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Duke fans ‘Welcome Home’ Jabari Parker on his official visit

Jabari Parker

FILE - In this March 13, 2012 file photo, Simeon Career Academy’s forward Jabari Parker (22) fights for position in an Illinois state basketball super-sectional game against Evanston High Schoo in Chicago. On Wednesday, July 11, 2012, Parker tweeted the 10 schools in no particular order he is considering with a year to go before he graduates from high school. They are: national champion Kentucky, Stanford, Michigan State, Kansas, Florida, Duke, BYU, Georgetown, DePaul and North Carolina. (AP Photo/Charles Rex Arbogast, File)

AP

It’s been a busy week for Simeon 2013 small forward, Jabari Parker of Chicago. The 6-foot-9 recruit was part of the latest ESPN 30 for 30 film, Benji, on Tuesday night.

Then two days later, Parker officially surrendered his crown as the top senior in the nation, when Huntington Prep’s Andrew Wiggins reclassified to the Class of 2013.

Friday, Parker took an official visit to Duke, presumed to be the frontrunners along with Michigan State. When the Chicago native reached the Durham campus he was greeted with a welcome home sign by the Duke faithful.

On one of the main buildings on campus, the Cameron Crazies had sprain painted a sheet reading “JABARI, WELCOME HOME”

Clearly Duke is pulling out all the stops for Parker. It’s been no secret that Coach K has been on Parker for some time. Parker was the first member of the Class of 2013 to receive a scholarship offer from Duke. He could also become another Chicago-area star to commit to Duke, like Jon Scheyer (Northbrook) and Corey Maggette (Oak Park).

Duke is inching closer and closer to locking down their prized recruit for this year’s class, narrowing down his list to Duke and just four other schools: Michigan State, Stanford, Florida, and BYU.

Parker was scheduled to visit Michigan State last weekend and coming up Parker will visit Florida (Nov. 2-4), Stanford (Nov. 9-11), and BYU (Nov. 16-20), according to ESPNChicago.com.

Shooting guard Matt Jones and small forward Semi Ojeleye currently making up the 2013 freshman class for Duke.

Looks like the Crazies know who’s on campus this weekend. Excellent spray paintmanship twitter.com/MarkBaden/stat…

— Mark Joseph Baden (@MarkBaden) October 26, 2012

Terrence is also the lead writer at NEHoopNews.com and can be followed on Twitter: @terrence_payne