Butler vs. Indiana at Bankers Life Fieldhouse, 3:45 p.m. Saturday, CBS

INDIANAPOLIS – Jordan Tucker’s father has been an agent for athletes and music artists. He has been around glitz and glamour all of his life.

Butler basketball is the antithesis of that. That is perhaps why Tucker ended up as a Bulldog.

“Maybe the first time around, I wouldn’t choose Butler, to be honest with you,” he said.

The one-time Indiana University target chose Duke, or rather Duke chose him. It was late in the recruiting process, and Tucker accepted Duke’s offer. It was a dream school. Why not go to his dream school?

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There were reasons. We’ll get to those.

“I had a lot of maturing to do,” he acknowledged.

For now, Tucker is excited to play college basketball, beginning with Saturday’s game against Indiana at the Crossroads Classic. It is the first game for which he is eligible following a midyear transfer.

He has the highest high school ranking of anyone ever to represent Butler. He is neither afterthought, as he was at Duke, nor savior.

He is a 6-7, 215-pound forward who can shoot the 3-pointer and rebound. He cannot be Kelan Martin, although watching Martin blossom as an All-Big East player influenced Tucker’s destination.

Where Tucker fits will play itself out, Butler coach LaVall Jordan said. After all, 11 months is time for teammates to learn Tucker’s game and for him to learn Butler’s.

“I don’t worry about it as much because of the guys we have in the locker room,” Jordan said. “He’s finding his way.”

Growing up, Tucker found himself in the world of entertainment and sports business. He was a child model from ages 6 to 12. In his one semester at Duke, he was asked for autographs and photographs by other students. Around campus, players “felt like rock stars,” he said.

He is the son of Lewis Tucker, a native New Yorker who played basketball at Tuskegee University. The father was once president of hip hop artist Diddy’s Sean Combs Enterprises. Diddy’s son, Christian Combs, and Jordan were born a day apart and grew up together in White Plains, N.Y. Lewis Tucker was also an executive at Uptown Records and Universal Music Group. Jordan’s godfather is Dwight “Heavy D” Myers, a hip hop artist and producer.

Lewis Tucker became a sports agent representing NBA players such as Ben Gordon, C.J. Miles, Charlie Villanueva and Daniel Gibson. The son met superstars such as Michael Jordan and LeBron James.

The father said his son has had the advantage of “just seeing what goes into it, the amount of work you have to put in” to make it in the NBA.

“He’s a very focused individual,” Lewis Tucker said of his son. “He takes his craft very seriously.”

Jordan Tucker is a self-described basketball junkie. Even though he tried football and could have done other sports as a child, he had no interest. By third grade, he was playing AAU.

When it comes to basketball, he practices it, studies it, watches it, tweets it. He was going to play intramural ball at Butler but, for reasons of safety and rules, did not do so. Instead, he became coach of a team.

He played as a freshman at White Plains High School before transferring to Archbishop Stepinac, where he averaged 15.6 points as a sophomore and 17.8 as a junior. In a one-point loss, he had 38 points, 10 rebounds and five assists.

Tucker’s father relocated to Atlanta in 2016. Jordan transferred to Wheeler, a high school in Marietta, Ga., whose six NBA alumni include Jaylen Brown of the Boston Celtics. Wheeler was ranked No. 2 in the nation in preseason but faded to a 22-6 record.

Villanova was the first major program to offer Tucker a scholarship, in his freshman year, and retained interest until Tucker finally looked elsewhere. He said he was leaning toward Indiana before Tom Crean was fired, then considered Syracuse and Georgia Tech.

Tucker, ranked 42nd by ESPN, was a late addition to a Duke class that had four top-10 prospects: Marvin Bagley III, Wendell Carter, Trevon Duval and Gary Trent Jr. All but Duvall were selected in the 2018 NBA draft, as was Grayson Allen of Duke. In the 2019 draft, Duke’s Zion Williamson, R.J. Barrett and Cameron Reddish are projected to go 1-2-3.

Where are the minutes? There were not enough for Tucker, who played 14 minutes in two games and totaled six points.

Tucker said it was the first time he had confronted such adversity since fourth grade. Always before, he had been “The Man,” he said. At Duke, he was nobody. It was a long four months, he said.

“Experiencing that really helped me a lot, let me step back and re-evaluate everything,” he said. “I kinda questioned myself as far as confidence-wise. Me leaving Duke was more of like me going to find myself somewhere rather than staying. Because I wanted to tough it out.”

He said practices at Duke were harder than games, that there was a lot of pressure and that “everyone has their own agenda.” He did not fault coach Mike Krzyzewski or any teammates.

“It was just too much at one time,” Tucker said. “I thought I could handle it.”

Without specifying, he said “bad habits” from high school that he used to overcome with talent were harming him. His father said Coach K was good for his son, but that the situation at Duke was not right.

LaVall Jordan reached out to the Tucker family, and the father remembered the Butler coach from years spent at Michigan developing future NBA players. Jordan Tucker, who did not want to leave the East Coast, was visiting Georgetown while deliberating on where to transfer.

He ruled out Ohio State (enrollment too big) and Gonzaga (too far away). His father persuaded him to look at Butler, and Tucker saw Kelan Martin score 37 points in a 94-83 win over Marquette on Jan. 12.

Two days later, Tucker committed. He could play in the Big East. He could develop his skills. After conferring with his father, he said, Butler made the most sense.

“When I came to Butler, my biggest thing was listening and being on time,” he said. “Doing everything. Handling my business. Little things. Because that’s what’s going to carry over to the court, not my talent. The more positive I’m doing off the court, the better it’s going to carry on the court.”

Days after committing to Butler, he traveled to Chicago with a team manager so he could cheer his new teammates in a game against DePaul.

Tucker said he developed rapport with not only the head coach, but all the Butler assistants. Peers have told him they don’t have relationships with all their coaches. He embraced new strength training, adding muscle and losing fat.

Butler senior Paul Jorgensen knew Tucker because both are New Yorkers.

“He’s a good dude, funny guy, hard worker,” Jorgensen said. “He’s going to bring a lot to our team, a lot to Butler. I think people are really going to love him.”

Tucker has not played a meaningful minute in 21 months. Doing so in front of a national TV audience on one of the biggest stages where the Bulldogs perform might unnerve someone else.

Never mind the glitz. Tucker has lived through all that.

“When in doubt,” he said, “just play basketball.”

Contact IndyStar reporter David Woods at david.woods@indystar.com or call 317-444-6195. Follow him on Twitter: @DavidWoods007.

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