Six months into his tenure, Ben Johnson already kept one promise as Gophers men's basketball coach: He has stopped the mass exodus of Minnesota's best prospects from leaving the state.
Johnson landed his third local Class of 2022 recruit Monday night after Osseo senior forward Joshua Ola-Joseph announced his commitment to play for the Gophers.
"My family loves the Gophers," Ola-Joseph said after announcing his decision on KSTP-TV (Ch. 5). "It just felt like a no-brainer to me."
The 6-7, 215-pound Ola-Joseph, one of the most exciting finishers in the country, joins Park Center's Braeden Carrington and Park of Cottage Grove's Pharrel Payne in Johnson's first full recruiting class.
The Gophers are off to a better start in local recruiting than where the program was when Richard Pitino was fired in March following his eighth season.
Pitino struck gold locally with current NBA players Amir Coffey and Daniel Oturu earlier in his tenure, but he signed only one Minnesotan, Alexandria's Treyton Thompson, in his last three recruiting classes, missing on more than a dozen targets in that span.
"There's obviously been some high level kids to leave Minnesota in the last few years," 247Sports.com national recruiting analyst Eric Bossi said. "That's been a major sticking point for the fan base. Ben Johnson has come in and found some up-and-coming local talent. You get these guys in the program and do well with them, you'll start catching the eyes of kids behind them."
Johnson, a former Gophers player and assistant coach, took advantage of existing relationships with high school and AAU coaches. So did his assistant Dave Thorson, who was a longtime coach at DeLaSalle.