Two of the Duke basketball program’s 2019 commits will play in the McDonald’s 2019 All-American game, but a third future Blue Devil will not, and he vows not to forget the snub.
McDonald’s has named a prep All-American team every year since 1977. And with Thursday’s announcement of the rosters for this year’s game — to be played on March 27 — there have now been 77 future Duke basketball players to make the team (the first year, Gene Banks made the team, but there was no actual game).
That’s an average of almost two Dukies per year. No other program has had more total representatives.
The 2019 selections — 24 high school seniors split evenly amongst the East and West teams — include two guys who have already committed to Duke: Vernon Carey Jr. (a five-star center who ranks No. 2 on the 247Sports Composite) and Wendell Moore (a five-star small forward who ranks No. 24), who will both play for the East.
Also among the selections is Matthew Hurt (a five-star power forward who ranks No. 7), who will play for the West. Hurt holds an offer from coach Mike Krzyzewski and took an official visit to Duke last weekend, but he will not likely announce his college choice until after the McDonald’s game.
One member of the Blue Devils’ 2019 class did not see his name on the list, though. And that teenager, Boogie Ellis (a four-star combo guard who ranks No. 36), took to Twitter shortly after the announcement to express his emotions:
Been proving people wrong my whole life we going to make them pay believe that
— Boogie Ellis (@BoogieEllis) January 24, 2019
Ellis, who has already had two games this season scoring at least 45 points for his Mission Bay (Calif.) squad, may not have needed any extra motivation. But it should benefit Duke that he now does seem to have exactly that.
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While most do not consider the 6-foot-2, 165-pound Ellis a true point guard, the Blue Devils may end up needing him to be their starting floor general next season. In fact, if current freshman Tre Jones leaves for the NBA after this season and no 2020 guard reclassifies, Ellis seems likely to be the top candidate for the job.
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Ellis would definitely not be the fastest or most skilled Blue Devil to ever play the position. However, he is likely to be in Durham for several seasons, meaning that if he commits to learning from Coach K and his staff, a college career similar to that of former Dukies Nolan Smith and Quinn Cook is not out of the question.
In other words, if Ellis practices and plays with the same emotion that he tweets about McDonald’s sleeping on his game, Duke fans should expect him to be far from a disappointment — no matter what role Coach K asks him to play as a freshman.
Click “Next” to check out the entire rosters for the McDonald’s game…