by Eric Prisbell, USA TODAY Sports

Before Aaron and Andrew Harrison, two of the nation’s top high school basketball players, narrowed their list of potential colleges to Kentucky and Maryland, five schools had made the cut for the twin brothers.

And in a recruiting world often laden with characters with various ulterior motives, their father, Aaron Harrison Sr., said there was one trait common among those five coaches: authenticity.

“For college coaches to come in and tell me, ‘I’m holier than thou,’ it doesn’t work like that,” Harrison Sr. said in a recent interview. “You are in that business because that business makes a lot of money. That means you are pushed by money. There are some wrong things. I just don’t like the ‘holier than thou’ that they put themselves on, then I see them do things.”

The Harrisons will announce their college choice Thursday at 5 p.m. ET on ESPNU. College coaches cannot comment on unsigned recruits. The two guards can sign their national letters of intent Nov. 14.

Harrison Sr. said that former Maryland standout John Lucas, who helps work out the Harrisons in the Houston area, has been instrumental in providing the dad invaluable insight into the cutthroat world of recruiting and summer basketball. But Harrison Sr. also relies heavily on his own street smarts and ability to read people.

“I’m standing here today, but – I am from East Baltimore – and I probably know every slick conversation you want to have with me,” he said. “There’s not much you can tell me to make me jump off the cliff.

“I’ll be frank with you, there are college coaches who are just as involved in this thing as any AAU guy. I have had college coaches do things that were wrong and you just see them do things that are just wrong, that you wouldn’t want to do to another kid. I am not talking about anything under the table or illegal. I am just talking about morally wrong.”

He said the five coaches whose schools made the cut distinguished themselves.

Harrison Sr. said he first met Kentucky coach John Calipari when his sons were in ninth grade – … [For more on Harrison twins' dad: Coaches with authenticity wanted, click here.]