Dereck Lively trims list; Kentucky makes the cut

Last week, Dereck Lively earned a scholarship offer from the Kentucky Wildcats.

Today, Lively announced his top seven, which included Kentucky.

Among the other finalists were the Michigan Wolverines, USC Trojans, Duke Blue Devils and North Carolina Tar Heels among others. That kind of list speaks to just how special of a prospect we’re talking about with Lively, who’s currently ranked as high as 14th overall in 2021 by Rivals.

A 7-footer from Pennsylvania, Lively has already had official visits to Kentucky and North Carolina, while he’ll visit Duke on June 28th. As of Thursday night, there are no predictions at Rivals or 247 Sports for where Lively lands.

Lively recently told KSR that a decision may not come until the spring, which is probably good news for a Kentucky team that currently has guys like Daimion Collins, Keion Brooks, Lance Ware and Oscar Tshiebwe in the frontcourt. Lively may want to wait until several of those guys have likely moved on to the pros by next spring.

That’s not even accounting for the potential for Jalen Duren to be on the roster next season. While he won’t be in college when Lively is, Duren being on Kentucky’s roster could cause a guy like Collins to be on it, whereas schools like Duke and North Carolina may have much lighter frontcourts by then.

Either way, Kentucky is still in the hunt for one of the top frontcourt players in 2021, but it doesn’t look like we should expect a conclusion to happen anytime soon.

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