Jimmy Whitt and his Hickman teammates attended the Minnesota Team Camp this past weekend.
Jimmy Whitt, a 6-foot-2, 170-pound rising senior guard from Columbia (MO) Hickman, was recently ranked as the #52 player in the country by Yahoo Sports. Whitt helped lead the K.C. Run GMC team to the Jayhawk Invitational title in April and they have advanced to the semifinals of the Howard Pulley Invitational, despite missing two starters.
Whitt helped lead the Kewpies to a 27-3 mark, losing to Christian Brothers 86-77 in overtime in the Class 5A title game. Whitt had 29 points, seven rebounds and seven steals in the game as Hickman rallied from a twelve-point deficit at the end of the third quarter to force overtime.
White was named Class 5A All-State after averaging 22.4 points, 5.3 rebounds and 4.4 steals per game this season.
Whitt and his Hickman teammates attended the Minnesota Team Camp this past weekend. He was forced to miss his game Sunday after losing a tooth in a game Saturday that required a four-hour emergency hospital visit. Gopher Hole.com recently caught up with Whitt to learn the latest on his recruitment.
Gopher Hole: Most importantly, how is your mouth?
Jimmy Whitt: The mouth is good. They ended getting the tooth back in and they just gave me these braces. It will be fine. I’ll be good.
Gopher Hole: Every player has had some injuries. Have you had any injuries in the recent past?
Jimmy Whitt: Not too many injuries. My freshman year, I had a different tooth hit and I had to get a root canal, so this is the second mouth injury. I am going have to invest in a mouth piece.
Gopher Hole: How was the trip to Minnesota?
Jimmy Whitt: It was great. They showed around the camps and everything. Talked about their program. Talked about different ways that I would fit in. It really helped me imagine myself in the program, in the system and in their style of play.
Gopher Hole: Your head coach, David Johnson, attended Fergus Falls Community College and cached in Brainerd. Had he told you much about Minnesota before this trip?
Jimmy Whitt: We talked about Minnesota a little bit, the city and everything. It is a great place to live. There is so much support, fan support. You come up here and you will be known by the fans, the people and you will have so many connections from the business standpoint and everything, because that is what I want to study for. There are so many opportunities here.
Gopher Hole: What is your recruitment like right now? Are you pretty much narrowing down schools yet or are you still open to new schools?
Jimmy Whitt: I’m still open. The new schools that I have talked to are Marquette, North Carolina, Indiana and KU, so I am still talking to schools like that. I am going to narrow it down after July, though. That is when I am going to really start chopping down the list to about five to eight and talk to my parents about where we want to take the official visits.
Gopher Hole: Do you know what schools you definitely want to visit or have you thought that far?
Jimmy Whitt: I don’t think that there are any schools that I definitely want to go to. We are just taking it all in right now.
Gopher Hole: I know that you were at the recent NBA Top 100 Camp. What was that experience like playing against some of the top players in the country?
Jimmy Whitt: Great experience. Being able to go out there with professional people who have been down the road in your shoes. They have been there. Ex-pros who know what you need to do to get there. They are people that have made it there from lottery picks to people who were undrafted who had to work their way even harder. To be able to see that and have them talk to you and pick their brain about the different things in the NBA and how to make it, is huge for me.
Goper Hole: How about playing against some of the top players, so you can see how you stack up and what things you need to work on?
Jimmy Whitt: Playing was great because you are playing with so many great players. It is not like AAU, where not everyone is top ranked. Every player is top where they are from, so they are the best of the best. Every game is the highest level of competition that you can get, so it really helps you figure out your strengths and weaknesses. What you do really great on the court and what you need to work on.
Gopher Hole: Obviously, Columbia Hickman is right there by the University of Missouri. Do most of your friends and family want you to play close to home?
Jimmy Whitt: Obviously, since being in town, there is a lot of people that want me to stay home and be in Mizzou, but at the end of the day, I have a lot of people around me that just want the best for me and feel that wherever I am most comfortable and excel the most, is where they want me to go.
Gopher Hole: Does this visit give you a little appreciation for Minnesota?
Jimmy Whitt: Definitely. It really helped me gauge my interest and gauge how serious Minnesota was and how much I liked the town. I really liked it. I loved being up there. Being able to play in front of Coach. Being able to talk to Coach and everything. Being able to meet some of the players. It was a great experience for me.
Gopher Hole: Does this make you even more aware how nice it might be to play here?
Jimmy Whitt: Definitely. It really increased my interest in Minnesota being able to get up here and see it for myself.
Gopher Hole: You definitely plan on signing in the fall, right?
Jimmy Whitt: Yes. I am definitely going to take my official visits before my season when college is back in and I’ll commit before my first game, sometime before then.
Gopher Hole: You were missing a likely starter and a couple of key reserves this past weekend. How much do you think that you gained as a team playing in a camp like this?
Jimmy Whitt: Definitely, we grow a lot as a team. More physical. We had to play more physically as team, being able to gauge how we were against some top schools, like teams that won state. Teams like Apple Valley who has had Tyus Jones on their team, so they know how to move the ball and play as a team. We are young, so it was a huge learning experience for us.