Everyone has been waiting & Im officially announcing that im gonna be playing basketball for Baylor University!
— June 2nd (@TP_onefive) May 15, 2012
Recruiting across all programs is an extremely funny thing. Sometimes you can go weeks without getting any "new" commitments despite the fact that there are those rumored to be on the verge, and sometimes, like today, you can get two different recruits from two different sports that nobody outside the respective programs saw coming. I posted about the first "surprise" of the night a few minutes ago with Tanner Thrift's commitment to Art Briles and Baylor Football. Now Taurean Waller-Prince, a 2012 forward from San Antonio, Texas, has pledged himself to Scott Drew and Baylor Basketball by announcing it on twitter in the above statement.
Despite the fact that Waller-Prince is a relative unknown to the Baylor community, he is not to the larger recruiting world nearly to the same degree that Thrift was. Ranked #54 in the country by Maxpreps, Prince was, at one point in this past fall, committed to play for Long Island University. He actually signed an LOI with the Blackbirds (had to look that one up) before they changed coaches and released him from it. That release, which only occurred recently, reopened his recruitment.
Though Taurean "broke" the story himself on twitter, Ashley Hodge of BearsTruth.com has been on point with it from there and reports that Taurean has an Anthony Davis-esque quality to him-- as a freshman in HS, TWP (as I shall call him) stood only 5-9. He is now 6-7.
The recruiting services like Rivals, which has him as a 3*, and ESPN list TWP as a power forward in their databases, but I suspect that TWP's recruitment and commitment comes as fallout from the Quincy Miller saga. He has the build (6-7, 210 pounds) of a 3 rather than a 4 and will likely be at Baylor all four years. Unless something incredibly unexpected happens, we don't have to worry about a one-and-done here. HUDL has one rather-shaky highlight video that anyone can watch if they so choose. I'd be interested in the take of anyone with a better eye for basketball than my own.