• Ringing off the hook

  • By Adam Finkelstein, ESPN Recruiting | June 16, 2010 7:20:33 AM PDT
Tuesday was the first day that NCAA rules permitted college coaches to call perspective student athletes in the Class of 2012.Harvard coach Tommy Amaker started calling 7-foot center Kaleb Tarczewski (Southborough, Mass./St. Mark's) at 9:30 a.m ET.He was caught off guard by the call because he didn't realize the significance of June 15 until he spoke with his St. Mark's teammate Alex Murphy, another highly regarded prospect in the Class of 2012."I didn't even know [Tuesday] was the first day we could get calls," Tarczewski said. "I was talking to Alex after Harvard called and he told me. He said 'you wait, you're about to get a ton more'." By the time the day had come to an end, Tarczewski had heard from Duke coach Mike Krzyzewski, West Virginia coach Bob Huggins, Marquette coach Buzz Williams and Boston College coach Steve Donahue in addition to assistant coaches from Arizona, Texas, Ohio State and Florida."It was a surprise, that's for sure," Tarczewski said of his call from Krzyzewski. "He just told me that I had a lot of potential and that they were interested and to keep working hard."While Tarczewski said that he doesn't have any favorites in the recruiting process yet, one school seems to have established a bit of an early advantage. Tarczewski has visited the University of Kansas campus twice this spring, first with his New England Playaz grassroots team for the Jayhawks Invitational and most recently for the Kansas Elite Camp."It was great," Tarczewski said. "I got to work out with [assistant coach] Danny Manning and some of the players. We worked on footwork a lot and talked about different angles that could help my game. I got to learn a lot about Kansas basketball. It was a real interesting weekend. I had a lot of fun."Tarczewski currently holds scholarship offers from Kansas, Indiana, West Virginia, Arizona, Boston College, Providence, Arizona, Vanderbilt, Wake Forest, Marquette, and a variety of others according to New England Playaz director T.J. Gassnola.It's still a little hard to believe for Tarczewski, since he was a virtual unknown two years ago until going to a local big man camp run by Alex's father Jay Murphy, a former NBA player and college coach."It's been pretty crazy," Tarczewski admitted. "Getting a call from Coach K, going to Kansas, ... if you told me two years ago that this was all going to happen I never would have believed it. I'm obviously around great people so that really helps. I'm learning a lot from my coaches and really having fun."

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