Frank Martin’s surprise proved worth the wait.
UMass’ men’s basketball coach has been teasing a big surprise since July 28 on Twitter, and it revealed itself Wednesday.
Four-star recruit Tafara Gapare will join the Minutemen this winter, he and the team announced. The Kent School product is the No. 1 player in the state of Connecticut and No. 10 power forward nationally according to 247sports.com. The site ranks him as the No. 42 available prospect in the country.
Gapare was originally a member of the class of 2023 and committed to DePaul in June. He de-committed in June and also held offers from Arizona State and UConn.
“Recruiting high-level players to UMass is something that I’ve been excited about from the day I got hired,” Martin said in a release. “Tafara adds that to the class that is already in place. He is a 6-foot-10, skilled forward that has a chance to be an unbelievable player both offensively and defensively. He has only been in the United States for six months, so he is somewhat unknown, but UMass fans will know who he is as soon as he takes the court for us.”
âœ’ï¸ ð•´ð–™â€™ð–˜ ð•ºð–‹ð–‹ð–Žð–ˆð–Žð–†ð–‘ 🖋
Welcome to the #Flagship 🚩 @Tafara_Gapare5
🔗 https://t.co/kZm0M3GDVN pic.twitter.com/rmHfgm5MQj
— UMass Men’s Basketball (@UMassMBB) August 10, 2022
The New Zealand native spent time playing for Scots College in Wellington and attended the NBA Global Academy.
He’s UMass first four-star recruit since Tre Mitchell in 2019.
Gapare joins fellow freshmen Keon Thompson and RJ Luis in UMass’ Class of 2022 and will be the program’s eighth newcomer.
Kyle Grabowski can be reached at kgrabowski@gazettenet.com. Follow him on Twitter @kylegrbwsk.