Kendall Stephens headed to Nevada
More: ($) Blog on Kendall Stephens' departure
Former Purdue guard Kendall Stephens is transferring to Nevada, GoldandBlack.com has learned.
Stephens will sit out this coming season per NCAA transfer rules, then have one remaining season of eligibility.
The son of former Purdue star Everette Stephens, Stephens averaged 21.5 minutes over his first two seasons, despite playing through assorted injury, and made 137 three-pointers on 37.7-percent shooting and averaged 8.4 points over that time. He started 32 of the 66 games he played in those two seasons.
This season, though, didn't go as planned.
A key contributor for Purdue his freshman and sophomore years, Stephens fell out of the Boilermakers' playing rotation following his return from a three-game leave of absence taken from the team mid-season, taken for personal reasons related to the death of a close friend.
As Coach Matt Painter said often, "it was the best thing for him as a person," but set him back from a basketball perspective. Sophomore Dakota Mathias and freshman Ryan Cline had already impacted Stephens' minutes prior to his leave, before which Stephens had played a career-low nine minutes against Penn State, followed two games later by a new-low five vs. Ohio State.
After returning to the team, Stephens played in only four of the Boilermakers' final 12 games, totaling just 23 minutes, 12 of which came in the Big Ten Tournament blowout of Illinois.
As a transfer, Stephens picked Nevada over San Diego and had also drawn interest from Tulane, UNLV and others.
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