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Braydon Hawthorne, the No. 64 recruit in the Class of 2025, according to On3's Industry Rankings, finished his high school basketball career at Huntington Prep. The 6-foot-8 small forward decommitted from the West Virginia Mountaineers in April after head coach Darian DeVries left for Indiana.
Hawthorne announced his commitment to the Kentucky Wildcats on May 20. He made an appearance in a YouTube video posted by "Wired to the Game" on Tuesday and discussed a variety of topics. The interviewer also asked him about the reason for transferring from Woodrow Wilson High School to Huntington Prep.
"Man it was just too good of an opportunity to turn down, to be honest with you, I was going to go somewhere else ,and then I had a great summer," Hawthorne said (timestamp: 3:50 onwards).
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"I had coaches start to reach out to me, and then Coach Rel from Huntington, shout him out - he called my dad and said, 'He wants me there.' And I just took the opportunity and it worked out for the best. Worked out good for me bro."
Braydon Hawthorne, ranked 16th in the small forward position and first in West Virginia, averaged 23.5 points, 6.0 rebounds and 4.0 assists per game in his senior year at Huntington Prep.
He also won plenty of accolades, including being a McDonald's All-American nominee, winning the MVP award at the Dr. Pepper Classic, and participating in the Wooten Top 150 camp.
The Beckley native also talked about the best part of playing at Huntington Prep (Timestsamp: 4:19 onwards):
"On court is obviously, the workout..skill.. work. You get better every day they kind of prepare you for it and then outside the court is being in a a town you've never been to with new people, it's like college, bro and this is like college. It was a great experience, real fun experience.''
A look into Mark Pope's new signings after the addition of Braydon Hawthorne to his roster
Mark Pope has added 10 new players to his roster, including freshmen and players from the transfer portal. Their first signing from the Class of 2025 was four-star center Malachi Moreno on Aug. 16, followed by four-star shooting guard Jasper Johnson on Sep. 5.
This year, they received hard commitments from an unranked power forward from Zagreb, Andrija Jelavic, on Apr. 12, before Braydon Hawthorne.
In the transfer portal, they acquired Jayden Quaintance from Arizona State Sun Devils, Jaland Lowe from Pittsburgh Panthers, Mouhamed Dioubate from Alabama Crimson Tide, Denzel Aberdeen from Florida Gators, Cam Williams from Tulane Green Wave and Reece Potter from Miami Redhawks.
