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Who is the top player in the class of 2008?
Busy weekend: Shumpert visits Marquette and Liggins breaks his foot »
« Simeon coach Robert Smith named coach of the year by the Black Coaches Association

For the first time in a number of seasons, the title is up for grabs. There's no Jon Scheyer or Derrick Rose...

The Contenders
(in no particular order)

DeAndre Liggins, Washington: Liggins is full of potential and promise, but plenty of questions linger. Will his shot improve? Can he step up and win the big game? Just how athletic is he?

Iman Shumpert, Oak Park: The toast of the spring, but he often disappeared on the high school court.

Michael Dunigan, Farragut: Sometimes dominant, but then he can drop a zero point effort and seem frustrated. He has the most upside, just due to his size.

Nick Fruendt, Batavia: The best scorer in the class, but hasn't faced a lot of top-tier competition yet.

Matt Humphrey, Hales: Seems to be two different players. In AAU ball he's a confident, sharp-shooting superstar. During the season, nothing seemed to fall for Humphrey. If he puts it together he could surpass Fruendt and and Shumpert.

Kevin Dillard, Homewood-Flossmoor: His sophomore season was exceptional, and now he's dominating on the spring circuit.

Ryan Hare, Marshall: Didn't have quite the season a lot of people expected last year, but now that Beverley and Stovall are gone, we should see what he can do.

Stan Simpson, Leo: Very underrated. Simpson is the best combination of size, polish and athleticisim in the class.

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Comments

Liggins is the man! He's like Julian Wright and Humphrey isn't even close.

The big question is will Bruce Weber get any of these guys, or will he strike out on the top in-state players like he usually does?

At this point Liggins is the man. However, he does not have to gaurd Humphrey and he does not want to. Hales has great basketball and the pressure of winning it all in Class AA was a lot for a junior. Watch out for him next season. His length and lefty stroke is hard to contain. He will hurt Oak Hill.

Stan Simpson will surprise everyone!

I'm not a fan of rating players' hype but right now Liggins is the Class of 2008 leader, hands down.

Most likely to catch him is Michael Dunigan, who needs more consistency and mental toughness.

Two guards who deserve mention on list of contendors: Deon Dixon of Crane and Kenyon Smith of Simeon.

O'Brien responds: Good call on those two guys. It will be interesting to see how much they improve this season, also Isiah Williams of Farragut.

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