Trailblazers sign Tennessee 3A Mr. Basketball Damarien Yates

VINCENNES, Ind. – The Vincennes University Trailblazers picked up another big signing Friday morning in Tennessee 3A Mr. Basketball Damarien Yates.

Yates is a six-foot seven, 210 forward from Fayette-Ware High School in Somerville, Tenn., just outside of Memphis.

“He’s obviously a highly rated recruit,” VU Hall of Fame Head Coach Todd Franklin said of Yates. “He’s the 3A Player of the Year in Tennessee and has been successful throughout his high school career. What brought us to him, more than anything, is probably his length and his ability to find the ball. He gets about 15 rebounds per game and gets a lot of touches. I’ve always thought that the most translatable part of the game going from high school to college that you almost know, that guy is going to be a good player, is if he’s a good rebounder.”

“If he’s rebounding the ball, always getting touches and his hands are always active, that suggests that he has instincts, athleticism and effort,” Franklin added. “You have to have all of those things and if you have those things, you are usually going to be somebody that at least contributes. He’s got great length. He’s very young. He hasn’t turned 18 yet, so he’s still growing into it. He plays hard. He’s still a little bit raw, but he’s like a lot of guys that come in here, his key to success will be how quickly does he come in, lock in, listen and work and adapt. If he does that, hopefully we’ll have him in here over the summer, he has a chance to be a really good player next year. He has to make some adjustments, like they all do, but from an instinct standpoint, I think he’s got pretty good vision. From a length and ability standpoint, he’s right there with what you need.”

Yates was named a top-10 senior in Tennessee this past season and averaged 18 points and 15 rebounds for the Wildcats.

Yates recorded a double-double in every game for Fayette-Ware last season, including a 21-point, 22-rebound double-double against Bolivar Central in December.

Yates helped guide the Wildcats to a 25-8 record last season, including a perfect 11-0 record in 3A District 15 play and guided Fayette-Ware to a spot in the Regional Championship game under Head Coach Demarius Chearis.

Yates earned a spot in the Iverson Classic All-Star game and was a 1,000-point scorer in high school.

“He’s a three-four type of player,” Franklin said. “Meaning, if he’s a four, he’s a stretch four. Those guys are essentially the same and sometimes you can get some advantages that way just like we did last season with Kris King. He’s not a low block, even though I think he’s got to get better down there so we can take advantage of some mismatches. As you’ve seen, we try to post all of these guys. It’s one of the great hidden things in the world and I don’t understand how we ever got away from that.”

“Once our guys get in here and embrace it, they want to be,” Franklin added. “I was in here the other day and Ryan Oliver was down there working with Michael and those guys learning what we are teaching in the post because he knows he wants to learn how to post these guards and score. We’ll work with Damarien on the low block, but he’s not going to be that guy. He’s more of a three-four or a four-three wing, but at our level, can definitely play that pick and pop stretch four.”

“The skill sets for those are very similar,” Franklin said. “And early on in their career’s those guys do better as a stretch four because they are matched up with a guy that has a hard time guarding them and gets them comfortable. We did that with Kris last year and that really helped him get comfortable and locked in. But Yates is that type of guy. He’s long, can fill the lanes, can slash to the rim. But he just finds that basketball. He was an 18 and 15 guy with a bunch of blocks. It’s harder to do those things here. We are probably not going to see those exact numbers. But bringing those types of qualities to the table, he’s just got to get locked in on what you have to do here to make those things happen.”

Yates joins Gerard Thomas as the first two VU signees this offseason, joining a Vincennes University team coming off VU’s 19th 30-win season in program history and a National Quarterfinal appearance last season.

“We’re in a good spot,” Franklin said of where he team is at so far heading into next year. “We’re not in a completed spot, but we are in a good spot. We’ve got nine guys, seven guys coming back that have been in the gym working all the time. I think they are seven solid players and I think they are seven guys that will all contribute to our team next year. You have those and now you add the two high school kids that we’ve brought in in Gerard and Damarien that we had kind of zeroed in on. They were here right after we got back from the National Tournament and we’ve managed to get both of them. So we’re about where we wanted to be right now.”

“Now you get into the next stage,” Franklin added. “We’ve got more guys coming in here in the next week or so. They will be more of the DI guys that are going through the portal and we’ll start to see who is out there and maybe we will find a guy or two kind of like we did with Tasos last year. Or they could be the JuCo transfer we’ll find like Caleb last year.”

“But we won’t make a living off of that because that’s not who we are,” Franklin said. “They have to be the right guy. Obviously Tasos and Caleb were the right guys last year and we will be very picky. But I would imagine at one point we will find about one or a couple at least of those older type of guys. That phase of recruiting is more coming up in about a month. We’d love to have them before we get into summer school. We did that last year with Tasos, we weren’t able to do that last year with Caleb but both still worked out.”

“I think we’ll get a couple of older guys somewhere,” Franklin added. “We’ve got some more high school kids that we’ve liked and have looked at for a while. Coach Davis has done a good job of staying on top of that throughout the season. I get a lot more serious after our season. During our season I’m trying to win a National Title. But once we’re done, I throw myself in. Coach Davis has done a great job of being on top of these guys. But that’s kind of where we are right now. Who knows who those two or three older guys will be. It could be a couple of these high school kids we’ve got coming in the next couple of weeks and we’ll just see what lays out. So far we’ve gotten who we’ve looked at that we thought was somewhat within our area here and we came down to a couple of guys out of that and we got both of them.”

“We like the seven we have coming back,” Franklin said. “So we’re sitting here right now with nine pretty good ones. We’ve got guys across all of the positions right now and some guys that are multiple position guys. Now it’s just about getting the right guys. As good as I think we are going to be and what we are trying to do, a couple of older guys, we’ll do our part to make sure they are the right guys like we got last year, if we add that to where we are will go a long way to where we are trying to go.”

“We have a mentality, we have a way, we have a who we are and even though Damarien is not as thick, 210 is not too skinny when you are coming out of high school, some of our guys, the rest of our team we are kind of barrel chested across the board,” Franklin added. “Bur Yates fits in and I think he will be a guy that will be able to defend. He’s still got to come out here and learn, but he’s got all of the attributes to come out here and be a playmaker on defense. Then he goes and gets the ball. We think we are going to be pretty good on the glass next year and he certainly isn’t going to hurt us. It’s one more guy that we’ve added and I think that both of these guys, Gerard and Damarien, I think fit into who we are in terms of style. Their attributes that they bring into the game fit into the style that we will play, who we are and who our personality is. So these next six that we bring in will be the same type of thing.”

The Vincennes University Athletic Department would like to welcome Damarien Yates to the 2023 recruiting class and wishes him well as he finishes his senior year of high school.