Rodney Purvis considering Duke, N.C. State

RALEIGH -- Upper Room Christian Academy's Rodney Purvis, one of the top junior point guard prospects in the country, is no longer committed to Louisville.

The 6-foot-4 guard from Raleigh said Monday that he is most interested in Louisville, Duke, Kentucky and N.C. State. He said he had not had any contact with new N.C. State basketball coach Mark Gottfried.

Purvis said the relationships he builds with the coaches and coaching staffs of the schools was going to be a big factor in his decision.

"To me, that is a really big factor," Purvis said.

Purvis was getting college recruiting attention from all over the country before he made a verbal commitment to the Cardinals in December. The commitment was not binding on him or the school, and he decided this past weekend that he wanted to reevaluate after Louisville assistant Tim Fuller, who had handled much of his recruitment, left the program to join new Missouri coach Frank Haith's staff. Haith was on the Wake Forest staff when Fuller played there.

"I had built a very good relationship with Coach Fuller during the recruiting process," Purvis said. "With the coaching changes at Louisville, I was going to have to start building new relationships with the staff.

"My family and I talked it over and decided that if I was starting to build a new relationship that I should consider other schools as well."

Purvis is known nationally for his Twitter account. He has almost 6,000 followers on the social network and has sent out close to 12,000 messages in the past year.

Nevertheless, he said he was hurt and disappointed by some of the negative comments made to him on Monday about his decision to open his recruitment.

"I kind of knew what to expect," he said. "But it hurt."

Purvis averaged 25.4 points per game on a 17-8 Upper Room team that was made up primarily of sophomores and freshmen.

Upper Room coach Avie Lester said Purvis "emphasized to me that he has never said that he would not go to Louisville."

"He committed very early and just wants some time to look at other opportunities," Lester said. "I've told him from the start that he needs to do what feels right to him. He is the one that will be sitting in the classrooms and going to practices. He needs to make the best decision that he can."

Lester added, "He wants to make sure he is doing the best thing for him and his family. He is an unusual kid. He is very family-oriented. It is important to him that he feel comfortable."