Duke basketball lands Purdue transfer after series of departures
22/04/2024 20:56
Former Purdue forward Mason Gillis has committed to the Duke basketball program, according to The Field of 68.
Mason Gillis won the Big Ten Sixth Man of the Year award last season with Purdue basketball, helping the Boilermakers make the national championship game, where they lost to UConn. Gillis played 39 games for Purdue last season, averaging 6.5 points with 3.9 rebounds. He adds experience for a Duke basketball team that needed that under head coach Jon Scheyer.
Gillis was a red shirt at Purdue for the 2019-2020 season, then had a significant role over the last four seasons, starting a good number of games in the three years following. Then, this past year, Gillis was strictly a bench player, and was a big part of Purdue’s success, as it showed their depth that helped them make a deep run in March.
It will be interesting to see how Gillis fits in with the Duke basketball program under head coach Jon Scheyer. This past season, Gillis had his best season from a three-point shooting standpoint, shooting 46.8% from three, according to Sports Reference. Purdue’s roster got a lot of good three-point looks last season due to the attention that Zach Edey took up on the inside, and he was good at passing outside to the open shooters.
Duke’s outlook for 2024-2025 with Mason Gillis in the fold
It has been an eventful offseason for Duke, as they have had seven players depart so far. Jeremy Roach, Mark Mitchell, Sean Stewart, TJ Power, Jaylen Blakes, Christian Reeves and Jaden Schutt have entered the transfer portal, while Kyle Filipowski and Jared McCain have entered the NBA Draft. Duke has a large recruiting class headlined by Cooper Flagg coming in next season, but it is a young team, so the addition of Gillis adds some needed experience.
As of right now, the Blue Devils have six freshmen coming in with Cooper Flagg, Kn Knueppel, Darren Harris, Isaiah Evans, Patrick Ngongba and Khaman Maluach. There is one sophomore in Caleb Foster with juniors Tyrese Proctor and Maliq Brown, wile Gillis is entering his fifth season in college.
The centerpiece for this team will be Cooper Flagg, the No. 1 overall recruit in this year’s class. He is expected to be a dominant player on the defensive end right away with the potential to be a dominant force on offense if he puts it all together. He could open up shooting chances on the outside for players like Gillis, like Edey did for him at Purdue.
This is the third year for Scheyer, and while he has proven to be a great recruiter, he has to give some results in March. Expectations will be sky high, as always, so it will be interesting to see how Duke fares this upcoming season.
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