According to multiple reports, Georgetown forward Otto Porter Jr. will announce his intention to leave school early and enter his name for the 2013 NBA Draft this afternoon at McDonough Gymnasium.

“I mean it was hard,” Porter said in his opening statement. “It was a tough decision. I love Georgetown.  I love my coaches.  I love my teammates.  I would like to come back and finish my degree [at some point].”

With head coach John Thompson III by his side, the sophomore is expected to announce what many draft experts have been speculating for some time now, as the versatile forward is projected to fall in the top-10 of the draft. If he decides to sign with an agent, he automatically forgoes his final two years of collegiate eligibility. CBS Sports’s Jeff Goodman was the first to report his decision.

“I think he is ready as much mentally, emotionally, as it relates to basketball,” Thompson said. “I thought he went about the process in an educated manner.  He didn’t make a rushed decision one way or the other.  He had two good choices.  It is a process.  He is prepared.”

Porter’s stock escalated rapidly this past season, since he started off as a probable lottery pick and is now firmly entrenched near the top five selections this June.  He raised his play over the course of the year and has been deemed an ideal NBA small forward for his versatility.

“A lot of people come into this, young players, with the attitude that they will leave as soon as possible,” Thompson said. “They walk in the door thinking about walking out the door.  That has never been the case with him.”

“What has been consistent with him and what he will take with him to the NBA, and once those days are over, is his caring, his work ethic, his commitment to what he is a part of,” Thompson said. “He is completely committed to this institution, to our program, to our team.”

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Last night at the NBA Draft at WaMu Theater in New York City, DaJuan Summers was selected with the 35th overall pick by the Detroit Pistons.

The Baltimore Sun quotes Summers as saying, “”I’m very excited. That’s where I wanted to go. Didn’t think I’d go in the second round, thought it was the first. I told [Detroit president of basketball operations] Joe Dumars I wanted to be a Piston.”

In many mocks drafts, Summers was projected to be a first round pick. By falling to the second round, Summers is no longer guaranteed a professional contract. He will have to impress the Pistons enough to get them to sign him. Casual Hoya quotes ESPN’s Chad Ford as saying the Pistons considered Summers for the 15th pick and were more than happy when he fell to 35.

Even though Summers will probably donning the Detroit red and blue next season, one can’t help to question his decision. As Patrick Stevens of the Washington Times put it, “Any time an underclassmen falls out of the first round, there have to be questions about the decision to bolt school.”

Summers played three years for the Hoyas and averaged 13.6 points per game and 4.1 rebounds per game in his final year.

Summers’ selection marks the third straight year a Hoya was selected in the draft. Last year, both Roy Hibbert (Indiana Pacers) and Patrick Ewing, Jr. (Sacramento Kings) were selected and in 2007, Jeff Green was picked by the Oklahoma City Thunder (then the Seattle Supersonics).

Say it ain’t so!

Though he declared his intentions to stay at Georgetown just over a month ago, DaJuan Summers seems to have changed his mind. John Thompson III announced today that the junior forward will be leaving Georgetown before his senior year to enter the NBA draft, saying:

“We wish DaJuan all the best in his future endeavors, wherever they may take him”, said Coach Thompson. “He informed me that he is closing the book on his college career and focusing fully on the opportunity to play professionally. He is in the process of choosing an agent.”

Once Summers hires an agent he will not be allowed to remove his name from the draft and return to play NCAA basketball.

Summers came to Georgetown as a highly-touted recruit out of Baltimore and was an immediate contributor on the 2007 Final Four team. He developed into one of the Hoyas’ top offensive weapons, leading the team in scoring this season with 13.6 points per game.

Overall, this season may have been as disappointing for Summers as it was for the Hoyas. After being placed on the preseason watch list for the Wooden Player of the Year Award, he saw his production taper off during the Hoyas’ slide. Once considered a potential lottery pick, ESPN’s Chad Ford is now predicting that Summers will be “squarely on the first round bubble” of the draft.

While Roy Hibbert is packed off to Toronto (or was it Indiana?) and Patrick Ewing Jr. joining Sacramento, let’s remember the Georgetown basketball players who weren’t so lucky.

Lee Scruggs from the class of 2001 is one of them. Trying to finagle an NBA career by playing abroad, he ended up dodging bullets in Venezuela:

“I was staying in a run-down hotel with just a mattress on the floor. There were chickens running around the hotel. It was bad,” he recalled.

“I do believe during the time I went there, that there was a civil war going on in Venezuela. There were militants riding around in Jeeps with guns. It was bad. I stayed there about two weeks and me and another American guy, we snuck out in the middle of the night, got our own plane tickets and came home.

Despite his derring-do in the pursuit of basketball fame, Scrugg’s is currently playing for the Edmonton Chill. If he can’t into the NBA, he says he plans on becoming a real estate agent.

Basically, Scruggs’s is Will Ferrell in Semi-Pro, but with more pathos.

A Georgetown basketball star has been the prize of a Draft Day trade.  The Hoyas’ beloved big man Roy Hibbert, who was pegged to fall somewhere in the early 20′s in the draft, worked his way up to the 17th spot where he was drafted by the Toronto Raptors.

But like Georgetown teammate Jeff Green, who was selected by the Celtics last year only to be traded immediately to Seattle, Hibbert had no chance to imagine a future north of the border before talks of a trade to the Indiana Pacers. Hibbert will join Kansas star Brandon Rush, who was traded to the Pacers via the Portland Trailblazers on Draft Day.

It’s difficult to imagine a long, successful career in the NBA for Hibbert.  His size, passing and solid all-around fundamentals might make him effective, but his athleticism (read: rebounding) is beyond suspect at this point.  Expect to see Big Roy get his two-step hook shot thrown back in his face a few times before he figures out the NBA’s bigger, faster style.

After the jump, Patrick Ewing Jr.’s chances.

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We were all worried there for a minute, but as it turns out, Roy Hibbert’s going to be all right. The big man was picked up by the Toronto Raptors as the 17th pick of the draft, despite a bitchy scout report that Hibbert would “need a parachute on draft day.” According to media, Roy will ultimately end up playing in an Indiana Pacers uniform. This will require some trades, in a process not unlike when a younger you needed a Wartortle card but only had a bent Clefairy.

Patrick Ewing Jr. also scored big, going to the Sacramento Kings as the 43rd pick.

Congratulations, boys. 6 weeks out of college and you already have jobs.

Staying another year at Georgetown is looking like a bad idea for Roy Hibbert’s NBA draft prospects, according to a Washington Times article:

Hibbert was not among the 16 prospects invited to watch the NBA Draft from the green room in Madison Square Garden in New York, and one anonymous NBA scout suggested to the Boston Globe that Hibbert would need a parachute to slow his free fall down the draft board.

JTIII shows up to give the obligatory booster quote, but even he doesn’t sound optimistic. At least the Seattle SuperSonics are supposedly interested in him. Maybe Seattle (and the rest of us) will be treated to another Green-Hibbert match-up.

Update: Things might not be so bad–the Washington Post makes Roy sound like a cool cucumber. Just goes to show you can’t trust the Reverend Moon, not even with basketball.

As Georgetown students prepare to enjoy the game John Thompson III brought them, someone “close to Thompson” is saying he’s looking at a move to the NBA. Terrible news if it were true. But fortunately, it probably isn’t going down for a while, if at all.

The Washington Times reported that the Charlotte Bobcats are making overtures to Thompson, but he said he’s not immediately interested. A blogger on AOL’s campus sports blog points out that it’s a bad idea, for two reasons: JTIII’s best players, Roy Hibbert and Jeff Green, still have another year of playing; and Charlotte’s an awful team.

Here’s another reason for JTIII to stay: the Charlotte logo is terrible. I feel like I’m looking at a Pokemon card, not a reputable team insignia.

Posted by Will Sommer, Staff Writer