Juniors may stay around for Mayo

Signing prized recruit O.J. Mayo might have been a three-for-one coup for USC Coach Tim Floyd, who now could benefit from the services of standout juniors Nick Young and Gabe Pruitt for an additional season.

Young and Pruitt, projected as first-round NBA draft selections by nbadraft.net, said they were leaning toward staying for their senior seasons and playing with a Trojans lineup that could include four potential first-round draft picks.

Mayo is projected as a lottery pick in the 2008 draft and incoming freshman forward Davon Jefferson also has been projected as a potential first-round selection.

“That will be a great lineup,” said Young, who smiled broadly when told that Mayo had signed his letter of intent with the Trojans. “That’s national championship right there. That’s like the football team.”

Said Pruitt, “With the additional guys coming in for next year, I think we’ll be a very strong team and contend for a national title.”

So they’re staying?

“As of right now, I’m looking at coming back and finishing my career at SC,” Pruitt said. “I’m not looking at the next level.”

Said Young, “It looks like 99%, 99.1%.”

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Floyd said Mayo, the point guard from Huntington, W.Va., High, and Jefferson, the forward from Lynwood High, were only the third and fourth top-100 recruits he had signed in 14 years as a college coach, joining Marcus Fizer at Iowa State and Melvin Simon at New Orleans.

Mayo, of course, may be in a class by himself, and not only because of talent.

“He chose our program because he doesn’t have the herd mentality, that he feels like he’s got to be the next guy to go to North Carolina or Duke or Kentucky, which I admire,” Floyd said. “In fact, the other guys have quite frankly bored me through the years because it’s such an easy thing for a guy to do.”

Though Mayo sent mixed signals publicly -- he canceled a news conference in August, during which he was supposed to commit to USC, and told his hometown newspaper as recently as a week ago that he would visit five schools and decide in the spring -- Floyd said the prospect never wavered from his commitment to USC.

“He told me in our first conversation that he wanted to come to SC a year ago and not to worry, although we did quite a bit,” Floyd said. “You think about it every day. You’re worried that something might happen at the 11th hour.

“But I respect his strength and I respect his vision because he sat down and he decided what he wanted for his career. He wanted what Los Angeles could offer and he felt like he wanted to play for a coach who knew what it takes in the NBA, and he wanted a place he could leave a mark on and his name on, and he never wavered from the first conversation.”

Floyd said Mayo’s impact would last much longer than his one season as a Trojan.

“There’s going to be a lot of people who decide that SC basketball is a good thing to watch and I think they’re going to come back,” Floyd said. “And I think there’s going to be a lot of recruits in the future that are going to be saying, ‘You know what, that’s a program I should pay attention to.’ ”

Mayo is scheduled to arrive in Southern California today for an official visit that is now nothing more than a formality. Mayo’s signing gave USC the second-ranked recruiting class nationally, behind only Kansas State, according to rivals.com.

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While acknowledging that it had been difficult to be away from his teammates, Pruitt said he agreed with Floyd’s decision to bar him from practice the last several weeks so he could focus on his schoolwork.

“It’s only for the best,” said Pruitt, who hopes to return by the middle of next month after having been ruled academically ineligible for a semester. “I’ve had more time to do things, like spend extra time on a paper or studying. I have to do what I have to do to get back with the team.”

Pruitt said he had been lifting weights and running and shooting jump shots on his own so that when he returned he wouldn’t be far behind his teammates.

ben.bolch@latimes.com