LSU Tigers basketball recruiting: 2017 4-star small forward Galen Alexander commits

While hoards of attention has deservedly been diverted to LSU’s 2017 football class, the Tigers saw their 2017 class for basketball get off to a great start. Breaux Bridge, Louisiana’s Galen Alexander, a four-star small forward and the second-best player in the state, committed to LSU via his personal Twitter account.

There hadn’t been much news regarding Alexander and his intentions for quite some time before the 6-foot-6, 215-pound small forward announced his intentions Sunday afternoon. Last we heard back in April he received offers from both Alabama, Texas and Arkansas.

As mentioned, Alexander is one of the best players in the state of Louisiana. He ranks second behind Baton Rouge’s Josh Anderson, a four-star shooting guard who is currently undecided. Thus far, Alexander is the lone commit for LSU in the Class of 2017 and with his decision being made, LSU now ranks 16th nationally and fourth in the SEC as of writing.

As far as in-conference recruiting goes LSU is finally getting their feet wet in the 2017 class. Arkansas is currently setting the pace with three total commits and it comes as no surprise that as a result, they’re currently ranked first in the conference with two four-star players - Daniel Gafford and Khalil Garland - and one three-star in the form of Darious Hall. Auburn and Florida meanwhile each have two commits, with the Tigers currently possessing the only five-star commit of the bunch. That would be Birmingham’s Austin Wiley, an extremely talented power forward who was the top recruit in the state. Four-star point guard Davion Mitchell is no slouch either as he was the fifth-best player in the state of Georgia. Mike White and Florida meanwhile have two four-star players: Shai Alexander and DeAundrae Ballard with the former being the top player in the state of Tennessee. Ballard meanwhile checks in at 10 in the Peach State.

It’s obvious that Kentucky will soon get their feet wet int he class as well. You can’t discount John Calipari when it comes to, well, anything, and we shall see how that class plays itself out as eight of the current Top 10 are undecided at the moment. Still, it’s a positive for LSU to sink their teeth in the recruiting game as early and quickly as possible. Getting Galen Alexander as a hard commit in July 2016 is one way to do it.