Duke basketball misses out on top-rated center recruit from Indiana
Flory Bidunga, a five-star prospect and one of the top players in the 2024 recruiting class, committed to Kansas on Saturday night in a nationally televised announcement on ESPNU.
The 6-10 Bidunga, from Kokomo, Indiana, selected Kansas over three other finalists that included the Duke Blue Devils, Michigan Wolverines and Auburn Tigers.
Rated the No. 4 player nationally and the top center in the class by various recruiting services, Bidunga visited Duke on June 20 and Kansas on May 13. He made his visit to Auburn last November.
Duke offered Bidunga a scholarship on June 21. Michigan was the most recent team to offer him, doing so on July 17.
Bidunga, last year’s Gatorade Indiana player of the year, cut his list to his final four teams earlier this month.
Anticipating a need on the interior with sophomores Kyle Filipowski and Mark Mitchell likely to head to the NBA after this season, Duke coach Jon Scheyer had hoped Bidunga would help. Instead, he’s heading to the Big 12 Conference to play for coach Bill Self.
Even without Bidunga, Duke has two committed players in its 2024 class in 6-6 small forwards Isaiah Evans from North Mecklenburg High School in Huntersville and Darren Harris from Paul VI High School in Fairfax, Virginia.
The Blue Devils are also going hard after 6-8 superstar Cooper Flagg, the top player in the 2024 class who announced plans to reclassify from the 2025 class on Friday. Flagg made an unofficial visit to Duke’s campus on Aug. 1.
This story was originally published August 12, 2023 at 10:20 PM.