Social distancing and a world-wide cancellation of sports hasn’t stopped the transfer market in college basketball from spinning on, and on Wednesday afternoon Creighton plucked a lengthy sharpshooter out of the portal.
Alex O’Connell, a 6-foot-6 senior-to-be, announced via Twitter that he would be moving to Omaha for his final season at the collegiate level. O’Connell was ranked 55th overall by Rivals.com out of high school in Milton, Georgia. After signing to play at Duke and donning the same uniform his father, David, wore in the mid-70s, the former four-star prospect spent his first three seasons in Durham, but only started in 14 of the 101 games he played in and saw his shooting percentages dip each season with the Blue Devils. He averaged 3.3 points and shot 48.9% from 3 as a freshman, 4.4 points on 37.5% shooting from 3 as a sophomore, and 5.2 points on 27.3 shooting from 3 as a junior.
He entered the transfer portal on March 21, and despite only being able to get a look at Creighton through a Zoom conference call, O’Connell was impressed with several aspects of the presentation along with a few things he looked into on his own.
“With the virus I couldn’t really go anywhere or see any of the places that I wanted to see,” O’Connell said over the phone. “I knew that I wouldn’t be able to visit the campus, so I just took an in-depth look at each team’s roster and asked questions about who was going to be there next year and the year after that. I based a lot of my choice off relationship and trust with [Creighton head coach Greg McDermott] and the strength and conditioning component. I wanted to be somewhere where that is a big thing, because that’s going to be a big part of my development.”
Though he won’t have a chance to actually step foot in the weight room located right inside Creighton’s nearly 6-year-old Championship Center, O’Connell raved about the presentation put together by first-year strength and conditioning coach Jeremy Anderson.
“That was something that really caught my eye,” O’Connell said. “He’s definitely very professional at what he does. He knows a lot of people in the NBA and he’s done NBA strength and conditioning. He has a scientific approach to it, which I think is pretty popular and often used nowadays. He did a great job with the presentation and he broke down a lot of stuff. He had a very detailed power point on everything. It was a very intriguing approach to my body, and it was one of the things that led me to Creighton.”
O’Connell still has an unused redshirt season in his pocket, and his intention at this time is to use it for the upcoming 2020-21 season in order to develop his skill set and his body, as well as get acclimated to Creighton’s pace and space system. Even with the possibility that the NCAA will soon approve a new rule that allows transfers to be immediately eligible at their new school, O’Connell has his mind set on utilizing the upcoming season as a developmental year.
“I’m totally committed to sitting out,” he said. “I’ve been seeing reports that even if the NCAA passes the new rule it won’t go into effect until 2021-22, so my mind is fully set on sitting out — I’m totally ok with that.”
Next season, the Bluejays are expected to return their top six contributors, including all five starters, from a team that finished 24-7 overall and earned a share of their first Big East regular season title with a 13-5 mark in league play. With O’Connell’s addition, Creighton currently has two open scholarships remaining after losing Jordan Scurry and Kelvin Jones to graduation, and Davion Mintz and Jalen Windham to the transfer portal.
Some additional Alex O’Connell highlights