Ever since June 15, Jeff Capel and his staff have been allowed to directly contact 2023 prospects and speak to them on the phone. On Sunday night, while Capel was watching some hoops, he decided to pick up the phone and offer an exciting guard in the class, Scotty Middleton.
“Jeff Capel talked to me earlier,” Middleton told Pittsburgh Sports Now on Sunday, hours after receiving the offer. “He asked me if I was watching the Hawks game, said he’s an Atlanta fan. He wanted to talk to me at halftime, so he called me. He said he’s been watching me on film, on YouTube, but he is an old-school guy so he wanted to see me in person. So he came to Blair and watched me play, and I played good. He said it was time to offer me.”
Excited and Blessed to announce Ive picked up an offer from University Of Pittsburgh🙏🏽💙 pic.twitter.com/VnHdrbkLrr
Middleton is a 6-foot-7, 175-pound wing who plays for The Patrick School in New Jersey, as well as the NY Rens AAU program. Originally from South Carolina, he is now up in the northeast, playing for both an AAU team as well as a high-school team who Pitt has recruited players from in the past.
“We talked on the phone, and he knows where I am from,” Middleton added about his talk with Capel. “Nobody knows where I am from, in Orangeburg, South Carolina. Anybody that knows where that is, that is like a small town, so anybody that knows where that is, that is an automatic connection already.”
The versatile rising junior prospect holds offers from Pitt, UConn, DePaul, Kansas State, Penn State, and Bryant, and is receiving additional interest from Virginia, Creighton, Ohio State, and more. Middleton added that he has never been to Pittsburgh and that he is hoping to visit campus sometime this summer.
“I was just smiling a lot,” Middleton said about his reaction to the Pitt offer. “It is my first ACC offer, so it really means a lot to me. There are no nights off in the ACC. Every game is tough, everybody wants to win. Everybody is a winner over there, it’s just competitive.”
