Duke basketball: Mark Williams worries fans with notes on social media

A Duke basketball big man has been keeping fans on the edge of their seats.

If all you had tuned in for were the last six games of the 2020-21 Duke basketball season, then you would probably be wondering right about now why Mark Williams has yet to declare for the 2021 NBA Draft.

Across those half-dozen contests, the 7-foot, 245-pound freshman center averaged 16.7 points, 7.8 rebounds, 1.7 blocks, and 1.5 steals in 28.0 minutes per game for the Blue Devils while shooting 74.6 percent from the field. In other words, Williams essentially put up All-ACC numbers during that final stretch.

In fact, at the time of Duke’s positive COVID-19 test, which effectively ended the discouraging 13-11 campaign on March 11 despite a 2-0 record in the ACC Tournament, Williams was the conference’s leader for the month with 74 points and a 77.5 field goal percentage.

It wasn’t just a matter of his production, however. No, some of the excitement surrounding the emergence of Williams was simply a product of the positivity he had shown throughout the season, even when inexplicably residing on the bench during the first half of the season.

Yet another Duke basketball one-and-done?

Needless to say, avid Duke basketball supporters would certainly be heartbroken if Mark Williams was to indeed announce within the next six weeks his decision to bolt for the pro ranks.

Freshman DJ Steward and sophomore Matthew Hurt have already done so, each with the intent to hire an agent. And so too did freshman Jalen Johnson when he packed his bags in mid-February with six games still to go on the schedule.

ALSO READ: The most promising Duke freshman last season

The deadline to declare is not until May 30. And judging solely from the cryptic messages that Mark Williams has been leaving on social media as of late, it’s totally understandable why some folks are only penciling in his name for the time being on next season’s Duke basketball roster.

First, his Instagram Stories on Sunday included the following quote of the day:

"“Allow new beginnings to happen. Let go of what’s holding you back. Flow & let life unfold. Don’t resist the change. Take a leap of faith. You are ready.”"

Granted, Williams regularly posts these daily inspirational messages. Yet pairing that Sunday quote with some extremely vague tweets in recent days, one has to wonder if he is either seriously contemplating a departure or just messing with a fanbase that is borderline neurotic at times.

This was his latest tweet:

That followed Sunday’s doozy, which many people in the comments viewed as Williams getting ready to “roll the dice” on his NBA career:

Then there was this odd one-word tweet out of nowhere late Thursday night:

So what was the question there? Well, we may never know the answer to that.

Tweets aside, though, bear in mind that incoming five-star power forward Paolo Banchero has recently expressed on several occasions his eagerness to man the paint as a Blue Devil alongside Mark Williams.

Nevertheless, the waiting game — for either his stay-or-go decision or more of his indecipherable notes — continues for now…