Duke basketball quietly lands 5-star prospect in boost to recruiting class

The Duke basketball program quietly landed another 5-star prospect. 

There are typically hints when a high school prospect is going to announce his commitment but Kon Knueppel left everybody in the dark except the Duke basketball program.

Knueppel announced on social media Thursday night that he will be playing for the Blue Devils next season and his decision took many people by surprise.

“The Brotherhood just got bigger,” he said on Twitter.

There was an expectation that 6-foot-5 small forward would announce his decision at sometime this week after taking visits to Virginia and Duke over the weekend with Wisconsin and Marquette also firmly in the mix to try and keep the 5-star talent home.

However, the timing of the decision from Knueppel even took the recruiting experts by surprise as many did not post about the latest Blue Devil commitment until nearly 10 minutes after the initial tweet — a lifetime in terms of posting breaking news on social media.

ALSO READ: Countdown to Craziness lands another huge visitor

Kon Knueppel ranks as the No. 15 player in the 247Sports Composite rankings and the top player in the state of Wisconsin as his involvement with Duke progressed quickly after Jon Scheyer extended an offer on July 2.

Widely regarded as one of the best shooters in high school basketball, Knueppel led the Nike EYBL circuit in scoring this summer with 22.5 points per game and made an incredible 46.7-percent of his attempts from 3-point range.

Revisiting where Duke basketball stands with other top prospects

He now joins 5-star forward Isaiah Evans and 4-star guard Darren Harris in the 2024 recruiting class for Duke, which jumped to No. 2 in the country.

Harris was the Most Valuable Player of the Nike EYBL Peach Jam this summer and is also considered to be an elite shooter in this recruiting class.

The Blue Devils now have three Top-50 players committed in 2024, the only program to have that many top players verbally pledged at this moment.

ALSO READ: Cooper Flagg expected to see Duke on UConn visit

Duke also remains heavily involved with top ranked recruit Cooper Flagg, who begins an official visit to UConn this weekend, as well as 5-star center Patrick Ngongba II.

Dylan Harper, the No. 2 player in the 2024 class, has the Blue Devils in his Top-5 but it has looked increasingly unlikely for months that he will land in Durham.