NFL
By: Melo Williams
2024 3 Star and Wisconsin men’s basketball commit Jack Robison of Lakeville North HS (MN) showed exactly why he’s one of the best high school basketball players in the nation at the 60Eight Basketball Tournament.
Robison put on an all time two day scoring clinic from all three levels showing proof of why he was highly recruited by the Badgers leaving Wisconsin fans Coach Gard and current Badgers basketball players who were in attendance watching Robison play with an increased amount of excitement of what could become when Robison suits up for Coach Greg Gard and his Badgers men’s basketball team.
Per 247sports, Robison is the nation’s No. 21 ranked small forward in the class of 2024.
Jack Robison committed to the University of Wisconsin-Madison and the Wisconsin men’s basketball program last month on National Letter of Intent Signing Day along with four-star Badgers men’s basketball commit, Daniel Freitag who is also from Minnesota.
Friday night with Coach Gard and former Lakeville North standouts Tyler Wahl and Nolan Winter in the building for game one vs Verona HS, not only did Jack Robison come out hot shooting, Lakeville North as a team did as well and though Verona gave maximum effort trying to slow them down, the Panthers couldn’t miss a shot.
Robison had 19 of his points in the first half. Robison was 9-12 from the field, including 2-5 from the three. Jack snagged six rebounds with two assists in 23 minutes before resting.
In the championship game against 2024 5-star Duke men’s basketball commit Kon Knueppel II, Robison had five points and two rebounds at halftime and ended up finishing the game with 17 points on 5-of-16 shooting with four rebounds and two assists, scoring 12 of his 17 points in the second half.
While Lakeville North was getting back in the game with defensive stops to go along with scoring from Andrew Quad and Matt Drake, Robison scored back-to-back buckets cutting the deficit to 55-51 with 4:31 left to go in the game.
Five-star Duke commit Kon Knueppel and Wisconsin Lutheran sustained the run by Robison and Lakeville North and held on to win after Knueppel sank two free throws in the clutch to lead the Vikings to a 68-63 final score winning the 2023 60Eight Basketball Tournament championship.
Jack earned 2023 60Eight Basketball All-Tournament Team Honors averaging 21 PPG and 5 RPG.
OBSERVATION: After watching Jack Robison play at the 60Eight Basketball Tournament I became a bigger fan of his game and can’t wait to watch his career at Wisconsin. Robison is an elite scorer who knows how to score in multiple ways and bunches when he has it going with his textbook left-handed jump shot.
Jack has an extremely high basketball IQ with an elite skillset that allows him to be an impactful all-around player that translates to winning.
Robison has a championship mindset telling me while at Wisconsin he looks forward to competing winning Big Ten and National Championships.
UW Badgers men’s basketball head coach Greg Gard said this about his future three-star commit:
“We are very excited to add Jack to our program,” Gard said in a statement. “He has all the qualities we look for in a student-athlete. Both of Jack’s parents are educators, and Jack understands the value of a degree from the University of Wisconsin and wanted to be a part of this program from the beginning of the recruiting process. We have been able to watch him grow and develop as a player for several years now. He plays the game with the kind of passion and fire that our fans have come to know and appreciate here at Wisconsin.
Our staff is excited to work with Jack to help him reach his goals as a student-athlete as a Badger.”
In game one, even when the shots were falling, Robison was setting up teammates with assists, grabbing rebounds, playing solid defense contesting shots, and forcing a couple of turnovers.
In game two, the championship game, Kon Knueppel was matched up defensively against Jack Robison and played Robison very physically. I loved how Robison matched Knueppel’s physicality fighting for position on the wing and in the post. Robison even moved well without the ball and made some fantastic reads passing the ball for assists when Wisconsin Lutheran’s defense was collapsing. The three-star recruit was even active on the rebounds. Robison displayed a mental toughness that I like to see and that is needed to play not only for Coach Greg Gard and the Badgers but in the Big Ten as well, one of the most if not the most mental and physically demanding conferences of all of men’s college basketball.
Robison plays HS basketball for the legendary head coach John Oxton who has an all-American championship program at Lakeville North HS, and has produced Badgers players Tyler Wahl and Nolan Winter who is Jack Robison’s former teammate at Lakeville North HS.
I spoke with Jack Robison, the Badgers three-star commit at the 60Eight Basketball tournament, and asked him what he was looking forward to the most coming to Wisconsin besides winning Big Ten and National Championships:
“I’m looking forward to the atmosphere of the campus, the team, I enjoyed getting to know the guys, I’m pretty good friends with a lot of the team, and just being coached by those coaches and playing with those guys will be a lot of fun for me.”
Right now though Robison is focused on the now and that’s competing with the guys in the Lakeville North locker room for another successful season and winning a state championship to close out his senior prep HS basketball career.
Jack Robison surpassed the 1,000-point mark for his career at Lakeville North and is the 8th Panther in school history to reach that milestone.
I’ll catch up with the Badgers commit shortly, but make sure you follow Melo on X and Instagram @_MeloWilliams to stay current with Jack Robison and all of your Wisconsin Badgers men’s basketball news.
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