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Dariq Whitehead chose Duke as you probably know, becoming Jon Scheyer’s second commitment, just a few days after Kyle Filipowski picked the Blue Devils.
Here’s a pretty good piece from Slam Magazine on Whitehead and how he got to where he is.
A product of Montverde, what you may not realize is that he started there when he was just 13, which is pretty amazing. At 13, a lot of us probably barely knew how to use a controller and didn’t get off the couch very much either.
You may also not realize - we didn’t - that he overlapped with former Blue Devil RJ Barrett there, so obviously he has someone he could turn to, if he so desired, to get information about the Duke program.
He comes from a football family and decided that he liked basketball better after a coach encouraged him to give it a shot.
And what does he say about choosing Duke?
“It was a lifetime decision—after basketball, it can help me. Just the relationship I had with the coaches and kids on campus. The campus was a great place, kind of reminded me of Montverde. Beginning a new era with Coach Scheyer, I feel like Duke is going to remain the same. It’s still going to be Duke. Nothing is gonna change but the coach. I feel like he’s the coach that can come in and get the job done.”