UNLV eyeing two new PG transfer targets in Gary Franklin Jr., Reggie Smith

By Ryan Greene

Published Friday, Jan. 7, 2011 | 2:15 a.m.

Updated Friday, Jan. 7, 2011 | 1 p.m.

What seems like a bottomless well of potential point guard transfers around the country this basketball season has again overflowed.

The latest targets for the UNLV coaching staff are a pair of freshmen: Reggie Smith and Gary Franklin Jr.

Smith announced just after Christmas his intentions to transfer from Marquette, while Franklin Jr. on Wednesday filed his transfer papers at Cal.

Franklin Jr. is the more local of the two prospects, having enjoyed a stellar prep career at powerhouse Mater Dei in Santa Ana, Calif. The 6-foot-2, 180-pound Franklin Jr. was ranked by Rivals.com as the No. 19 point guard and No. 78 overall prospect in the 2010 senior class.

He averaged 8.2 points and two assists per game for the Golden Bears, starting 11 of the team's 13 games, but after becoming frustrated with not getting much run at the point, he opted to leave the team in pursuit of a full-time gig at his favored position.

He'd been starting as the team's shooting guard alongside former Findlay Prep standout Jorge Gutierrez. It was a role he struggled to produce consistently in, shooting just 29.7 percent from the floor and 29.3 percent from long range. The tipping point may have been the recent insertion of sophomore point guard Brandon Smith into the Bears' starting lineup, with Gutierrez moving to the two-guard and Franklin Jr. still coming off of the bench.

"He has dreams to play in the NBA and doesn't feel like he'll be able to do it here," Cal coach Mike Montgomery told the San Jose Mercury News on Wednesday. "He wasn't upset about anything. He feels like he needs to be a point (guard) at the next level. (Transferring is) something he felt he needed to do."

Attempts by the Sun to reach his father, Gary Sr., were unsuccessful on Thursday, but it was discovered that one of the schools Franklin Jr. had his scholarship release form sent to was UNLV. Another top potential suitor for Franklin Jr. will be UNLV's Mountain West rival San Diego State, who has plenty of point guard minutes to offer after D.J. Gay graduates after this season.

Another tie to UNLV for Franklin Jr. is that he was a long-time AAU teammate of current Rebels sophomore guard Justin Hawkins.

No official visit to campus has been set up as of yet for Franklin Jr., but it's assumed that he's looking to make a decision quickly and enroll at his new school in time for the spring semester, thus making him eligible at the conclusion of the fall 2011 semester with 3.5 years left to play.

As for Smith, the Sun learned that he will visit UNLV this weekend, taking in the Rebels' 7 p.m. Saturday tilt at the Thomas & Mack Center against TCU as part of the trip.

Smith played in eight games and started five for Marquette but fell ill following a Dec. 11 loss to Wisconsin and never came back. He was ranked by Rivals.com coming out of Thornton Township High in Harvey, Ill., as the No. 29 point guard in his class and No. 112 overall prospect.

Other schools pursuing Smith include Nebraska, Southern Illinois, Dayton and Vanderbilt among others. TCU has also shown interest, but there could be conflict regarding transfer rules within the conference, as Jim Christian's program is set to join Marquette in the Big East in 2012.

Smith was shooting just 36.4 percent from the floor and 25 percent from deep this season, averaging 1.4 points, 1.6 assists and 1.5 rebounds in 9.9 minutes a game. The 6-foot, 170-pounder is regarded as a top-level athlete whose overall game is still a bit raw.

In high school, he averaged 18.1 points, 5.2 rebounds, 2.5 assists and 2.5 steals a game, shooting 47 percent overall and 30 percent (24 makes) from 3-point land.

"He's trying to make the transition from being a combo guard to a point guard," said Mike Irvin, who was Smith's AAU coach with the Chicago-based Mac Irvin Fire. "I know he's looking for a system where he can get up and down so he can show more of his athleticism. He definitely can play at the collegiate level, he just needs to work more on becoming a point guard.

"Coach Kruger's a good coach and he was a point guard. You've got Steve Henson on the staff and he was a point guard, and you have Lew (Hill) down there. We think they'd be very good at developing Reggie Smith as a staff."

Irvin said another attraction of UNLV's for Smith and his family, which is handling his recruitment, is the school's location. He said that he feels Smith needs a change of scenery, which worked for another former combo guard out of his AAU program — former Gonzaga standout Jeremy Pargo, who is now a successful pro overseas.

The UNLV staff has recruited a handful of Mac Irvin Fire prospects in recent years, but the last player to come from that program out to Las Vegas was Shawn Marion, who played for Mac Irvin before he retired and handed the operation over to his son.

Though both Smith and Franklin are not finished products as point guards, UNLV has time to be able to put in work with a player needing some development.

The Rebels' staff missed out on a handful of prep prospects in the class of 2011 that it had targeted then had a close miss on UCLA transfer Matt Carlino, who ended up choosing BYU.

Kruger & Co. are hoping to land a transfer point guard to bring along for the rest of this season and all of the 2011-12 campaign to eventually take over for Oscar Bellfield, who graduates after next year.

The staff got a big commitment from Findlay sophomore point guard Nigel Williams-Goss last month, who is already regarded as one of the top prizes in the crop of 2013 players. However, if that commitment holds for two more years, it'll still leave a gap between Bellfield and him, meaning that adding depth now is a priority.

For more on this story as it develops, stay tuned to lasvegassun.com/rebels.