Sampson picks up third commitment for 2008 class

In his introductory press conference in 2006, Kelvin Sampson told IU men’s basketball supporters he would recruit Indiana natives to play in Bloomington. But it is the prospects in border states, not the Hoosier state, that have padded the second-year coach’s 2008 recruiting class.\nMatt Roth, a 6-foot-2 shooting guard from Illinois, announced Wednesday he will sign a letter of intent to play for IU in 2008. Roth chose IU over Bradley and Saint Louis universities. Roth is the second player from a neighboring state to join next year’s recruiting class, and the third commitment overall. He joins Bud Mackey, shooting guard from Kentucky, and Devin Ebanks, small forward from Connecticut.\nRoth is ranked a three-star – out of a possible five stars – player by recruiting Web site www.rivals.com, and will help the Hoosiers from beyond the arc. Roth averaged 21.1 points per game for the Washington (Ill.) High School Panthers as a junior, and shot 48 percent from behind the three-point line. He drained 143 3-pointers last year, three shy of the Illinois state high school record. \nRoth is AAU teammates with Tyler Zeller, a 6-foot-11 center from Washington, Ind. Zeller, a five-star recruit, is ranked No. 22 nationally by www.rivals.com, and is considering IU among three other schools – North Carolina, Notre Dame and Purdue. Zeller’s brother Luke, who was Indiana’s Mr. Basketball in 2005, will be a junior at Notre Dame this season.