Here's what to know about Marquette basketball newcomer Caedin Hamilton, a 6-9 freshman from California

Marquette men's basketball fans have to get to know Caedin Hamilton pretty fast.

The 6-foot-9 freshman had a whirlwind recruitment before deciding to skip a post-grad year and instead enroll immediately at MU to be part of the roster for the 2023-24 season. Hamilton announced his commitment Aug. 1 just after his official visit to MU.

“The first day I got out there, they treated me like family,” Hamilton told reporters after signing his national letter of intent. “I met all the players, coaches. Built a relationship over the last couple months. They text me every day, FaceTime me, text my family. So I knew it was the place for me.”

MU's plan is to redshirt Hamilton this season. Here is a deeper look at the newest Golden Eagles player.

Caedin Hamilton has improved dramatically, but has room to grow

MU head coach Shaka Smart loves recruiting high school players with untapped potential, and Hamilton is another one.

“His trajectory is one of the best things he has going for him,” Smart said.

Hamilton was a 6-5, 290-pound freshman at St. Joseph High School in Santa Maria, California, when assistant coach Jeremy Jauregui introduced the young player to the BTI Basketball Club AAU program.

“He didn’t have great conditioning at the time,” said Robert Icart, the founder and director of BTI. “He was a big kid. He was physical, but usually kids that are physical lack touch and feel. And he had a combination of both.”

Hamilton kept growing and getting better, but playing time was hard to find at St. Joseph, which boasts one of the top high school teams in California. As a junior, he felt nailed to the bench.

“A lot of times with big kids, do you play him and give up some things?” Icart said. “Like you have a bigger kid out there, he can’t chase the ball against smaller and quicker guys. So sometimes those bigger kids, even though everybody wants size, they get lost on the roster.”

The AAU season after his junior season was when Hamilton slowly started to take off. His coach with BTI that year was Val Khamenia, a 6-8 former forward at George Washington who also coaches at Los Angeles Valley College.

“He was kind of down that he didn’t really get a chance to spend a lot of time on the court,” Khamenia said. “So he played for me a lot. He was a double-double machine.”

Hands and feet were what caught the attention of Marquette

Khamenia saw the tools that would eventually attract MU coaches to Hamilton.

“Good size, good hands, good feet.” Khamenia said. “Smart kid.”

Icart sat down with Hamilton and his family before his senior season at St. Joseph to talk about future options.

“I said here’s where I think you’re at,” Icart said. “I think you’re a mid-major-plus Division 1 kid. That could really get to the high-major level if you apply yourself in these areas. I thought, at that time, that he could utilize his post-graduate year and started to contact prep schools in the Northeast.”

Hamilton had a strong season at St Joseph, averaging 12.9 points and 10.3 rebounds per game for a team that lost to powerhouse Harvard-Westlake in the California Interscholastic Federation Open Division championship game.

Hamilton took that confidence into the spring AAU season with BTI.

“One game in April comes to mind when I think it all finally clicked for Caedin,” Jauregui said. “It was a 8 a.m. Sunday morning game against a team that had two high-major recruits.

“There were 40 college coaches on the baseline watching. It was a tight, one-score game with 5 minutes left. We called a timeout and his teammates were telling Caedin, ‘We believe in you, go to work.’ And he did. Caedin scored the last five buckets and we ended up winning.”

Hamilton still had only mid-major scholarship offers, so he proceeded with the plan of playing at a prep school for Williston Northampton in Massachusetts. He wasn't even enrolled yet when MU assistant coach Cody Hatt saw Hamilton at a showcase for New England prep schools.

“He reached out to me, it was Cody at the time, and he loved him,” Icart said. “He was so impressed him. He was like ‘I love his hands. I love his feet. His feel for the game.’ Caiden didn’t actually play his best that weekend. He had come from a Drexel visit.”

Smart then came to watch Hamilton, and after that a MU coach was at every game during live evaluation periods.

Marquette holds off late interest from other schools

MU wasn't the only school to see Hamilton's potential. Icart said Gonzaga and Colorado were close to setting up official visits.

“Those schools that were trying to get involved, long story short, they realized that Marquette had done a lot of work recruiting him already and it didn’t make sense to jump in late,” Icart said. “Especially because he had an early visit. Marquette was strategic enough to schedule an early visit and Caedin wanted it because he wanted to know if he liked this place.”

Hamilton's decision to commit to MU was sealed during his visit in late July.

“Quite a few Pac 12s and some Big 10 schools had reached out to me,” Icart said. “Even some ACC schools. So I think timing, Shaka and his staff, they kind of seized that moment quickly. Got on him right away and locked him up and secured him.”

Decision to redshirt at MU instead of prep school will help growth

Hamilton and the MU coaches also decided on enrolling immediately at MU instead of attending Williston Northampton.

While sitting out, Hamilton will continue to shape his body under Todd Smith, MU's assistant athletic director for applied sports science and performance, while also going against Oso Ighodaro in practice every day.

“You don’t have to get the results today,” Khamenia said. “That’s a big part of it, too. He knows he has to get better. So when you don’t have to worry about the results, you just stay on the track and you know you got to better. I think it’s easier mentally to do that.”

Once Hamilton can play, what can Marquette fans expect?

Smart often utilizes big guys as a “trigger man” in his fast-paced offense, and Hamilton can fit into that.

“No. 1, what people will realize very soon is that he is a very gifted passer,” Khamenia said. “He’s no (NBA MVP Nikola) Jokic, but he is very unselfish and a willing passer. People will see that. He will pass before he’ll shoot.”

Hamilton also has a different body type than the long-and-athletic centers that Smart has played at MU like Kur Kuath and Ighodaro.

“He’s got an unbelievable wingspan,” Smart said. “He, unlike anybody on our current roster, seeks out and enjoys and relishes contact. He’s someone that’s got a really big body and he loves physicality.”

Hamilton also has some old-school, back-to-the-basket game.

“I think a lot of times when kids are super athletic, they can dunk everything and they don’t develop touch,” Icart said. “Where he played low to the ground. He wasn’t a guy who was jumping over people. He actually had to learn how to finish and learn how to finish with either hand. Every angle.”

What else should Marquette fans know about Caedin Hamilton?

Icart praises Hamilton's coachability.

“Because of social media and wanting instant response and instant success, you’re seeing now that kids aren’t as coachable in a team setting,” Icart said. “It’s a little harder to get team buy-in.  Caedin is the opposite of that. He has a team mind-set. A team approach that’s innate.”

Interestingly, Hamilton also played volleyball at St. Joseph. Milwaukee Bucks center Brook Lopez, another big man who grew up in California, has talked about how playing volleyball helped shape him as a hoops player.

Hamilton was also the student speaker during St. Joseph's graduation in June.

“Over this year, I have learned how to advocate for what I need to be successful,” said Hamilton, according to the Santa Barbara newspaper. “I have risked trying and not getting it right. … I want to encourage all of you to take the risk to play big and take up space.”

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This article originally appeared on Milwaukee Journal Sentinel: Marquette newcomer Caedin Hamilton played at St. Joseph in California