One of the Duke basketball program's biggest recruiting targets in the class of 2026 is five-star point guard Deron Rippey Jr., the No. 2 point guard according to the 247Sports 2026 Composite Rankings. Rippey is continuing to get better, and just took home the MVP award from Steph Curry's basketball camp in California.
Deron Rippey Jr. took home MVP honors at the Curry Camp in the Bay Area on Friday.
— Jacob Polacheck (@PolacheckKSR) August 16, 2025
The five-star guard has 11 upcoming visits set, including an official visit to Kentucky from Oct. 3-5.
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Rippey is the No. 17 overall player in his class and No. 1 player out of the state of New Jersey per 247.
There were several elite prospects that Rippey outplayed, earning the MVP award from the greatest shooter in NBA history himself. Some of the top prospects at the camp were 2026 five-star prospect Baba Oladotun and Cole Cloer, a top-25 player in the class of 2026. 2027 five-star recruit Nasir Anderson was also in attendance at the camp.
The Blair Academy (NJ) product has several official visits to marquee programs lined up for the fall, and recently sealed a visit to Duke. Rippey Jr. will be in Durham from October 21st to 23rd. He also has visits lined up to Miami, North Carolina, Alabama, Texas, Syracuse, Kentucky, Indiana, Tennessee, Kansas, and NC State.
Rippey Jr. recently narrowed his list of schools down to 12 back in mid-July and now has visits scheduled for the schools still in contention for the elite point guard's services.
"Rippey is an explosively athletic lead guard who can set the tone on the defensive end of the floor," 247Sports Director of Scouting Adam Finkelstein said in his evaluation of Rippey. "He pressures the ball, picks up the length of the floor, gets over ball-screens, and is ideal at the point of attack. While there could be times down the road where his lack of size and length could be targeted on that end, that’s strictly theoretical right now."
The 2026 recruiting class is widely viewed as a weaker recruiting class as a whole relative to most other recruiting classes over the last decade or so. However, there's still lots of talent to go around, and the Blue Devils will likely need depth at the guard spots after the 2025-26 season.
Jon Scheyer has yet to seal a commitment from a member of the class of 2026.