With a new head coach in place, priorities on the court and on the recruiting trail were bound to change. One thing that seemed unlikely to change was what was being put together on the recruiting trail, in what many argued was Wisconsin’s best-ever recruiting class.
However, the original member of that recruiting class, Alona Johnson, has been reportedly granted a full release from her national letter of intent and will not play for the Badgers.
The 5-5 guard from Milwaukee Riverside is the only member of an otherwise intriguing class that did not reaffirm her commitment to the Badgers. She committed to Kelsey and the Badgers early on in her career after leading her high school to a state title in her freshman season back in 2013, and she finished her senior year by averaging 19.7 points and shooting 36 percent from the field for the Tigers.
Wisconsin will bring in a big and diverse class next season, even without Johnson (who had offers from Milwaukee and Cincinnati before shutting down her recruitment early in the process).
New head coach Jonathan Tsipis will welcome in 6-3 forward Abby Laszewski of Avon, Connecticut; 6-1 forward Courtney Fredrickson of Minnetonka, Minnesota; 5-8 guard Gabby Gregory of Irving, Texas; 5-5 guard Suzanne Gilreath of Fridley, Minnesota; and 6-2 forward Grace Mueller of Verona.
With Johnson in the fold, the Badgers had the No. 17-ranked recruiting class in the country and the No. 5 class in the Big Ten according to Blue Star Basketball.
Not having Johnson in the class may not be the biggest loss in the world, and according to Dennis Punzel of the Wisconsin State Journal, Tsipis and his staff have been after the state’s highest ranked players in the 2017 class during the club basketball season.
Those players are: 6-4 Sidney Cooks of Kenosha St. Joseph; 6-2 Estella Moschkau of Madison Edgewood and 6-2 Myriama Smith-Traore of Whitewater.
Cooks is perhaps the most highly touted of the bunch, coming in as a 5-star recruit according to ESPNW and holding a list of offers that stretches the entire country. Moschkau is a 3-star rated wing and has national offers including from most of the Big Ten, while Smith-Traore seems most serious about Saint Louis, Marquette, Wisconsin and Kent State at last notice.
Having a new direction for the program seems to be the selling point, and it will be most interesting to see how the recruiting process plays out for the likes of Cooks and Moschkau now that new emphasis on recruiting the state is in place.
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