Gonzaga’s Blake Harper Thriving at Howard; Will He Stay?

[DCSportsFan.com]

Any freshman playing his first college basketball game is likely to be slightly wide-eyed. Howard’s Blake Harper was no different, and he had the fortune (or curse, depending how you look at it) of making that collegiate debut at Kansas’s Allen Fieldhouse, one of the sport’s iconic venues.

Harper started for Howard, a near-miraculous tale on its own considering where he had been a few months before, but his first half was unremarkable. He cut backdoor for a reverse layup less than a minute in but missed it, the shot impacted by Kansas All-American Hunter Dickinson, then had another floater later in the half blocked by Dickinson. He entered the locker room scoreless, his team getting blown out 46–19.

Dickinson is nearly five years older than Harper, but the two share a connection from growing up in the talent-rich Washington, D.C., metropolitan area and even attending the same middle school. Coming out of halftime, the Jayhawks star gave an admittedly nervous Harper a few words of praise, encouraging him to shoot the ball and have confidence in himself. And shoot he did: Harper fired away in the second half and scored 16 points, drilling corner threes and even finishing a tough and-one bucket over the outstretched arms of Dickinson.

Read more here: https://www.si.com/college-basketball/inside-look-at-life-as-one-of-the-most-tampered-with-players-in-college-basketball?fbclid=IwZXh0bgNhZW0CMTEAAR1my-kCzT-XNvSH56qOq5M-YyaauOStHFLoorCQLSQ4TFtpmaJ4G3PY5Yw_aem_my_eIFE2NpNuabLEYp-Jnw

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