Former Duke forward Mason Plumlee familiar with Sixers
CHICAGO – Duke power forward Mason Plumlee says he's paid close attention to the 76ers the past two seasons.
A lot of it had to do with former Sixers coach Doug Collins, whose son Chris was Duke's associate head coach before nabbing the head job at Northwestern in March.
"I like Doug Collins a lot," Plumlee said Thursday here at the NBA draft combine. "I was friends with him."
Now, the post-Collins Sixers are among the franchises he's eager to impress. The 6-foot-11, 245-pounder said Thursday that he'll interview with the Sixers at the combine. He also has a workout planned with them leading up to the draft.
The Sixers will likely get the 11th pick in the NBA draft. Draft Express projects the 23-year-old will go 13th (likely to Dallas). Meanwhile, NBADraft.net believes he'll go 15th (likely to Milwaukee).
But Plumlee considers himself a Top 10 pick.
"I feel like athletically and how I played this year, I've proven that I am," he said. "But that's what's great about the workouts. You get another platform to prove it, again."
And on Thursday, he proved just how familiar he is with the Sixers.
"They had such a tough season, because they gave up [Andre] Iguodala, they gave up [Nik] Vucevic, the kid that went to Orlando," he said, "and they got nothing in return, and are expecting the same result. It was a tough season.
"But I really like Jrue Holiday a lot. I think they have a lot of really good players there."
Plumlee, Indiana's Cody Zeller and Syracuse's Michael Carter-Williams elected not to participate in Thursday's drills.