Of the seven players who get the majority of playing time for the top-ranked Arizona Wildcats basketball team, five were five-star recruits and one was a four-star.

Of the seven players who play at least 10 minutes per game for the Arizona State Sun Devils, just one, point guard Jahii Carson, earned more than three stars coming out of high school.

In their respective 2014 recruiting classes, the Wildcats are set to add three four-star recruits and another five-star, whereas the Sun Devils will welcome a pair of three-star players and one four-star.

“They’re a real challenge to compete against in basketball,” ASU head coach Herb Sendek told Bickley with Marotta Tuesday. “And honestly, what they’re doing in recruiting right now is almost unprecedented on a national level. The level they’re recruiting is absolutely astonishing.”

Sendek is in his eighth season with the Sun Devils, and in that time has seen four different coaches lead the Wildcats. And in 15 meetings with Arizona, Sendek’s teams have gone a very respectable 7-8, but has posted a 2-6 mark against current UA coach Sean Miller.

But Before moving to ASU, Sendek guided North Carolina State in the ACC, so this isn’t his first brush with an elite program.

So it’s fair to say Sendek has a solid perspective on what Arizona has been and what it seems to have become during his tenure in Tempe, and can ably compare what’s happening in Tucson with other programs around the country.

“The talent level that they continue to streamline into their program is just a real credit to whatever they’re doing, because I don’t see them having any peer right now,” he said. “And you’re talking to a guy who was in the same neighborhood as Duke and North Carolina for 10 years. Their recruiting is absolutely astonishing.

“I mean, they have guys who aren’t playing right now that teams in our league would covet to have.”

Now, as anyone will tell you, the number of stars a high school player is given before stepping foot on a college campus means very little with regards to how they will perform. All over the country there have been, are and will continue to be cases of high-profile players becoming disappointments and under-the-radar athletes turning into impact players.

But what the ratings system can show you is the level at which a program is recruiting, and right now Arizona’s is higher than most.

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