NORTH AUGUSTA, S.C. — While waiting on a connecting flight late Thursday inside Hartsfield-Jackson Atlanta International Airport, I bumped into a college basketball coach I’ve known for years. Per airport tradition, I asked where he was headed. He said he was on his way to an Adidas event in South Carolina.
Then he asked where I was going.
“Peach Jam,” I answered.
“The most stress-free Peach Jam in history,” the coach later added, at which point we got into a conversation about how various changes to the sport have dramatically altered the way this month will unfold as many of the nation’s best high school prospects have once again descended on this quiet community just a few miles across the Savannah River from Augusta National Golf Club.
So what did the coach mean by a “stress-free” Peach Jam? To understand, you must first understand how things were before NIL deals and transfer-waivers for everybody completely flipped the sport. Back then, coaches would enter July extremely focused on a handful of high school prospects and immensely motivated to secure commitments ASAP. When they missed, after years and years of attending grassroots games and texting and calling nonstop, it often felt devastating — partly because of all of the time wasted but mostly because alternative options were limited and theoretically not as good.
But things are different now.
Oh, I’m certain some staff — perhaps Kevin Young’s new staff at BYU — would still love to secure an early commitment from AJ Dybantsa, the consensus No. 1 player in the Class of 2025. The 6-foot-9 wing is now set to attend his final year of high school in Utah. Guys like him are real difference-makers. But outside of the super-elite prep prospects who project as future one-and-done lottery picks, every high-major staff can reasonably assume that somebody three or four years older and two or three times better equipped to impact winning immediately than…
..
