One of IU’s targets in the 2008 class, 5′9″ point guard Lewis Jackson from Eisenhower High in Illinois has decided on a school and he’ll be heading to chief IU rival Purdue.

Jackson announced the decision today on Rivals.com (subscription required).

While not a devastating loss for the Hoosiers, Jackson is a true point guard who will help the Boilermakers with his pass first attitude.

The Hoosiers are already set at the point guard position over the next few seasons with Armon Bassett and Jordan Crawford (and Bud Mackey in 2008) more than capable of handling the duties.

It’ll be interesting to see what effect, if any, Jackson’s decision has on Tyler Zeller’s college destination. Jackson and Zeller are AAU teammates on Indiana Elite.

Before I get into the topic at hand, let me first mention that Eisenhower (IL) point guard Lewis Jackson has narrowed his list of schools to five and Indiana is one of them. The other schools still under consideration by the Indiana Elite guard are as follows: Purdue, Tennessee, Bradley and Dayton.

Jackson had been considering Illinois, but he’s dropped them from consideration. This is nothing new for the Illini as coach Bruce Weber and staff have made a habit of missing out on premium talent from the state of Illinois.

In an article published Saturday in the Herald & Review, Jackson talked about his reasons for eliminating Illinois and that’s where this story gets interesting.

“They said, ‘You have to tell us you want to come here,’ ” Jackson said. “They said they wanted me to come there, but they weren’t going to recruit me because then it looks bad if I don’t go there. They told (Washington High School guard) Matt Roth and a couple of other guys the same thing. They all say they wish Illinois had recruited them harder. I respect Coach Weber and Coach (Jay) Price, and I like them a lot, but there was no love like at other schools.”

So this is what it has come to for good ol’ Bruce. He’s missed out on so many players in recent years, he’s now got a new method for his recruiting madness.

Rather than putting on the full-court press to get a commitment, he’s now telling kids they have to tell him up front they want to come to Illinois. This is obviously a tactic to save face publicly when a kid decides later on in the recruitment that he is no longer interested in Illinois.

Sounds genius to me.

It’s perhaps the biggest week of the year in terms of college coaches evaluating talent and that’s why it’s no surprise that Kelvin Sampson, Rob Senderoff and Jeff Meyer are all in Las Vegas this week taking in the AAU festivities.

The biggest news on the recruiting front that IU fans should be aware of is the offer that was extended to Washington, Illinois guard Matt Roth. Mike Pegram of Peegs.com broke the news and it came as a surprise to most. The offer was the third for Roth (St. Louis and Bradley have also offered), but it sounds like the shooting touch displayed by Roth this week could make him an even hotter commodity down the road. From that standpoint, it’s probably a good thing that IU is entering the picture with the Indiana Elite guard now rather than later.

I spoke to Jody Demling of the Courier-Journal earlier this evening about Roth and he told me that he’s been very impressed with Roth’s performances (specifically the one where he nailed seven threes) this week. Apparently he’s one of the best shooters in the country. With that said, the possibility of Roth coming to IU is quite intriguing.

Two other prominent IU targets, guards Dashan Harris (LA Dream Team) and Lewis Jackson (Indiana Elite) have also played well this week. Both have IU offers and my sense is that the Hoosiers will take whichever is ready to make the pledge first. I’ve been asked by a few people which guy I’d prefer to have and that’s a hard question to answer considering I’ve only been privileged to video of both. I think either guy would fit in well, but I get the sense that Jackson is the more likely get for Coach Sampson and staff.

It sounds like Marquette is the school to beat for Chicago forward Josh Crittle. Crittle is by no means an immediate difference maker, but he’s the type of blue collar player that Kelvin Sampson goes after and turns into a solid four-year contributor.

And one final note, regarding the play of Bud Mackey this week. While he’s been out of action for quite a while rehabbing his knee, there’s no doubt that Mackey is a better player today than he was at the end of last season. He’s putting in the necessary work to get back to full strength and he’s got his eye on defending the Kentucky state title with his Scott County (KY) teammates. He’ll also be a top Mr. Basketball candidate and could play his way onto the McDonald’s All-American team if the dominoes fall in line.

- The praise for D.J. White for his performances with the United States team leading up to the Pan American Games continues to come rolling in. Haverford, a blog that is following the team, has the latest on IU’s top returning scorer:

When the D stretched to account for Foster’s hot hand, White assaulted Jason Fraser with an array of hook shots and drop steps inside. D.J.’s hook is a throw-back to an earlier era with a contemporary influence. Both the traditional sky hook and White’s “power hook” are released with one hand with the off-arm pointed directly at the basket. The sky hook circa 1976 was a finesse shot, taken from a slight running start. But White doesn’t need the momentum or the leg kick often associated with the move to pour in his points. By dropping his beefy shoulder into his defender’s chest, he adds a powerful component to the high release point in order to hit this shot from the low post.

Sounds like D.J. is adding a nice hook shot to go along with his patented turnaround baseline jumper. If it continues to develop, he’ll be even more unstoppable on the low block.

- Bud Mackey, IU’s first commitment for the 2008 class, has landed with the Indiana Elite AAU team. Currently he’s participating in the Adidas Super 64 in Las Vegas, the biggest AAU tournament of the summer. This is Mackey’s first AAU action in quite a while due to a torn meniscus suffered at the end of last season.

Also playing on the Indiana Elite team are IU targets Tyler Zeller and Lewis Jackson. Through their first two contests of the event, Indiana Elite is 0-2. According to Jody Demling, coach Kelvin Sampson watched Indiana Elite yesterday along with UK coach Billy Gillispie, UNC coach Roy Williams and Illinois coach Bruce Weber.

With five-star Devin Ebanks and four-star Bud Mackey already in the fold, the IU coaching staff is working feverishly to land a point guard (along with a big man) to help round out the 2008 class.

One of the primary targets is 5′9″, 165 lb. Decatur (IL) point guard Lewis Jackson. Jackson has offers from IU, Gonzaga, Clemson, Depaul, Illinois and Tennessee and plays with Indiana Elite – Team Indiana.

After a bit of YouTube surfing, I came across an impressive video of Jackson and have posted it for your viewing pleasure. Either the guys trying to guard Jackson have their feet glued to the ground or Jackson is pretty darn quick. You be the judge.