot of the scoring needs for the Orange and Blue.
Let’s land a transfer portal recruit. Illinois has now lost three players to the portal and that doesn’t even count the number of players we have lost to graduation. Production needs to be replaced, and that is what these five players can do for the program.