No. 1 PG Elliot Cadeau making most of basketball platform
ORADELL, N.J. (BVM) – Elliot Cadeau has made it his goal to use basketball to help impact others and he isn’t just keeping the idea local, he’s taking it worldwide. With a growing brand on and off the court, Cadeau is making the most of the early opportunities that have come his way.
The No. 1–ranked point guard in the Class of 2024 and the No. 7 player nationally, is kicking off his busy offseason by taking his annual summer trip to Europe. Cadeau, who’s mother is from Sweden and father is from Haiti, has dual-citizenship in Sweden and travels to the country each summer to either play basketball or visit family. However, playing in the country has come about more recently.
Attending Patrick School in New Jersey as a seventh and eighth grader, Cadeau would make a trip to Sweden where the 6-foot-1, 165-pound point guard would gain the attention of the country’s national team coaches.
“We took a trip to Sweden to play this tournament and people really liked the way I played and they figured out that I had Swedish roots and I was a citizen,” Cadeau said. “They asked me to come to a training camp.”
Best of luck to future Lions @ElliotCadeau & @cluczynski33 as the represent their countries this summer in the FIBA European Championships. 🇸🇪🇵🇱 pic.twitter.com/qZJxaGMslq
— Link Hoops (@LinkHoops) June 12, 2022
The training camp would lead to an invite to the U-15 team where Cadeau would make his initial appearance back in 2019. Since then, he’s made it a priority to play on the Swedish national team, joining both the U-16 and U-18 teams. As part of the upcoming national team schedule, Cadeau is making the most of his stay in the country by hosting his second basketball camp for kids in the area.
Back in January, Cadeau kicked off his first official basketball camp for students attending Washington Elementary. With NIL starting for high schoolers in New Jersey, Cadeau and his mom helped use the platform to give back, with the hope of making his first camp a little different.
“The first one I did was an all free camp,” Cadeau said. “We rented out a place in West Orange and we invited all kids that we thought couldn’t pay [for it] in the area…. A lot of younger kids came and played basketball and had fun. We did it all for free because we wanted our first one to be special and we wanted to give back.”
The chance to do more off the court has been a continued effort for Cadeau, who partnered recently with the Swedish vitamin drink, Vitamin Well. The NIL deal with the company was one of the first for Cadeau who is represented by Roc Nation Sports and one of the first known international NIL deals signed by a high school athlete.
With momentum in the NIL space growing, the partnership will allow the New Jersey native to host another youth camp, this time across the globe. With the goal of expanding the game within his international roots, Cadeau will get the chance to help kids using the game of basketball during his time in Sweden.
“I’m just expecting kids to come out and have fun,” Cadeau said of his second basketball camp. “I know basketball is different [in Sweden] but I want to show them the American side of basketball and I’ll just run it as I run it out here. Maybe, it’ll give them a different perspective [of the game].”
As Cadeau gets back to doing what he loves, he’s taking advantage of his time back on the court. During his past year at Bergen Catholic High School, the sophomore point guard missed the entirety of the season after being sidelined with an ankle injury. With a chance to get back to playing, Cadeau would enjoy his time at the Pangos All-American Camp that was held in Las Vegas to kick off June.
“It was really hard because it was like a really rare injury and it was really tough to watch all my friends go out there and I was on the bench,” Cadeau said of what the past year in basketball has been like for him. “I’m [back to] doing what I love. I’ve just been playing as much as I can.”
Please help us welcome 5 ⭐️ and ESPN top 10 @ElliotCadeau to the Pride! We couldn’t be more excited to have Elliot in Branson! #PartOfThePride🦁 pic.twitter.com/cEVf7Zowzb
— Link Hoops (@LinkHoops) June 10, 2022
Between his time in Vegas and his trip to Sweden, the five-star point guard announced the decision that he would be transferring to Link Academy in Missouri. The school, which featured some of the top players in the country this past year, gives Cadeau a chance to join one of the elite basketball programs in the United States.
“There’ve been a lot of high schools that contacted me and we’ve been trying to make this decision for a long time and we thought that was the best option for me because we all had the same goals,” Cadeau said. “We all want to win games, me and the coaches want to win a national championship and I think they’ll put the right guys around me. I think I’ll develop a lot more out there and I think it’s just a perfect situation for me.”
With an appreciation for his time at Berger Catholic, Cadeau knows it will be a change moving away from his home in New Jersey. But, he’s looking forward to what his new opportunity can bring.
“I think it was the toughest decision of my life because I’m leaving all my friends,” Cadeau said. “My freshman year was COVID, and my sophomore year I was out, so I didn’t really get to play any games in front of a crowd in my own hometown so it was really, really tough. But, I felt like that was the best thing I could do for my long-term development so I made that decision.”
As Cadeau prepares for a more normal junior season, he’s using the next couple of months to get started on his basketball future. The rising junior is preparing to jumpstart what he expects to be an even busier recruitment period. Following the summer, Cadeau will look to start planning out his official visits with his first one scheduled for Sept. 24 with the team he grew up rooting for, Texas Tech.
“[Recruiting] kind of slowed down with my injury when I wasn’t playing but now it’s gone back up a little,” Cadeau said. “June 15, I’ll officially be a junior… so I think it’ll pick up then.”