Rumors out of Louisville have Derrick Caracter leaving the program for an NAIA school in Oklahoma City, but I haven’t been able to confirm anything just yet.
“As long as he’s in New Jersey and I am here, I don’t know what he’s going to do,” said Stacy Brooks, a professor in the Pan-African Studies Department at Louisville who has become an adviser to the 6-foot-9, 270-pound Caracter, a native of Fanwood, N.J.
“I don’t know anything. I know his mom really wants him to be playing right now.”
Caracter had been offered an opportunity to return to the Louisville basketball team for the 2009-10 season, assuming he met various academic and athletic criteria set out by head coach Rick Pitino.
But Caracter has been home in New Jersey for several weeks and now his future remains unclear. He worked at the Summer Heatt Basketball Camp at Midland Park High School in July and received some advice from Pete Vasil, the former Plainfield High coach, who urged him to return to Louisville and fulfill Pitino’s expectations.
“He worked a couple of camps of mine, and I haven’t heard from him since,” said Joe Jackson, who ran the camp.
