The Illinois basketball team has received a verbal commitment from five-star guard, Ayo Dosunmu.

Dosunmu announced on Thursday night that he will be attending the University of Illinois. He picked the Illini over Wake Forest. This was a decision that has been a long time in the making and Illinois came through with one of the biggest commitments in program history.

Back on August 9, Dosunmu cut his list for the first time down to just 11 teams. He included Creighton, Kansas, Memphis, New Mexico, Oklahoma State, UConn, USC, NC State, Wake Forest, Xavier and Illinois in that mix. From those 11 teams, he decided to take an official visit to USC on September 9 and then Wake Forest on September 29. He then took an official visit to Illinois this past weekend.

Now Dosunmu has decided to end his recruitment and he will be donning the Orange and Blue next fall when the Illini take the court. This was a huge commitment for the Illini because Dosunmu is a five-star recruit who is the No. 20 player in the class of 2018. He is also the first commitment for the Illini class of 2018 as well.

Many fans have been nervous as of late because some targets for Illinois decided to go elsewhere. But, what some people didn’t realize is that the main targets for the team hadn’t committed yet. Brad Underwood still has a few big-time recruits remaining and one of them is official off the board.

There are still a few others to keep an eye on as well. Talen Horton-Tucker is visiting this weekend and that is a huge official visit. He is a big-time player from the Chicago area as well. Getting him would help build depth for the Illini on the wing. He has visited Xavier, Georgia Tech and Iowa State already.

A few other targets for Underwood are Tim Finke and Bryan Penn-Johnson.

Penn-Johnson is a long shot and I don’t think he ends up with the Illini, but I think the recruitment of Finke has started to heat up again. The Illini need to fill three scholarships and he would be the third man to commit for the class of 2018. So, those three could be the class of 2018.

No matter what happens the rest of the way for Illinois, they at least have a five-star guard in Dosunmu coming to play on the team next season. He is the highest rated recruit since Dee Brown and hopefully, he can make a big impact like Brown as well. Rejoice Illini fans.