Porter leaving Georgetown for NBA

What may have been the worst-kept secret in Southeast Missouri and the greater Washington D.C. area is now a reality.

Otto Porter Jr. is leaving Georgetown after his sophomore season and declaring himself eligible for the NBA draft.

"The toughest part was knowing you're going to leave a great place like this," Porter said on Monday at a news conference on campus alongside Hoyas coach John Thompson III. "I love this place."

Porter, a native of Morley, Mo., who led Scott County Central to three consecutive Class 1 state basketball championships from 2009 to 2011, recently was named the Big East player of the year and finished second in the voting behind Michigan's Trey Burke as The Associated Press player of the year.

Helping a team that was unranked in the preseason reach as high as No. 5 in the AP poll, Porter averaged 16.2 points and 7.5 rebounds, both highs for Georgetown.

The Hoyas were a No. 2 seed in the NCAA tournament, but lost their opening game to Florida Gulf Coast University and finished 25-7.

"I talked to him my last time that I was down on break," said Dominique Porter, a cousin and former teammate at SCC who now is a freshman at Culver-Stockton College in Canton, Mo., on Monday afternoon. "I think it was about two weeks ago after they lost to Florida Gulf Coast. ... Everybody's excited, but he kind of already had mentioned it to his family that he was going to go ahead and go, so it was no surprise to me that he was going to go ahead and go to the NBA.

"He was telling us the story about how after they lost to Florida Gulf Coast, he said that he kind of just didn't feel that he could do any more, that he was ready to go to the NBA."

The 6-foot-8 Porter was Georgetown's sixth All-America selection and first since Allen Iverson in 1996. He also was a finalist for the John R. Wooden Award.

He is widely seen as a likely lottery pick in June's NBA draft -- and perhaps a top-five selection. Chad Ford of ESPN.com has Porter ranked as the fourth-best player available in the draft [www.espn.go.com/nba/draft].

"He said that he was just ready to take the next step and try to make himself better," Dominique Porter said. "That's a big opportunity to step up. Many people don't get to experience going to the professional level."

It's Porter's all-around game that impresses, with an ability to score inside or from beyond the 3-point arc, to rebound, to set up teammates and play defense.

"Whatever they ask him to do, he's going to be able to do," Thompson said.

Porter's breakout performance -- the one that put him on a national radar -- came on the road against Big East rival Syracuse on Feb. 23. Porter produced 33 points, eight rebounds, five steals and hit five 3-pointers while playing all 40 minutes in a Hoyas victory.

After Porter had 10 points, eight rebounds and seven assists when Georgetown beat Syracuse again on March 9, Syracuse coach Jim Boeheim declared Porter ought to be the No. 1 overall pick in the next NBA draft.

Now everyone will get a chance to find out where NBA teams think Porter stands.

"On draft night, we don't expect him to be sitting around too long," Thompson said.

Dominique Porter said his cousin's rapid rise from high school phenom to college player to pro prospect was no surprise.

"He puts in the work," Dominique Porter said. "He's in the gym day in and day out. I mean, he puts in the work and it pays off in the long run. With him going to Georgetown and having a good season last year coming in as a sixth man and then being the big man on campus this year, I wasn't surprised that he was going to be able to go to the NBA."

And as for where he'd like to see his cousin playing next year?

"Honestly, I really don't care," Dominique Porter said. "Either way, I'm proud of him. If he played at the same college or if he went to the NBA, either way I was going to be proud of him. But as far as the team goes, no. I just hope he goes to a team where he can get playing time. That's kind of what he told me, too -- that his intentions were that he wanted to go to a team where he could kind of make a name for himself, rather than going to a team like the Heat or the Lakers or somewhere like that."

The NBA draft will be June 27.

The Associated Press contributed to this story.