Tony Skinn is getting active at the point guard position on the recruiting front, bringing in two PG prospects in 2025 Juco sophomore Corey Caulker and 2026 high schooler BJ Ranson, both boasting 6’2 heights. That’s good size for the one in the A10.
Corey Caulker
Corey Caulker is a current sophomore at East Florida State, but was at Northern Virginia Community College for his freshman season before they shut down their athletics program. Caulker is a Sterling native, which is pretty rare for a DMV basketball player.
I believe the Juco product will have two seasons of eligibility at the D1 level.
2025 Juco prospect Corey Caulker, a 6’1 PG, took an official visit to George Mason.
He’s from Sterling, VA, went to Northern Virginia Community College, and then went to East Florida State, another Juco, after NOVA CC shut down their athletics.
Come home Corey! https://t.co/VSUIT6fmV8
— George Mason Recruiting (@GMURecruiting) October 15, 2024
Corey has offers from Mason, Cal State Northbridge, Hampton, North Texas, Bowling Green, Incarnate Word, and New Mexico State.
Caulker has taken an official visit to North Texas, which is a very quality mid-major program. If a recruit’s final whatever number of schools include Mason and North Texas, that’s a pretty good indicator of talent.
During his freshman season at NOVA CC, Corey averaged 23.8 points, 4.5 rebounds, 4.5 assists, and about 3 steals per game on 41.1% shooting from the field, 35.3% from three, and 80.7% from the line. He shot 44.9% on twos, meaning the point guard averaged about .9 points per shot on twos, and 1.06 per shot on threes. I think that could definitely increase with the better spacing Corey could get at Mason.
Those rebound and assist numbers are pretty cool, Caulker really fills up the stat sheet. He does have an unspectacular assist-turnover ratio of 1.6-1, which isn’t bad, but you would like it to be better. I imagine that a lot more of his passes could turn into assists at a good mid-major school.
Corey moves very well off-ball and looks to be a pass-first guy with the ball in his hands. The good end of being a combo guard.
The combo guard also has a really nice fadeaway jumper. He shoots it off one leg sometimes, kind of like Dirk.
Caulker is pretty shifty in the paint and around the rim.
I watched a little bit of Corey’s game with NOVA CC against Frederick CC, to get a feel for his defense. Here’s what I saw.
Caulker is a pretty active and cognitive off-ball defender, although he does have a bit of trouble getting around screens.
NOVA CC used Corey as a roaming double-team defender at times, which was pretty cool. He would pretty much just ball-chase, which seemed to work well, since they would eventually force something to happen. His athleticism makes him able to do it. They did it for two possessions and forced a bad pass, and then a tie-up because the ball-handler couldn’t pass it out.
Everything that NOVA CC is doing on defense is making it difficult to measure how good he is at playing man-to-man on-ball defense, since they are so help heavy that Caulker is pretty much just covering the three-point line and passing lanes.
I think Caulker’s role at Mason could be what we believed Jordan King would be at Richmond. I want to make it very clear, I am not projecting a player of the year caliber player, just that he does similar things to what Jordan King did. The hair doesn’t hurt either.
My apologies if my Juco evaluations are a bit off, you don’t get to look at this type of game often. There’s a very wide range of talent in those, as some of these guys are just happy to continue the basketball dream, while others had academic issues and are high-major talents.
BJ Ranson
BJ Ranson is another 6’2 PG, this time a 2026 high schooler out of Baltimore’s Mount St. Joseph. Ranson was in for an unofficial visit.
2026 6’2 PG BJ Ranson out of Baltimore’s Mount St. Joseph’s was in for an unofficial visit.
He’s unofficially visited with Saint Joseph’s and Towson as well. https://t.co/jgRIcc4X4G
— George Mason Recruiting (@GMURecruiting) October 16, 2024
BJ has offers from Mason, Towson, Albany, Manhattan, and St. Joe’s. It doesn’t really matter, but he did have an offer from the Travis Ford staff at Saint Louis.
Ranson has taken unofficial visits to Saint Joseph’s and Towson.
It’s worth noting that BJ is the son of Bino Ranson, a DePaul assistant for the 2021-22 and 22-23 seasons, and at Maryland for the previous 11 years. They say the point guard is an extension of the head coach; I assume that is even more true for the son of a successful assistant.
Ranson seems to have really good short-range burst, which is something I think really gives you an advantage in nearly every facet of the game.
BJ has a fast jump-shot; it seems like he does everything fast. Since it is so fast, the 6’2 guard can really punish guys for going under screens.
Like I did with Caulker, I watched a little bit of Ranson’s game with Mount St. Joseph against Mount Carmel.
BJ actually came off the bench in this game, but still looked impressive on the defensive end.
Ranson is a comically intense defender one-on-one. He drops deep into the defensive stance and puts his arms out. It’s a good look. More importantly, it works.
Mount St. Joseph seems to have used him as their point-of-attack defender for the bench unit.
BJ never falls asleep off the ball, always looking for things to do. Effort seems to be his best attribute on this end, which is something that is not always there with high schoolers.
The intense defender was only in the game for a couple of minutes, but showed elite effort during that stretch.
My comparison for Ranson is a toned-down version of Bub (known to Mason recruiting followers as Carlton) Carrington, mostly because of his pull-up jumper style and ability. BJ also seems to have the combo-guard upside that Bub developed during his season at Pitt.
What Does This Mean?
I like seeing how Skinn is attacking the point guard position, looking to get an immediate impact guy, and a guy who could develop under him. I am not sure they could take both of the PGs, as that would make the room quite crowded with it being Quigley, Begg, and these two. That’s a busy room, assuming nobody transfers out.
A possible explanation would be that the staff views one or both of them as combo guards, which would make them more versatile in what lineups they could play in.
Let’s hope that we will be welcoming them into Mason Nation soon.
