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As the summer recruiting circuit heats up, two Kentucky Wildcats targets could be making college decisions sooner rather than later.
One of which is five-star wing Kris Wilkes, who is ranked a top-20 prospect by every major recruiting service. He's also ESPN's 11th-overall prospect for next year, and for awhile now, UK has been firmly in the mix in his recruitment.
However, UK has yet to offer Wilkes as they're in the mix for several highly-touted wings in 2017. Between Wilkes, John Petty, Kevin Knox and Jarred Vanderbilt, expect the Cats to land at least one five-star wing in next year's class.
The problem with Wilkes is he wants an offer from UK now, something that's eluded him to this point, as he told the Herald-Leader.
"I haven’t talked to them recently," he told the Herald-Leader this week. "I talked to them before, I visited down there. They just kept saying, ‘Get better.’ Maybe they will offer me before the end of the summer, maybe not."
Wilkes also said he's planning to cut out all of the schools that haven’t extended scholarship offers at some point this summer, meaning UK needs to extend an offer soon if they want to remain in contention. Wilkes also said if UK does offer, they will "definitely" remain on his list.
If UK does end up offering Wilkes, there's a good chance he'll ultimately be a Cat. However, no offer may result in the Indianapolis native staying close to home and playing for the Indiana Hoosiers.
"They always say I’m the one wing guy that they want for sure," Wilkes said. "It’s good to hear that. I talk to them a lot. I talked to (Crean) earlier. He was asking how it’s going down here and stuff like that. He’s a pretty good guy."
As is always the case with UK recruiting under John Calipari, he has to pick and choose between which elite prospects he wants, which could lead to a guy like Wilkes moving on soon.
That's why the summer evaluation period is going to be critical to Wilkes either getting that offer, or him moving on as UK looks to land other big-time wings.