Trey Zeigler's predicament

Trey Zeigler, 18, is months away from one of the most interesting decisions a high school kid can make.

A 6-foot-5 shooting guard from Mount Pleasant High School, Zeigler is ranked as the No. 7 player at his position for the class of 2010 by Scout.com. He's been to nearly every top prep basketball camp in the past few years, and his impressed people with his fundamentally-sound play. Here's an excerpt from draftexpress.com, which evaluates players for NBA stock. That's right, the National Basketball Association.

6-5, smooth, but not incredibly athletic at this point, Zeigler likes to beat guys off the dribble and take the ball strong to the rim, finishing fearlessly and having no problem taking contact. He’s a crafty guy, sometimes finishing with a floater, which helps considering that he isn’t quite strong or explosive enough at this point to explode over players in traffic.

Zeigler didn’t shoot a lot of jumpers at this event, but appears capable of making shots from the perimeter—something we’ll have to look closer at next time we see him. He can create for himself as well as for others, looking very unselfish, not forcing the issue and showing a nice feel for finding the open man, and competes very hard on the other end too, hustling for loose balls and trying to play good defense, which is nice to see from a player so young.

Oh, and he happens to be the son of Central Michigan basketball coach Ernie Zeigler. School's love that he's been around the game of basketball since he could walk. Here's a list of a few of the schools Zeigler is considering:

School	Interest level	Offer?
Michigan	High	Yes
UCLA	High	Yes
Arizona	Medium	Yes
CMU	Medium	Yes
Michigan State	Medium	Yes
Oklahoma	Medium	Yes
Duke	Low	No
LSU	None	No
Miami (FL)	None	Yes

It's pretty staggering the decision Zeigler has coming up. Does he play for his father, who obviously would love to add his son to his team, single-handily revitalize Central Michigan's basketball program, which is opening a new events center in winter 2010 and instantly become 'big man on campus'?

Or does he follow his dream of playing at a top D-I school, playing in front of packed houses every night on national television?

Rose Arena likely would be packed too if Zeigler came to CMU. Interest has increasingly waned since Chris Kaman left for the NBA and the Los Angeles Clippers in 2003.

I myself have visions of a full "Rose Rowdies" student section, chanting Trey's name as he leads CMU to MAC championship after MAC championship.

But let's get real. It would be a tough dynamic if Trey plays for his dad. The pressure would fall all on his shoulders and there would be no release. The rest of the MAC would gun for him every night, making it a one-on-five.

There's no easy way to make this decision. There's no saying how his draft stock would be affected if he chose to rule the MAC for a few years as opposed to becoming a good player among the elite. I haven't had the chance to see him play yet, so I can't really judge his talent.

Playing for the Chippewas, he'll still get noticed. Look at a guy like Eric Maynor, from VCU, or Stephen Curry from Davidson. Take a team on your shoulders, you get rewarded by scouts and the media. And it makes you look even better. It makes you get national attention right off the bat because you're playing for your dad. Could be money in the bank.

Or...

He doesn't live up to expectations. Maybe an injury slows him down, takes him a year to get adjusted to D-I basketball (unlikely, but it's been seen before). He becomes an afterthought after the initial attention.

Going with a school like Michigan (which I'm hearing is his No. 1 choice right now), the odds for standing out on the national stage could be much better. He could replace Manny Harris (a junior who's likely gone to the NBA after this season) and do most of the scoring for the Wolverines and get noticed a lot faster for his talent, rather than just being a cool story playing for his dad.

Or...

Again, an injury or limited impact makes him another role player on a great team. You never know...

All this goes into the decision and we haven't talked about Ernie Zeigler's job status at CMU. He was given a one-year extension last fall, so he's locked up through 2011, or the end of next season. This was a sorely-needed message from Athletics Director Dave Heeke which basically says: "It's not your fault half of your guys got injured last season and another quarter turned out to be not committed to what you're doing and bolted but you have another year to figure this out otherwise we're going to move in another direction."

This also coincides with Trey's first year of college. Hmmm... Does Trey feel any pressure to save his dad's job by coming to CMU? Or will Ernie be safe if his own son decides to attend elsewhere?

That all depends on the wins and losses. This year is going to be a good indicator. That's what makes the second half (MAC schedule) of this basketball season so crucial. In the end, this is where Heeke has to decide whether Ernie has been the victim of bad luck (such as starter Antonio Weary breaking his hand on a pedestrian play in the first exhibition game and being out four to six weeks to start the year or losing leading scorer Chris Kellermann to a freak ankle injury in practice when Marko Spica, his other main post scoring threat already was out for the year with knee problems) or whether Ernie has not assembled the pieces correctly enough so that the bad luck is just faulty recruiting.

Whatever happens, it should be an interesting winter in Mount Pleasant nonetheless.