Mizzou Basketball Recruiting: Dennis Gates is about to have a big week

Last week we got caught up on who was planning upcoming visits. This week we’re talking about potential commitments!

Since last week two prime Missouri basketball targets have set commitment dates this week with Marcus Allen planning an August 7th announcement, and Peyton Marshall set for August 11th. Both announcements will be live on 247sports.com’s YouTube channel.

Let’s start with Allen since he’s announcing first. Allen is a 4-star prospect currently ranked 52nd in the 247sports.com’s composite ranking. His ranking has remained mostly steady over the last year or so when he visited Mizzou’s campus last fall. His 0.9794 rating is the rough equivalent of where Jeremiah Tilmon was when he committed to play for Cuonzo Martin. In fact, just five players have committed to Missouri ranked higher than Allen’s current rating since 247sports.com started ranking players in the early 2000s.

To say landing a player like Allen would be a big deal is an understatement. So far multiple predictions have come in, including Twitter’s favorite burner account Trilly Donovan on his new website Burnerball.com.

Allen isn’t a completed product yet, but he’s got a huge ceiling and defends well enough that he should be an impact guy right off the bat. He excels attacking the rim, and has a combination of size and athleticism which can develop into an elite player. We’ll have more coverage of Allen after the announcement, and provided he does in fact pick Missouri.

Next up is Peyton Marshall. Last week I said this about Marshall:

Marshall set a commitment date of August 11th. He visited Missouri last fall and the Tigers could be a surprise dark horse in the race while many presume the Ole Miss Rebels are the favorites.

Since then, Ole Miss took the commitment of John Bol of all players. Missouri and Bol were linked together quite a bit over the last year or so, but the Tigers were also very interested in Marshall. A 7’0 300 lb post from Marietta, Georgia, Marshall originally committed to Auburn before decommitting in April. Mizzou has been deep in the thick of the battle for Marshall all along.

His combination of size and nimble feet with soft hands make Marshall a supremely attractive collegiate prospect. He ranks just behind Allen in the Top247 rankings, but has fallen to 71st in the composite after dropping to 83rd in Rivals. Coincidentally, Rivals hasn’t been nearly as trustworthy in their rankings since Eric Bossi left for 247sports. Which is one of the main reasons why we try to use 247sports as much as possible. On3 and 247 rank him in the top 60, ESPN and Rivals have him in the 80s.

Regardless of exactly where Marshall is ranked, he’s still rated as a 4-star. And landing him, along with Allen and T.O. Barrett would give Dennis Gates and his staff a trio of 4-star recruits for the 2024 recruiting class.

After Marshall and Allen, the Tigers are still in hot pursuit of Annor Boateng. The Arkansas guard is perhaps the most ready to step in and contribute right away, and ranks 28th in the 247sports.com’s composite rating.

If both Allen and Marshall commit to the Tigers as expected, that creates a 3-man class with several outstanding visits yet to happen. As we detailed in the last Scholarship Math post, the Tigers have up to 7 spots to fill going into next season. So a 5-man freshman class may be more likely than we might have previously thought.