Oakville High senior Keith Pickens impressed on the AAU basketball circuit this summer and garnered several scholarship offers. On Tuesday, he made an oral commitment to Missouri State.

“I thought it was the right fit,” Pickens said. “I liked the school. The coaches seemed pretty cool. Everything seemed good.”

A 6-foot-3, 190-pound shooting guard, Pickens picked coach Cuonzo Martin’s Bears over offers from Evansville, Austin Peay, Tennessee Tech and Southeast Missouri State.

Pickens averaged 13 points, 5.9 rebounds and 2.4 blocked shots per game as a junior at Oakville, but improved his stock this summer playing with Team Rameybasketball.com.

“I came out of nowhere pretty much,” Pickens said. “It was my first year playing AAU basketball and I had a good summer, a consistent summer. That’s pretty much it.”

Pickens is the second St. Louis area player to commit to the Bears in recent months, after Miller Career Academy senior swingman Jerome Jones pledged to Missouri State in June.

Both Pickens and Jones are similar-type players who excel at slashing to the basket and finishing above the rim. They seem to fit what Martin, the new Bears coach and East St. Louis native, is trying to do in Springfield.

“He’s looking to run and gun, get up and down the court and play high intensity defense,” Pickens said