A scrum of reporters surrounded Michael Porter Jr. in a corner here at the Omni Hotel. The Missouri freshman commanded perhaps the greatest audience of any player at SEC Tipoff.
And in the opposite corner, his teammate appeared almost unnoticed.
“Michael is who he is,” forward Kevin Puryear, a Blue Springs South graduate, said during the 30 minutes he fielded questions, most of which were about Porter Jr. and the rest of Missouri’s talented freshman class. “I’ve accepted it by now. I’m not mad or jealous or anything.”
Puryear, a junior, has been Mizzou’s star basketball player.