The House Settlement supposedly eliminated walk-ons, but the concept is still there. Nick Arnold announced his commitment to Duke yesterday, but he is referring to himself as a preferred walk-on. The concept endures, even if the language has been memory-holed.
So the powers-that-be hope, anyway.
Here is a longer article that gives some insights into Arnold and what drew Duke to him, and vice-versa.
There’s always a chance he could be a new-age Wojo or a Jose Alvarado, a guy who just plays so hard that
he forces himself into the rotation.
And that’s apparently what sold Duke on him.
Jon Scheyer’s roster building really is meticulous. He starts with great high school talent, supplements it with transfers who fill specific rotational needs, then goes out and finds practice players who are not fooling around. Those guys are happy to be in a Duke uniform, and they generally share two other traits: they’re fiercely competitive, and they’re smart.
Look at some of the transfers Scheyer has brought in and where they’ve come from:
- Ryan Young, Northwestern
- Kale Catchings, Harvard
- Max Johns, Princeton
- Neal Begovich, Stanford
- Cameron Sheffield, Rice
- Ifeanyi Ufochukwu, Rice
- Jack Scott, Princeton
There’s a bit of a pattern there, no?
Obviously, Arnold is coming from high school, but he’s academically oriented as well.
We’re not going to bet that he’s going to emerge as a neo-Wojo or that he’ll go as far as Alvarado has gone, but how about this as a prediction: there will come a time when Duke, for whatever reason, is struggling, and he gets in for five minutes and has a Rudy game.
We don’t remember the game, but this is exactly what happened with former Blue Devil Antonio Vrankovic: there was one game where he was needed, and without him, Duke would have lost.
Can we imagine that happening with Arnold?
Yes. Yes, we can.
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