Rutgers lands top-40 center Cliff Omoruyi
One of the top remaining prospects available this spring, the college decision is in for Cliff Omoruyi. The top-40 center has verbally committed to Rutgers, giving the Scarlet Knights one of its biggest recruiting wins in recent memory.
“I am familiar with the coaches, staff and players. They have been there for me since my freshman year. Coach (Steve) Pikiell, he has been there, telling me that I am going to be a good player and has been keeping in touch with me since then,” Omoruyi told Rivals.com. “They love my defensive effort and tell me that I can block shots and rebound, but also develop more there and continue to win.”
Omoruyi chose Rutgers over Arizona State and Auburn, though he was a heavily coveted recruit prior to the condensing of his final school list. He is rated as the 36th best prospect in the 2020 class, and as the seventh best center nationally.
Location played a big factor thanks to the pandemic that has engulfed the nation. “The big difference was the coronavirus. Once it hit, it kind of gave him a real meaning of what distance really is,” his guardian, Mohamed Oliver, said. “Once all that stuff started to happen and everyone started to be quarantined, the first thing that was said was what would happen if this thing happened if he was out in Arizona. It all just started to make more sense to him with what he wanted.”
A hard-playing, physically inclined center that is the ideal 5-man for Steve Pikiell’s system on the defensive end, Omoruyi, who lives just 30-minutes from the Piscataway campus, will be an immediate cog down low. Boasting a 7-foot-5 wingspan, the New Jersey Gatorade Player of the Year is a tremendous rim-runner, shot blocker, rebounder and finisher. He will leave an immediate mark on the Big 10 program beginning in the fall.
“Pikiell had been recruiting him since he was a freshman and he was actually the only coach who had a plan for him early and showed him the plan. He told us that Myles Johnson would be good and that he would get him in there and have him lose weight,” Oliver continued to say. “He told us from day one that by the time Cliff is a senior, they will have an NCAA Tournament berth. Just to see the season that they had this year, it made me a big believer towards the end.”
He becomes the fourth member of Rutgers’ 2020 class and its highest rated recruit during the Pikiell era.