Arizona Marvelous Ideas: Arizona basketball recruiting: Five-star center Nick Richards to visit Arizona on October 7th, per report

Could Sean Miller land the two best centers in the country? He’s trying.

After having a “great home visit” with the Arizona Wildcats staff on Wednesday, five-star center Nick Richards is reportedly set to officially visit Tucson for the weekend of October 7, a week before the Red-Blue game.

Had a great home visit today with Arizona
— Nick Richards (@iamnickrichards) September 28, 2016

The report comes from Adam Zagoria of ZagsBlog on SNY.tv, who noted that Richards has strong praise for assistant coach Book Richardson, the second rated center’s lead recruiter. Richardson is known in many circles as one of the best East Coast recruiters in the country.

"Yeah, Book keeps it real with me. He's probably the only coach out of all of them that keeps it the most real with me."

Richards, who plays for St. Patrick’s in New York, released a top five of Kentucky, Arizona, Connecticut, Syracuse, and Indiana at the end of July. So far, the only other visit he has decided upon are the other Wildcats, which will take place this weekend.

Coach John Calipari has been hot on his heels, visiting Richards two times from September 14-22. Currently, all fourteen Crystal Ball selections on 247Sports have Richards going to Kentucky.

With DeAndre Ayton committed to Arizona, it’s intriguing to see the next best center still willing to give Arizona a shot. However, if Sean Miller was trying to assemble the most dominant post play in the nation, landing these two would go a long ways towards accomplishing that goal.

If you are wondering why the coaching staff is not having Richards in for the Red-Blue game, I have two theories. One, which may be the simplest, is due to scheduling conflicts.

However, I believe it’s because there are already two official visits that weekend (Ira Lee and Daejon Davis), two commits (Alex Barcello and DeAndre Ayton), and an unofficial visit from five-star point guard Brandon Williams. With all that commotion going on, Richards would understandably feel underappreciated. Having him on his own weekend allows the seven-footer to see the school and hang out with the players separate from the hectic Red-Blue weekend.

(Side Note: Five-star point guard Gary Trent Jr. was scheduled to visit fo the Red-Blue. That, however, has been scratched per Scout’s Evan Daniels. There does not appear to be a rescheduled date at this time. Duke continues to be the heavy favorite.)

Moving forward, Richards told Zagoria that he’s considering every school equally right now and doesn’t have a commitment date set yet. It should be noted he said his mom likes Calipari and Kentucky, stating, “She likes Cal, he keeps it real with her. She likes the energy that they give us.”

However, all of this uncertainty could fade if he finds the right spot, saying, “Whenever I have that feeling, I’ll just commit.”

Knowing Sean Miller, he’ll do his damnedest to ensure Richards gets the ‘feeling’ while in Tucson, Arizona.