By Nick Pantages
@nick_pantages22
Kalek and Kaden House have played together almost their entire lives. As twins, they have played together for their entire lives, including at the Panini Hoophall Classic for Arizona Compass. But unlike Adonis and Darius Ratliff, another ranked twin duo that also played at Hoophall, the House twins will be splitting up starting next fall in college.
Kalek will be taking his talents to Xavier, while Kaden goes to Maryland.
Despite the twins’ super close relationship, they don’t feel like they will be at a disadvantage without the other as a teammate.
“I feel like it’s going to be normal,” Kaden said. “My brother’s really just like another teammate, honestly. Obviously, that’s my brother, but it’s not really how certain people say, like, ‘I can’t play without my brother.’”
“I mean, it wouldn’t really be weird,” Kaden said. “It’s just like, this is going to be my last time probably playing with a dude like him, because sometimes he looks for me more than others. That’s really the only thing [it would] be different.”
For Arizona Compass at Hoophall, the twins helped lock down two wins for Compass, led by all three of the House brothers’ calling cards – defense.
Compass played two of the top teams in the country, Long Island Lutheran, and SCNext’s No. 1 team in the country, Link Academy, and held them both to under 60 points. Kaden and Kalek both certainly left their mark on the games defensively. Against LuHi they each had two steals, and in the upset win over Link Kaden’s three steals outdid Kalek’s one.
In the win over LuHi, Compass forced a number of late turnovers, helping them secure the win along with clutch free throw shooting down the stretch.
“I think our defense had a costly turnover at the end of the game, but just me being able to get it back with [Quincy Wadley] being in the Help causing him to turn the other way, and I got the steal,” Kaden said.
The twins get this defensive effort and intensity, partially from Jaelen’s experiences on the defensive end. He led the Mountain West in steals during all three years he spent at New Mexico, and defensive effort is something he is constantly preaching to his younger brothers.
“He’s been guiding us a lot,” Kaden said. “Just always beating up on us when we’re playing one-on-one. I would say the advice he’s giving me is just to play hard honestly, because that’s what he’s known for playing hard, playing defense.”
Despite their constant preaching of defense, the twins are no slouches on the offensive end. Kaden finished in double figures in both contests, mostly through his skills in getting to the free throw line, where he hit 10 shots from the charity stripe. He also hammered down a massive poster dunk against Link, electrifying the Blake Arena crowd.
Kalek plays a little bit of a different offensive game, acting more as an on-ball guard compared to Kaden. He was AZ Compass’ top scorer against Link, connecting on three 3-pointers and going 6-6 from the free throw line, and finishing with 15 points. Kalek is always trying to improve on his offensive game, particularly through his abilities as a point guard.
“’I’ll say my ball handling and I just being a leader of the team,” Kalek said. “You got to get the team together. You got to be like the orchestrator. So just keep working on being a leader, being vocal and, like, really my ball handling and running the point.”
Members of Kalek’s future coaching staff at Xavier were in attendance Saturday to watch him play against LuHi, and he has developed a real connection with that staff, partially through Jaelen. While he was at New Mexico, Richard Pitino was his coach, and Pitino is currently in his first year at Xavier.
Kalek has used his older brother as a resource during his recruiting process, especially with the Pitino-led coaching staff.
“We have a real good connection with all the coaches,” Kalek said. [Isaac] Chew, that’s my guy, but you know, head coach, assistant coach, I mean, that’s the main thing. And they coached my brother, so I’ve been around it, familiar with the situation I’m going into, and they just want the best for me, and they got my back so they’re gonna let me play free. They just trust me, and I trust them.”
Kalek will also be going to the Big East, a conference that was for decades always loaded with high-quality bigs. But due to recent shifts in collegiate basketball as a whole, the Big East has become more guard oriented, something that he has definitely noticed.
“The Big East is physical, aggressive, and I feel like I’m a physical guard,” Kalek said. “I play defense, you know, and then like they are mainly, like a guard conference. So I feel like I’ll fit in well over there.”
Kaden on the other hand, will be going to the Big Ten with Maryland, who have a conference culture based around defense, perfectly suiting his game. He hopes to bring that energy to the Terrapin fans in College Park.
“The fans can expect a high intensity player who loves defense, get rebounds and get buckets,” Kaden said.