NEW YORK — Austin Rivers is “definitely” considering Duke even though he has verbally committed to Florida, according to his father, Celtics coach Doc Rivers.
“He definitely is,” Doc said before Boston met the Knicks Sunday at Madison Square Garden. “It may be 50/50 given the day. One day he’s one way, the other day he’s the other. The great thing he has is he’s a junior and he can wait and see what both schools do and then make a decision from there.”
Austin is a 6-foot-3, 175-pound shooting guard out of Winter Park (Fla.) High who verbally committed to Florida in July of 2008 following his freshman season. He is ranked No. 2 at his position in the Class of 2011.
Doc has encouraged Austin to consider other schools and Austin took an unofficial visit to Duke in September and Blue Devils coach Mike Krzyzewski visited Winter Park later that same month.
“I didn’t tell him that I wanted him to look at other schools, I just wanted him to visit schools, just to see. And he did that,” Doc said.
“He had been doing that mentally anyway, if you want to be honest.”
Doc said Austin would wait and see how both teams do this season and who they would add. Duke has picked up 2010 point guards Kyrie Irving and Tyler Thornton and power forward Josh Hairston while Florida has commitments from 2010 small forward Casey Prather and center Patric Young. The Gators are trying to land Brandon Knight, a point guard from Fort Lauderdale Pine Crest ranked No. 1 overall in the Class of 2010.
“The good thing is he can wait and see,” Doc said of Austin. “He’s probably right in between [Florida and Duke].”
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