Making Sense of the Jordan Brooks Situation

Is he an assistant coach for Georgetown or not? And how did his mystery status with Georgetown affect their chances with Tyrell Ward?

Saturday will go down as one of the more disappointing days in Georgetown basketball history during the Patrick Ewing coaching era. Georgetown was the favorite for Tyrell Ward heading into the day, despite yours truly hearing concerning things about the Hoyas’ chances with him as the week went on, and LSU came in with a strong push at the last minute to sway Ward their way.

The man at the middle of the Ward recruitment, and who has also been recruiting other players to Georgetown in the last couple weeks, is a familiar name by now: Jordan Brooks.

But Jordan Brooks has still not been announced as an assistant coach at Georgetown, despite recruiting for the team. Why?

Here is what we know to be definitively true right now when it comes to Brooks:

• Brooks has been recruiting players on behalf of Georgetown (e.g hosting Tyrell Ward for a visit last weekend, as well as recruiting Jahmir Young to Georgetown as well, before Young chose Maryland)

• Georgetown has made no announcement regarding Brooks joining the coaching staff in any capacity, like they did with Kevin Nickelberry and Clinton Crouch.

• Brooks, who is active on social media, has made no announcement or hint of an announcement that he is on staff himself. In fact, his Twitter bio still reads “Director of Recruiting at Xavier University” and his Instagram bio reads “Coach at Xavier University”.

Simply put, Brooks is not an assistant coach on this staff yet.

Ask yourself this: If he was an assistant coach by now, why would his social media profiles not be changed yet? Wouldn’t you want recruits who visit your pages to know where you are currently coaching at? If Brooks was an official assistant here, the school would have announced it, and his social media profiles would have been updated. Neither of those things have happened still.

Where it gets interesting with Brooks and his status with Georgetown is what I had heard about his prospects of joining the staff several weeks ago.

According to two sources, Georgetown had made clear to Jordan Brooks that he needed to bring in Tyrell Ward if he was going to be an assistant coach on the Georgetown staff. What is not known is what happens now that Brooks couldn’t bring in Ward.

It would be awkward, needless to say, to actually show Brooks the door now, considering he has been recruiting other players to Georgetown, like Jahmir Young, Gus Okafor, and Jay Heath. Are they at the point of no return with him? That’s unclear. With Brooks’ hiring still not official, it appears that Georgetown could still back out of whatever handshake agreement they had with Brooks, if they choose to do so.

In speaking with people close to Tyrell Ward’s camp, Ward was uncertain about committing to Georgetown for several reasons, chief among them being the school’s refusal to hire Brooks fully before Ward committed.

Of course, that then raises a chicken vs. egg scenario: If Brooks needed Ward to get the assistant job at Georgetown, but Ward wouldn’t commit because Brooks wasn’t fully hired, it seems that there was an impasse here for Georgetown with Ward. Was there a lack of transparency and communication here that led to this? It’s hard to say exactly, but it looks like Georgetown fumbled things if they weren’t willing to fully commit to Brooks, which led to Ward entertaining pitches from other schools.

Brooks and Ward are so tight, and the expectation that Ward would follow Brooks was so widespread that several sources I spoke to this week wondered out loud if Brooks would join the LSU staff, with how much ground they made up in only a couple of weeks. Right now, it does not appear that Brooks will be going to LSU, but the fact that was even raised by multiple parties says a lot.

Another reason was some good old fashioned dirty recruiting by LSU. During their in-home visit with Ward, Matt McMahon and the LSU coaching staff pitched their vision for Ward at LSU, but also specifically called out Georgetown, positioning their own roster and overall program outlook as being more stable and promising in the long-term than Georgetown’s. A source close to Ward said that made him re-think the idea of going to Georgetown.

A Instagram story post by Tipton Edits on Instagram on Sunday adds one crucial new detail to Ward’s timeline for making a decision: Ward chose LSU on Monday, April 18, the same day he had his in-home visit with LSU.

Hilltop Hoops @HilltopHoops_

Tyrell Ward made his decision on Monday, April 18.

Georgetown got played. Why? Because they hosted Ward for a visit, led by Jordan Brooks, five days later.

Could that have been a last-ditch attempt to sway Ward? Did Brooks know Ward had chosen LSU already and this was his Hail Mary attempt to get him to reverse course? Or did Brooks not know at all?

If you really wanted to get cynical: Could Brooks, who is close with Ward, have known that Ward was going to LSU, and still leveraged Ward visiting Georgetown five days later to improve his own chances at getting the final assistant position? There are more than a few folks from local area programs who have wondered that.

From what I gather, after that visit, Georgetown very much still believed they were in the hunt, which indicates that Brooks and the rest of the coaching staff did not get wind of Ward choosing LSU on April 18. Concern began to emerge early last week from Georgetown’s end, after his visit to Georgetown, because Ward went dark on the staff for multiple days, per source. That’s when the red flags started flying for Georgetown with Ward, and the LSU buzz started to grow louder.

Hoya fans have been quick to fall back on the “L$U” tagline to explain away losing another talented recruit to the Tigers, but multiple sources since Saturday have said that Georgetown offered an NIL package to Ward in the neighborhood of $200,000. So Georgetown fans can’t act like the Hoyas didn’t try and sweeten the pot for Ward too.

LSU offered more than Georgetown did, but sources close to Ward insist that NIL wasn’t the determining factor in Ward’s decision. It is notable however, to hear that Georgetown is beginning to play in the mud when it comes to NIL. Unfortunately, it didn’t work out for them here.

The “Is he or is he not?” situation with Jordan Brooks is starting to become embarrassing, especially now that Ward has made his decision.

Georgetown is in a tough position now: They can either start their search for a third assistant all over again, or they can move forward with Brooks and promote him from this weird “shadow” assistant position to a full-time assistant, despite his failure to land Ward.

Whatever they choose, they need to decide soon. If Brooks is indeed not going to be the third assistant, it’s a pretty bad look for a high major Division 1 basketball team to not have a full coaching staff heading into the month of May, especially with how many holes on the roster there are that still need to be filled.