Brandon Huntley-Hatfield, a freshman from Tennessee, was the first recruit or transfer to head to Louisville during the Kenny Payne era when he announced his commitment to U of L Sunday night.
Huntley-Hatfield, who made his official visit to Louisville over the weekend, chose the maps over Auburn, Arizona State, SMU and Wake Forest, among others. The 6’10, 246-pound center has three years of eligibility left and can play for U of L in 2022-23.
“The connections that Coach KP (Kenny Payne) has are amazing and I really feel like he’s being honest with me,” Huntley-Hatfield told On3. “While he was in Kentucky, he recruited and developed as many people as me… people that I hope to reach one day. I feel like he can help me in many ways.”
Huntley-Hatfield started in 13 games for Tennessee last season, averaging 3.9 points and 3.0 rebounds per game for the SEC tournament champion. He scored 10 points in UT’s SEC Tournament semifinal win over Mississippi State.
Huntley-Hatfield, a native of Clarksville, Tennessee, was a 5-star candidate who dropped out of high school, preferring Tennessee to Kansas, Kentucky, Louisville, Baylor, and Auburn, among many others. He was ranked the No. 26 overall player in the Class of 2021 by 247 Sports’ composite rankings.
Kenny Payne certainly has a lot of frontcourt weapons to work with. Given his track record, that seems like something we should all be pretty excited about.