Kansas basketball coach Bill Self reflects on season, Gonzaga loss
Check out what Kansas basketball coach Bill Self had to say recently after the Jayhawks’ season ended with a NCAA tournament loss against Gonzaga.
LAWRENCE — Johnny Furphy entered the week of the 2024 NBA draft as someone many expected to be selected Wednesday during the first round.
Maybe Furphy, a freshman guard with Kansas basketball this past season, would be selected in the picks just after the lottery. Maybe Furphy, whose size, athleticism and 3-point shooting ability made him an intriguing prospect, would be selected somewhere in the 20s. Regardless, the Jayhawks standout from Melbourne, Australia didn’t seem to be in a situation where he would drop past 30 and into the second round.
Furphy did, though, have to wait until the second round on Thursday to hear his name called with the 35th overall selection. Through a trade between the San Antonio Spurs and Indiana Pacers, he’s going to start his NBA career with Indiana. But while KU head coach Bill Self said Thursday in a KU release that Wednesday was a “tough and humbling night for Johnny,” that adversity didn’t keep Furphy from landing with an organization he can enjoy success with.
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“The anticipation of being in the Green Room and the assurance that he and his representation had been told that he would be drafted didn’t turn out that way,” Self said in the KU release. “It was a tough night and I thought Johnny handled it very maturely and very well, but it was not easy for he or his family. For him to come back, get drafted and find out he is traded to the Pacers is great. It’s an up-and-coming franchise. They’ve got really good players. I spoke with them (the Pacers) this morning and they were very excited about Johnny. They ended up trading up a pick to get him.”
Self continued: “I’m excited for Johnny. I think they will do a great job in developing him. Johnny knows that he needs time to improve his strength for the NBA game. I think it’s a good landing place for him.”
Furphy emerged as a Big 12 Conference all-freshman honoree, and All-Big 12 honorable mention honoree, during his lone season in college at Kansas. Despite coming off the bench for the most part during the early stages of his time with the Jayhawks, he emerged as a starter for a team with aspirations for conference and national success. Despite KU not reaching those goals as a team, his rise caught the attention of many and catapulted him into the NBA draft conversation.
Furphy ended up starting 19 of his 33 appearances at Kansas and averaging 24.1 minutes per game. He also averaged 9.0 points, 4.9 rebounds and one assist per game, while shooting 46.6% from the field, 35.2% from behind the arc and 76.5% from the free-throw line. He garnered a lot of attention for how he played during a regular season win at home against eventual national champion UConn and added a number of high-profile Big 12 performances after that.
Furphy told ESPN Australia he knew there were some teams interested in moving up Thursday to draft him, but noted as well it didn’t hadn’t sunk in yet that his dream had come true. He’s excited to be on a roster with the likes of Indiana stars Tyrese Haliburton and Pascal Siakam, and the more he talks and thinks about it the more he considers it a perfect situation. Furphy believes he has a high ceiling as a talent, and is excited to see how a NBA locker room and weight room help him develop his body and overall game.
“It was pretty crazy,” Furphy said about receiving a phone call from Indiana head coach Rick Carlisle. “He gave me a call, just congratulated me. He’s very excited. Yeah, he’s very excited with kind of the way that I’ll be able to fit in with their play style — very, kind of, yeah, exciting team dynamic. He said, yeah, it’s going to be — we can’t wait to get to work. … I’m going to be coached hard, which is good.”
Jordan Guskey covers University of Kansas Athletics at The Topeka Capital-Journal. He is the National Sports Media Association’s sportswriter of the year for the state of Kansas for 2022. Contact him at jmguskey@gannett.com or on Twitter at @JordanGuskey.