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Ellenson: ‘I feel like this is the right place for me to go to’

The Pistons didn’t expect Henry Ellenson to be available to them with the 18th pick. They were hardly the only surprised party.

“I didn’t expect to be on the board at 18, but God has a plan and I feel like this is the right place for me to go to,” Ellenson said by phone from New York, where he attended the NBA draft as one of 19 green room invitees. “It’s in the Midwest. It’s a great team that made the playoffs last year and I feel like I can contribute a lot right away, so I’m just excited to be playing for the Pistons.”

Ellenson, a Wisconsin native who played his freshman season at Marquette University before declaring for the draft, said his family will travel from Wisconsin to Michigan on Friday to meet him and start the familiarization process with the organization.

Ellenson was projected as a top-10 pick after averaging 17.0 points and 9.7 rebounds a game for Marquette. There was some concern about his lateral mobility, but the Pistons were stunned to have the chance to draft him. Stan Van Gundy said he was rated 10th on their draft board.

Ellenson said Andre Drummond contacted him as the pick was made via FaceTime, but it was too loud to carry on a conversation. Then Van Gundy welcomed him to the Pistons via the phone. Though Ellenson never spent much time envisioning himself with the Pistons before the draft, it didn’t take him long to warm to the possibilities.

“It’s nice to be going to a winning team,” he said. “Be able to make the learning process, I would think, easier. They’ve already had success and they kind of found a groove. I’ll just be happy to come there and bring a whole ’nuther kind of dimension with my versatility. I think this is the right fit.”

Van Gundy said the Pistons feel Ellenson, who measured at 6-foot-11½ with a 7-foot-2¼ wing span at the NBA draft combine last month, can play both power forward and center. He’s most comfortable facing the basket. Before hitting a growth spurt, Ellenson started in basketball as a point guard and it shows with his comfort in putting the ball on the floor.

“I think it’s great,” Ellenson said of the way he’ll mesh with Drummond. “I feel like I play really well with centers. I think we feed off each other and I feel like it can work really well.”