MARYLAND RECRUIT - Devon Branch

UNIVERSITY of MARYLAND

RECRUIT

Devon Branch

By - MATT BRACKEN

Despite growing up a little more than an hour away from College Park, Devon Branch had never attended a Maryland basketball game. That changed last Friday when the 2008 Aberdeen grad took an unofficial visit to see the Terps take on Radford.The Terps just recently started pursuing Branch, an All-Harford County player who missed NCAA qualifying standards coming out of high school and worked at a Holiday Inn in Aberdeen for a year before resurfacing at Cloud County.

At Cloud County, Branch has emerged as one of the top junior college players in the country. JUCOJunction.com ranks the 6-foot-5, 175-pound shooting guard the No. 30 sophomore junior college player in the country. Branch is scoring 25 points per game for the Thunderbirds (10-4), and was named the NJCAA Division I Player of the Week for Nov. 28 – Dec. 4.

Assistant coach Bino Ranson has taken the lead on recruiting Branch for the Terps, and the former Aberdeen star said he remembered the UM coach from the AAU circuit when he was playing for the Baltimore Stars. Branch said the Maryland coaches have told him that he would be an “instant-impact” player for the Terps.

“It sounds real good,” Branch said. “I’ve only got two years left to make a name for myself.”

In addition to Maryland, Branch said he’s also being heavily recruited by Oregon, Texas A&M, Virginia Tech and Wichita State. He plans on taking his official visits in the spring after Cloud County’s season is done.