It goes without saying that 5-star in-state guard Romeo Langford is Indiana’s top remaining recruiting target for its 2018 class. The New Albany High School senior has trimmed his list down to 3 schools — Indiana, Kansas and Vanderbilt. For what it’s worth, prognosticators have Indiana and Vanderbilt as a coin toss, with Kansas bringing up the rear. We’d warn however that these predictions are more like uneducated guesses than anything scientific, with the percentages drifting with the wind of any unsubstantiated rumor. This is especially true with Langford, who has provided no clear indication as to which way he might be leaning.
Now that Curtis Jones has announced his transfer from the Hoosiers at the end of the semester, Indiana will have another opening for its 2018 class, but Langford is the one remaining target that IU fans believe can restore the program back to elite status. Today we’ll check in on Langford’s senior year performance at New Albany thus far, and also revisit his pursuit of Damon Bailey’s all-time Indiana high school scoring record.
2017-18 STATISTICAL UPDATE
Langford is off to a career best scoring pace 3 games into the 2017-18 season:
| Opponent | Points |
|---|---|
| Charlestown | 48 |
| Bloomington South | 24 |
| Evansville Harrison | 47 |
| 2017-18 Average | 39.7 |
| Sophomore/Junior Average | 28.5 |
| Differential | 11.2 |
CHASING DAMON BAILEY
Coming into this season, Langford needed 1,044 points to catch Damon Bailey’s all-time Indiana high school scoring record of 3,134 points. Whether or not Langford is ultimately able to catch Bailey is in part dependent on New Albany’s ability to advance in the post season tournament. The most games that New Albany could play this season would be 29 if they played the maximum sectional games and advanced to the state championship game. If they make it that far, Langford would need to average 36 points per game. If they lost their first sectional game he would need to average more than 45 a game.
In order to break Bailey’s all-time scoring record, Langford will need the best scoring season of his career, which would also be the 3rd best scoring season in Indiana high school basketball history. If he scores more than 1,000 points this year he would be only the 5th player in the state to ever do it. So while we throw around these numbers like they are routine for a player of Langford’s ability, in reality this is still a very tall task.
One interesting fact about Langford’s pursuit of Bailey — the two will cross paths along the way. Damon’s son Brayton Bailey is a sophomore on Bedford North Lawrence, the same high school that Damon attended. Brayton made the all-conference team last season averaging 12 points and 6 rebounds per game as a freshman. BNL and New Albany play on February 16 at New Albany.
Photo Credit – Matt Kryger – Indy Star
