It was the second question posed to Donte Greene by the group of media around his corner locker.

‘Are you going to the NBA?’ a reporter asked.

‘I don’t know yet.’

‘Is that the last collegiate play from Donte Greene?’ another chimed in.

‘I don’t know.’

Greene repeatedly buried his face into the light blue towel he held. He knew, eventually, these questions would come. He knew, sometime, his freshman season had to end.

But not like that. Not with the ball in his hands, Syracuse down one, having blown a 22-point, second-half lead. Not with Massachusetts’ Dante Milligan blocking Greene’s final shot of his freshman season in an unthinkable 81-77 defeat to the Minutemen in the quarterfinals of the NIT.

No, not this way.

‘I’m not making any decisions right now, especially after a loss like this,’ Greene said.

Ultimately, a decision will have to come by April 27. That’s the NBA’s early-entry deadline to be eligible for this year’s draft. And Greene, who averaged 17.7 points per game, the second most by a freshman in Syracuse history behind only Carmelo Anthony, will evaluate his options in the coming 33 days.

Of course, even if Greene decides to enter early before April 27, he has until June 16 to withdraw his name from the draft, provided he hasn’t hired an agent.

But until then, let the speculation begin.

‘Sometimes you have to do what’s best for yourself,’ Greene said. ‘So we’ll sit down, weigh my options and see how it’s looking.’

If anything, Tuesday’s game will weigh heavily in Greene’s mind. He scored 18 points on 6-of-14 shooting, but floundered when SU needed scoring the most. He had seven second-half points, but missed three crucial free throws in the game’s final 1:36.

And then there was the last shot he took. Out of a Syracuse timeout with the Orange trailing UMass, 78-77, with 25.8 seconds remaining, SU head coach Jim Boeheim drew the play up for Greene to drive to the basket.

Greene said he saw a hole in the defense and thought he had a fine look at the hoop.

‘I saw an open layup. I got past my guy, went up, trying to draw a foul and get an and-one,’ Greene said. ‘Sometimes the ref doesn’t see it how you see it.’

‘We wanted him to go to the basket,’ Boeheim said. ‘He just didn’t get a good angle on it.’

A quiet Greene couldn’t explain the collapse or his failures at the end of the game. The talk turned, predictably, to his looming decision. Greene will attend the final team meeting of the season today and then go home this weekend to be with his family in Baltimore. He’ll listen to those close to him, including Boeheim and his SU teammates.

Greene said he didn’t plan on calling his friend Anthony, the former Syracuse star and Baltimore native, who went one-and-done after leading SU to the national championship in 2003.

At Madison Square Garden following the Orange’s first-round defeat to Villanova in the Big East tournament, Greene told The New York Times he would return to Syracuse if he wasn’t a top five pick.

He did not echo that Tuesday.

‘Possibly. You never know,’ he said. ‘It depends who likes who, or whatever.’

Paul Harris jokingly said he’ll constantly be around Greene, letting him know how much Syracuse would benefit from another year of the 6-foot-11 phenom.

‘I think it will weigh on him,’ fellow freshman Jonny Flynn said. ‘As a basketball player you always want to be known as a winner. Leaving like that, never playing in an NCAA game, you’ve got to ask your friends – he’s friends with Eric Gordon and other freshmen, they’ve been there. … Hopefully he’ll come back, but it’s up to him and his family.’

Now Greene will decide whether or not he wants to atone for his freshman season, which he called ‘very disappointing,’ or if Tuesday’s defeat, which capped the worst win-loss record at Syracuse in 39 years, is the legacy left behind him at SU.

‘Personally, I could have helped the team out a lot more,’ Greene said. ‘I could have gotten us a lot farther. But you know, there’s always next year.’

Maybe.

magelb@syr.edu

Published on March 25, 2008 at 12:00 pm