Charles Oakley in the news for all the wrong reasons by Chris Mckee

Mississauga born RJ Barrett announced that he is reclassifying to be eligible to play NCAA basketball in 2018. Barrett is the No.1 rated recruit who led Canada to the U19 World Championship title in July. With so many elite young Canadians coming through the ranks it’s only a matter of time before the Raptors have a home grown superstar.

Mississauga born RJ Barrett has the basketball world buzzing with his announcement that he has reclassified his NCAA eligibility and will play college basketball in the U.S in 2018 (he was originally supposed to wait until 2019).

Barrett is rated as the No.1 recruit in North America by several recruiting services and his list of suitors includes the most famed schools in the history of college basketball.

Barrett said his list of schools includes:

Barrett is just one of many elite young Canadians coming up through the high school and college ranks who is ready to take the basketball world by storm.

Fellow Mississauga native O’Shae Brissett will play for Syracuse this fall while Nickeil Alexander-Walker (Toronto) will suit up for Virginia Tech and his cousin Shai Alexander (Hamilton) is set to be Kentucky’s next star guard.

There are somewhere in the range of 150 Canadians playing NCAA basketball with a handful of them considered elite prospects which means it is only a matter of time before we see the Toronto Raptors with a home grown super star.

Cory Joseph and Jamaal Magloire are both Toronto guys but neither was considered the face of the franchise even though both were solid role players for the Raptors during their time in Toronto.

The NBA is littered with young Toronto born talent including the likes of Andrew Wiggins, Kelly Olynyk and Tristan Thompson but the Raptors have been unable to snatch up one of their home grown products in the draft or via free agency.

20 years ago, it was unthinkable that the Raptors would ever see a Toronto born kid become a star for the Raps but with the likes of Barrett, Brissett and the two Alexander’s among the dozens of young stars coming through the NCAA it is inevitable that Toronto fans will soon have a star of their own running the floor of the Air Canada Centre.