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38 ILLUSTRATED VOLUME 25, ISSUE 3 f BY KYLE CHARTERS KCharters@GoldandBlack.com E very summer for the last nine years, Miracle Gray and Dominique Oden have comprised the starting backcourt of their AAU teams. First for the Georgia Metros, the team in which they met at the ages of 7, then for FBC Southeast Elite, for which they star now. How many games is that? "Oh wow, that's a good question," Gray said, laughing. "It's been a lot." Probably in the vicinity of 250, and that might be a conservative estimate. And the total will continue to rise. The Atlanta area backcourt duo — Gray is a point guard; Oden a combo — is com- mitted to play for the Boilermakers, making up two-thirds of Sharon Versyp's 2016 re- cruiting class. Gray verballed more than a year ago, while Oden did so only recently, accepting Purdue's offer in mid-December. "This is a great opportunity," Gray said. "Not only is she a teammate, but she's my best friend." Still, uniting on the Boilermakers, or any Division I school, wasn't always the plan. It was unlikely, with Gray's and Oden's offer lists not often lining up with shared schools. Oden, who is interested in civil en- gineering, was offered opportunities from Ivy League programs and scholarships to play basketball at places like George Mason and Bucknell; Gray, who is the sis- ter of Purdue associate head coach Nadine Morgan, jumped on the early Boilermaker offer, although she was seeing interest from national pow- erhouses like Louisville and North Carolina. But in the Boilermakers, they both found a match that fit their unique criteria. Gray, a 5-foot-6 ju- nior at Stephenson High School, immediately accepted her offer in November 2013. Oden, a 5-8 junior at Marist School, took more time; she was offered during an unofficial visit to West Lafayette earlier this W O M E N ' S B A S K E T B A L L R E C R U I T I N G Best Friends AAU teammates soon-to-be Boilermakers AAU teammates Miracle Gray and Dominique Oden, who took an unof- ficial visit together in September, will be Purdue teammates starting in 2016-17. INCOMING BOILERMAKERS 2015 Signees Lamina Cooper G 5-8 Indianapolis/Lawrence North Nora Kiesler C 6-6 Louisville/Assumption Dominique McBryde F 6-2 Bedford, Ind./Bedford North Lawrence Tiara Murphy G 5-6 South Bend, Ind./Washington 2016 Commitments Aerianna Harris F 6-1 Indianapolis/Ben Davis Miracle Gray PG 5-6 Stone Mountain, Ga./Stephenson Dominique Oden G 5-8 Lithonia, Ga./Marist 2017 Commitment Dani Lawson F 6-2 Shaker Heights, Ohio/Hathaway Brown