Shaedon Sharpe (Dream City Christian Photo)
Kentucky recruiting target Shaedon Sharpe has had to deal with more than just COVID-19 protocols this season. The 6-4 junior for Dream City Christian (Glendale, Ariz.) had a sprained ankle that forced him to miss games earlier this season, and now he has a broken jaw.
“One of his teammates got him,” said Dwayne Washington, Sharpe’s long-time coach.
Sharpe won’t be one to waste time even while he cannot play.
“Every game, every day he has certain goals and is always trying to make progress,” Washington said. “His biggest goal this season was to get comfortable playing through mistakes and playing long enough to get in a rhythm. That’s why he changed schools (he was at Sunrise Christian in Kansas last season) so he can play longer and sharpen his game.
“We want him to get his game sharper and be able to build a comfort level on the court and see how impactful he can be.”
Sharpe got his Kentucky scholarship offer this fall just a few days after Kansas offered him. Alabama and Oregon were other teams to offer the four-star guard early in the recruiting process.
Sharpe is a London, Ontario, native who plays for UPlay Canada in the offseason and is ranked as the second-best layer in Canada in the 2022 recruiting class. Sharpe played for Team Canada in the FIBA U16 Americas Championship and averaged 13 points, 3.7 rebounds, and 2.3 assists per game. He helped Sunrise Christian go 22-3 last.
This year he’s played in 12 games due to the injuries but has averaged 21.4 points per game and shot 60.8 percent from the field and 75 percent at the foul line. He’s also averaging 6.0 rebounds, 3.0 assists, 1.5 steals, and 1.0 block per game.
Dream City Christian plays on the Grind Session, the first-ever winter circuit of elite high school basketball players and teams that plays in events across the country as well as Canada and the Bahamas from late November to early March.
“It helps a great deal to play on a circuit like this,” Washington said. “You cannot have a letdown because every game is played at a very high level. This allows him to know he cannot take games off. It makes him stay aggressive if he does not want to get exposed.
“Every team he plays against has excellent players and every game is played at a very high level.”
Sharpe is expected back on the court in about two weeks.
