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The 2022 Indiana men's basketball freshman class comes into this season as one of the top recruiting classes in the entire country and with two five-star prospects, one four-star, and one three-star it is not hard to see why.
The highlight of this freshman class have been the five-star prospects Jalen Hood-Schifino and Malik Reneau, both who come from Montverde Academy out of Florida. At Montverde Academy, Hood-Schifino averaged 11.7 points and 5.9 assists whereas Reneau averaged 11.9 points and 6.6 rebounds per game. They also helped lead Montverde Academy to back-to-back GEICO High School National Championships.
Hood-Schifino finished ranked No. 18 (No. 4 ranked shooting guard) and Reneau finished ranked No. 26 (No. 3 ranked power forward) in the Rivals150 class of 2022 rankings.
Both are expected to be immediate contributors this upcoming season.
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Player Q&A: Jalen Hood-Schifino talks summer workouts, role and more
Look: Freshman guard Jalen Hood-Schifino putting in offseason work
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SEE ALSO:
Player Q&A: Malik Reneau discusses summer workouts
Clif Marshall making immediate impact for Indiana freshmen
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This past Monday, CBS Sports and College Basketball Today insider Jon Rothstein broke down the Big Ten Conference and named his All-Big Ten First Team, Player of the Year, incoming freshman, projected lineups, and much more.
Rothstein named both Hood-Schifino and Reneau as two of his Impact Big Ten Freshmen.
Both players come in "college ready" due to their size at each position along with the amount of skill and talent they already possess, something that they learned and developed at Montverde Academy playing in the NIBC against other high level high school programs. They also come in with incredible chemistry with both of them playing together the past few years which has resulted in them becoming best friends and roommates.
"Malik (Reneau) is a really good person and a great player," Hood-Schifino previously said. "He works really hard, and that was my high school teammate obviously, so I know his game really well."
"Jalen (Hood-Schifino), he's a very unselfish player," Reneau previously said. "Finds his teammates. Knows how to get his shots -- get open shots for himself, and he's just -- he's an all-around player on the defensive end. He picks up the ball 94 feet. He's going to defend their best players and he's just going to be a spark plug regardless if he's starting or he's coming off the bench, and he's just a great guy to be around."
Like mentioned before, both Hood-Schifino and Reneau are projected to play important roles this season which should make them one of the favorites to win Big Ten Freshman of the Year.
Here are a few other tidbits from what his teammates have said of both Hood-Schifino and Reneau this summer.
"I watched a little bit of his (Reneau) film," Trayce Jackson-Davis said this summer. "The thing with him too, he's a winner. So that's great. Montverde is a powerhouse team. Him and Jalen (Hood-Schifino) coming in, they're going to make big contributions, no doubt about that. They're very mature for their grades....But I expect them to be ready to play."
"My early impressions of him (Reneau) are that he's a great player," said Race Thompson earlier this summer. "I have not seen a lot of film of him in high school. When he got here, he was bigger and stronger than I had expected him to be, and he's just, like I said earlier, seems like he's already ready to play in the Big Ten. In the weight room he's strong, on the court he's strong, he's athletic, and he's skilled."
"Jalen Hood-Schifino, he's a good point guard, good facilitator and good leader," Kaleb Banks previously said. "He's already shown good leadership skills. Malik Reneau, he's a beast overall. He's really good at attacking the basket and getting his teammates involved and stuff like that."
"Schifino, he's a great facilitator," said CJ Gunn earlier this summer. "He knows how to use his body really well to just affect the defense in so many ways. And Malik (Reneau), he's just a straight killer when it comes to post work and mid-range, and he also has a clip from the three-point line."
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