BJ Freeman is no longer with the Arizona State men’s basketball team due to conduct detrimental to the team, a team spokesperson confirmed to Arizona Sports on Sunday.
“He’s had a couple of conduct issues, and it was just too many, and it got to the point where we’re at right now,” coach Bobby Hurley said on the pregame radio show ahead of facing Kansas State on Sunday. “We’re going to be very supportive of him as he looks for his next opportunity.”
AZCentral’s Michelle Gardner first reported the dismissal.
Freeman was ejected in back-to-back games against Colorado (Jan. 28) and Arizona (Feb. 1) before later earning a one-game suspension that kept him out of a meeting with Oklahoma State (Feb. 9).
The senior ends his season as ASU’s leading scorer, averaging 13.7 points per game. He hit his stride when conference play arrived, averaging 15.6 points (39.4% 3-point shooting) and 2.6 assists over 14 games.
Beginning with Kansas State, ASU has five regular-season games remaining without a path to an at-large bid for the NCAA tournament.
What events led to BJ Freeman leaving ASU?
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Freeman landed at ASU as a transfer from UW-Milwaukee after averaging 25.8 points in his final Horizon League tournament, positioning himself as a potential force on offense for the 2024-25 Sun Devils.
His ASU season started poorly on the court with a 2-for-9 showing against Duke in an exhibition, leading him to come off the bench for his first three games once the regular season had gotten going.
Freeman scored in double digits each of the three games and carved out a central role in the ASU offense, which became even more so when freshman Joson Sanon injured his ankle and missed time.
His first ejection came as a flagrant 2 foul when fighting through a screen against Colorado and as a result hit an offensive player where people don’t like to be hit. He insisted postgame that he was only trying to fight through the screen in a show of effort, saying he knew Hurley would be on him if he didn’t.
The second came after he headbutted Arizona guard Caleb Love at the end of the Wildcats’ victory over ASU. The two teams, which did not shake hands afterward, will meet again on March 4.
Then came the suspension, which was never clarified beyond “conduct detrimental to the team.”
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