{"id":96482,"date":"2024-09-18T19:25:58","date_gmt":"2024-09-18T23:25:58","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/?p=96482"},"modified":"2024-09-18T19:25:58","modified_gmt":"2024-09-18T23:25:58","slug":"smu-basketball-first-2025-commit-jermaine-oneal-jr-links-pacers","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/2024\/09\/18\/smu-basketball-first-2025-commit-jermaine-oneal-jr-links-pacers\/","title":{"rendered":"SMU Basketball\u2019s First 2025 Commit Has Links To Pacers"},"content":{"rendered":"

2025 small forward prospect Jermaine O\u2019Neal Jr. \u00a0announced his commitment<\/a> to SMU Basketball on Wednesday. A four-star recruit out of Texas\u2019s Dynamic Prep, he\u2019s the son of former NBA star Jermaine O\u2019Neal<\/a>. The elder O\u2019Neal, who was the 17th overall pick in the 1996 NBA Draft, was named an All-Star six times while playing for the Indiana Pacers.<\/p>\n

O\u2019Neal Jr. also held offers from Arkansas, Missouri, Tennessee, Arizona State, and Vanderbilt. Aside from visiting SMU, he also took a trip to Vanderbilt\u2019s campus. The Commodores are now led by a former James Madison head coach Mark Byington after parting ways with Jerry Stackhouse<\/a>, a two-time NBA All-Star selection.<\/p>\n

SMU Basketball\u2019s First 2025 Commit, Jermaine O\u2019Neal Jr., Has Links To Pacers<\/h2>\n

After the announcement, the O\u2019Neal showered his son with compliments, offering a scouting report of sorts<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe are beyond proud of the incredible growth Jermaine has shown year after year,\u201d O\u2019Neal Sr. tells ZAGSBLOG. \u201cHis development as a three-level scorer has been tremendous, and his vision on the offensive side of the ball continues to elevate his game. What truly sets Jermaine apart is his defense \u2014 it\u2019s his superpower right now. He can guard positions one through four, and even sometimes five, thanks to his athleticism, which allows him to play above the rim, and his quickness, which gives him the ability to cover the entire court.\u201d<\/p>\n

Listed at 6-foot-5 and 175 pounds, O\u2019Neal Jr. is a spry wing capable of playing on or off the ball. As he\u2019s not the most explosive athlete, he doesn\u2019t often finish above the rim. Nonetheless, he\u2019s a three-level scorer with a soft touch.<\/p>\n

https:\/\/youtu.be\/flGwYIQ_ixQ?si=vXx1MQAi4vRfuaiw<\/p>\n

Of his decision, O\u2019Neal says \u201cthe biggest part is the love coach [Andy] Enfield and everyone else has showed me\u201d (h\/t ZAGSBLOG\u2019s Sam Lance).<\/p>\n

\u201cThey actually started recruiting me about two years ago at USC. So just that love they\u2019ve shown over the two years has been great. And then coming to Dallas, it seemed like a great opportunity.\u201d<\/p>\n

In his assessment of what he brings to the Mustangs, he says:<\/p>\n

\u201cI believe I\u2019ll be able to go to a campus and impact winning there just by knowing small detail things like switching, hedging, different playstyles, being able to read offenses and knowing when people should cut. Just small things like that. So I believe my IQ is higher that a lot of my peers.\u201d<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Enfield decided to leave USC<\/a> and become the Mustangs men\u2019s basketball head coach in April. In his time with the Trojans, they earned commitments from two NBA stars\u2019 sons: Bronny James<\/a> and D.J. Rodman. Had Enfield stayed in sunny Southern California, O\u2019Neal may have been the third prospect in that category.<\/p>\n

As it turns out, he got his guy anyways.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

2025 small forward prospect Jermaine O\u2019Neal Jr. \u00a0announced his commitment to SMU Basketball on Wednesday. A four-star recruit out of Texas\u2019s Dynamic Prep, he\u2019s the son of former NBA star Jermaine O\u2019Neal. The elder O\u2019Neal, who was the 17th overall pick in the 1996 NBA Draft, was named an All-Star six times while playing for […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":5008,"featured_media":96493,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_lmt_disableupdate":"no","_lmt_disable":"","sfio_featured_image":false,"sfio_embed_code":"","_ef_editorial_meta_date_first-draft-date":"","_ef_editorial_meta_paragraph_assignment":"","_ef_editorial_meta_checkbox_needs-photo":"","_ef_editorial_meta_number_word-count":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[11,1608,62,556,3],"tags":[1213,98,3249],"class_list":["post-96482","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-pacers","category-basketball","category-nba","category-nba-draft","category-news","tag-jermaine-oneal","tag-nba-draft","tag-smu-mustangs"],"modified_by":"Quenton S Albertie","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/96482","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/5008"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=96482"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/96482\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/96493"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=96482"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=96482"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=96482"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}