John Hugley's 1,000-Point Journey Comes Full Circle at Duquesne
By: Joe Smeltzer
John Hugley IV probably once envisoned scoring 1,000 points for a college basketball team in the city of Pittsburgh, and he got there, but not in the way he would have thought.
In the winter of 2020, Hugley started his college career at Pitt, where he played his first three seasons.
His experience at Pitt had some highs (14.8 points and 7.9 rebounds per game in 2021-22) and some lows (a suspension that ended his freshman season and a knee injury/mental health issues, which led to him stepping away from basketball during his junior year).
“I want nothing more than to be on the court with my teammates,” Hugley wrote on Twitter, announcing his decision. “However, due to an injury and my mental health being a priority, after long discussions and talks with my coaches, family and mentors I have decided the best course of action will be for me to sit out the remainder of the season to fully invest in healing mentally as well as physically.”
But Hugley kept plugging away. He spent the 2023-24 season at Oklahoma and the next season at Xavier, and then, this spring, he decided to come back to Pittsburgh, but this time, to play at Duquesne.
So far, it’s worked out.
The 6-foot-11 super senior is second on the team in scoring (15.9 PPG) and leads the Dukes in rebounding 6.1 RPG.
Against Stony Brook, he had one of his best performances as a Duke, ending Saturday’s 84-75 win with 25 points and five rebounds.
In the first half, Hugley reached the 1,000 point milestone, but in the postgame press conference, he deflected the credit.
“I just want to give a special thanks to my teammates and my coaches for believing in me and trusting in me and calling plays for me to go score the ball,” Hugley said. “So I just want to give special thanks to them. I don’t know who threw me the assist, but shout him out, whoever did.”
Duquesne coach Dru Joyce III has only been Hugley’s coach for eight months, but the significance of the moment wasn’t lost on him.
“Any time you reach a milestone of a thousand points in your college career, it’s an accolade that shouldn’t be just looked over, right? It comes with a testament of hard work and consistency,’ Joyce said. “Not everyone knows how to put the ball in the basket, even though they know how to play basketball. Some guys do it better than others, and John has sharpened his skillset from his time back in high school and continued to get better and improve his game year after year. It’s a testament to being in the gym, to loving the game, and hard work.
Hugley has been playing college basketball for a long time, so games like the one he had several days before Stony Brook don’t discourage him for long.
In a home loss to William & Mary, Hugley played 17 minutes, scored two points, and both of those points were from the free throw line.
A younger player might have been shaken.
But Hugley wasn’t.
“This is a long season,” he said. “I’ve been in college for six years now. Every game is not going to be a good game. So, just coming into this game, I had to play much harder than what I played the previous game before. I had to be there for my teammates much more, and even if I wasn’t as effective on the offensive end, I just had to find something else to keep myself going.”
Hugley has played nine games at Duquesne and has reached 20 points in five of them.
He’s enjoying all of it.
“I’m just grateful to be here, be in this position, and I’m just grateful to have a great college career,” he said.
