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All four of the University of Virginia men’s basketball 2012 class recruits have signed, according to a release posted on VirginiaSports.com this evening. Justin Anderson , Teven Jones , Evan Nolte and Mike Tobey are Tony Bennett and company’s latest additions, and the group is ranked in the top 25 nationally by ESPN.com, Rivals.com and Scout.com.
“There’s a level of completeness in all of these players that I like because it doesn’t make them one dimensional,” Bennett said in UVa’s official release. Bennett further discusses the class in this Jeff White piece on VirginiaSports.com. “All of these young men are playing under very good coaches who push them hard and teach them the value of team basketball and the ability to play both ends of the floor. We like what this class represents as a whole because there’s a little bit of everything. I think we’re at that stage in our program where we want to get those multi-dimensional players.
“These players all fit character-wise and they value being around good teammates. They are all very aware of what a degree from Virginia means and are driven to be a part of moving Virginia basketball to a higher level. That desire to bring relevance to Virginia in college basketball is the common goal for our first three classes. When we can layer the classes as we have and there’s maturity in them, then we can get the depth, the competitiveness and the steadiness that’s needed to become a real high level team.”
Anderson, a 6’6″, 225-pound wing guard/forward, is a native of Spotsylvania (VA) but plays for Montrose Christian in Rockville, Maryland. The most highly acclaimed prospect in the class, Anderson, who played for Boo Williams on the AAU circuit, is rated a 4-star prospect by all three aforementioned recruiting sites. Rivals ranks him as the no. 35 player in the country, while Scout rates him at no. 60 and ESPN has him at no. 61.
Mike Tobey , a 6’11”, 230-pound center out of New York, and Evan Nolte , a 6’8″ sharpshooting forward out of Milton High School in Georgia, are rated 4-star prospects by ESPN and Scout and 3-star recruits by Rivals. Tobey currently attends Blair Academy in New Jersey after attending Hotchkiss School in Connecticut last season as a junior. Nolte has helped Milton to three consecutive state championship game appearances.
Point guard Teven Jones was the last player to commit to the Hoos. The Kannapolis (N.C.) native is in a postgraduate year at Fishburne Military Academy. He impressed Coach Bennett enough to garner an offer this fall, and he accepted immediately. The 6’0″ prospect averaged 22 points per game as a senior at A.L. Brown last season.
UVa’s 2012 class — Tony Bennett’s second full class as Cavaliers head coach — is ranked no. 18 in the nation by ESPN.com. Scout.com rates it no. 20, and Rivals has the class ranked no. 21 nationally.
Stay tuned to TheSabre.com for more analysis on Virginia’s class in the coming week.
