“I really respect Coach (Bob) Huggins and I trust what he’s saying. I also feel like I can make an impact quickly at West Virginia. I enjoyed my visit to West Virginia and just feel as though it’s the best situation for me.”

Ebanks joins Kevin Jones, Roscoe Davis and Darryl Bryant in WVU’s 2008 class and should become the go-to-guy in Morgantown with the departure of Joe Alexander to the NBA Draft.

– A friend of Inside the Hall, Jody Demling of the Louisville Courier-Journal, has a brief update on Josh Harrellson, the junior college forward from Illinois who is reportedly interested in Indiana. Jody lists IU as “still in the mix,” but this looks like a two horse race between St. Louis and Kentucky. Go Rick Majerus. The Hoosier Scoop also has an update on Harrellson.

– And finally, in a shocking development, a day after Derrick Rose declared for the NBA Draft, Tyreke Evans committed to Memphis. Those of you unfamiliar with Tyreke, he’s a top 10 player in the 2008 class and a good friend of everybody’s favorite basketball ambassador, William Wesley. Evans, by the way, was also involved in a shooting a couple of months ago. The reason I bring this up for you, the Indiana fan, is that our former prized recruit, Devin Ebanks, has lined up his visits and the final one is Memphis. It’ll be interesting to see if Ebanks lands alongside Evans in Memphis. I would like my chances if my name were John Vincent Calipari.

Holloway has given a verbal commitment to Xavier. The Cincinnati Enquirer has the details:

Xavier received an oral commitment from a fifth incoming freshman for next season while one of its current players prepared to take leave of the program Wednesday.

Point guard Terrell Holloway orally committed to play for the Musketeers Tuesday night, joining a stable of incoming recruits that includes two other guards, bolstering Xavier’s backcourt depth.

Meanwhile, Ebanks has set his list of visits, according to Adam Zagoria of the Zagsblog:

The 6-foot-9 Ebanks, a small forward who is the No. 13 prospect in the Class of 2008, will visit West Virginia this weekend before playing in the Jordan Brand Classic April 19 at Madison Square Garden. Ebanks will then visit Texas the weekend of April 25, Rutgers the weekend of May 2 and Memphis the weekend of May 9, according to his AAU coach, Lawrence McGugins.

“We would decide within that two-week span because the last signing day is May 21,” McGugins said. “It all depends on how he feels. All four visits are a definite.

Ebanks has spoken with new IU coach Tom Crean, but they have not yet met. “Indiana is still in it but they have not met,” McGugins said, adding that Ebanks had no definite plans to meet in person with coach Crean.

If Ebanks ends up anywhere but Memphis, I’ll be shocked (Coach Cal can thank his boy, Worldwide Wes). As far as Holloway goes, he’ll be missed initially for depth reasons but long term there are better options out there in the upcoming classes that IU can hopefully get involved with.

“He’s spoke to the people at Indiana and they’re apparently going to be sending him his release,” St. Thomas More coach Jere Quinn said Tuesday.

“Right now he’s talking about Memphis, Texas and Rutgers,” Quinn said. “He may add a fourth. A bunch of people are trying to get it, but who knows?”

Since both Memphis and Texas are competing in the NCAA Tournament, Ebanks likely couldn’t visit either school until after the Big Dance.

You can expect to see Ebanks suiting up for John Calipari and Memphis next season. For those of you hoping that Ebanks would wait to see who IU hires before seeking his release, it doesn’t look like that’s going to happen. So long Mr. Ebanks, we hardly knew ya.

Reminder: Don’t forget to join the Inside the Hall NCAA Tournament Pick ‘Em Challenge by clicking here.

“I’ve heard from about 25 schools,” Lawrence McGugins, Ebanks’ AAU coach, said Thursday by phone. “It’s not going to be open recruiting. He’ll let us know the 2-4 schools (he’s considering) and I’ll contact the schools to let them know.”

Ebanks, ranked No. 2 among small forwards and No. 13 overall in the Class of 2008, has opted to de-commit from Indiana after former coach Kelvin Sampson was fired for repeated recruiting violations. Ebanks chose Indiana last summer over Miami, Rutgers and Texas.

Not a huge surprise here. Rick Bozich was the first to report Ebanks’ interest in Memphis and the Tigers appear to be the odds on favorite to land him. As far as Indiana fans are concerned, this hurts Indiana’s chances to be a top tier club next season, but beyond that the effect on the program should be minimal. Ebanks was likely a one-and-done and if he doesn’t want to come now that Sampson is gone, let him go and move on. The most important recruiting work still remains: keeping the current roster intact for next season as well as Terrell Holloway, Matt Roth and Tom Pritchard. Let’s hope the next coaching staff can do just that.

Via Zagsblog:

It appears unlikely that the 6-foot-9 Ebanks, who had 22 points in the Hargrave game, will attend Indiana given the recent firing of Kelvin Sampson and a handful of schools appear to be in the running for his services, including Memphis, Rutgers and Texas.

St. Thomas More head coach Jere Quinn said he planned to meet later this week with Ebanks, his mother, Yvonne Jackson and Ebanks’ AAU people, including Lawrence McGugins, the head of Team Takeover.

“We’re going to try and make a quick assessment of what they’re trying to do,” Quinn said Wednesday by phone. “We’re hoping to get together soon.”

Memphis has made a push with Ebanks, and Quinn said that might be an option.

“Memphis has contacted us,” Quinn said. “I know they’ve contacted his AAU people.”

At this point, save for some Herculean effort by the IU coaching staff — and which coaching staff would that be? old or new? — it looks like Ebanks is peacing out of Bloomington before he even got there. And really, who can blame him. There’s a lot of talk about kids playing for “the name on the front of the jersey,” but I just don’t think that’s the case anymore. Kids come to schools because of the head coach and his staff first and foremost, everything else is just an added bonus.

Might want to ask Eric Gordon about that one.

The quick details from Bozich:

I talk to a lot of people in the college basketball game. Heard Ebanks to Memphis as a live possibility yesterday from a friend who is hot-wired into John Calipari’s program. Ebanks and Tyreke Evans. Those are the names for Memphis.

Oh Rob Senderoff, it’s looking like all your hard work might be for naught. Now, the interesting part of all of this is that today on Louisville’s 93.9 the Ticket, recruiting guru Jody Demling of the Courier-Journal said signees aren’t allowed to have this kind of language written into a LOI. He talked to a few people in the know and verbal agreements on that kind of talk is about as far as it can go.

We’ll see in the coming weeks and months how this one shakes out.

Devin Ebanks is “still committed” – for now. Ebanks, who’s finishing his post-grad year at the St. Thomas More School, heard about Sampson’s dismissal on television and also received a phone call from his mom.

“I’m disappointed,” he said.

The 6-8 swingman said he’ll decide whether to stay at Indiana or leave in “three weeks or so,” after the season. The school finishes the season in the National Prep Championship at Fordham on Mar. 4-6. “Trying to find another school … that’s not my focus,” Ebanks said. “I wouldn’t look forward to that.”

Call me overly optimistic, but I still think there’s a chance Ebanks comes to Bloomington. He chose Indiana over Rutgers and Miami and unless he decides to re-open his recruitment and start over, Indiana is still the best option of the three schools. Rick Greenspan said last night that he hopes the staff will continue to be in contact with IU’s four signed players in hopes of keeping them in the Hoosier family. After that, it’ll be up to the new coach to make the final sell.

Meanwhile, the mother of Devin Ebanks, the prized recruit of the 2008, is speaking out about the uncertainty of her son’s future. Here is what Yvonne Jackson told SI.com:

“Right now we still have yet to make a decision. Obviously this is more serious than ever before, but we’ll have to talk with the coaches and wait to see if Devin will re-open his recruitment.”

Jackson added that the family didn’t hear of the latest allegations from the Indiana staff, but instead heard the news second hand from various media outlets. For those that didn’t read the report, Jackson was mentioned for phone calls she participated in with the Indiana staff.

If Ebanks were to open his recruitment, he would need a release from the letter of intent he signed with Indiana back in November. Here’s to hoping it never comes to that.

Thanks to ITH reader Kelin for the news tip.

Ebanks is ranked considerably higher than Greg Monroe, the No. 1 player in the class according to Rivals.com as well as Samardo Samuels, another top five player in the 2008 class. I spoke with one of the authors of NBAdraft.net, Aran Smith, to get his take on Ebanks and how he’s viewed as a prospect at the next level:

It may be going out on a limb having him that high, but I really like Ebanks as a prospect and see him as one of the top prospects in his class in long-term potential. Ebanks isn’t listed as high as Samuels and Monroe on most recruiting lists, but in terms of NBA potential, in my opinion he has more than those guys. With tremendous athletic ability, he’s got a great deal of untapped potential and fits a position much better than Monroe as a prototype small forward. While Monroe is very skilled, he must get stronger to play inside and doesn’t have the foot speed that Ebanks has on the perimeter.

I’m not ready to call it yet since there’s a long way to go, but we could be looking at another case of one-and-done with Mr. Ebanks. It’ll be interesting to see if he returns to the court for St. Thomas More Prep after the Christmas break.