SYRACUSE—Decision day is drawing near for Greg Paulus.

The Duke basketball standout will graduate this weekend and then decide if he wants to play one year of college football as a graduate student. Since Paulus did not redshirt at Duke, he has one year of eligibility remaining in another sport. He has visited Michigan, Nebraska and Syracuse.

The Orange has plenty of ammo to land Paulus—an opportunity to start at quarterback, a prestigious degree and a full-circle homecoming of sorts. Paulus attended Christian Brothers Academy, a five-minute drive from SU. Last week in Syracuse, Paulus reminisced with old friends, met with football coach Doug Marrone and took a long look at the S. I. Newhouse School of Public Communication.

Joel Kaplan, the associate dean of Newhouse’s graduate program, said Paulus hasn’t formally applied to SU yet.

“He wouldn’t come up here and spend all this time if he wasn’t strongly considering it,” said Joe Casamento, Paulus’ former high school coach.

The idea of returning to football crystallized for the 6- foot-1 Paulus when the Green Bay Packers gave him a private workout in early April. At CBA, Paulus threw for 11,763 yards and 152 touchdowns. He received scholarship offers from Notre Dame and Miami (Fla.) but opted for basketball and Duke.

Casamento does not believe Paulus will have trouble brushing off four years of dust.

“He’s a leader and a competitor,” Casamento said. “I don’t think there’s a program in America that he could go to and couldn’t be an asset. That’s just the type of kid he is. If he doesn’t win the job, he’ll make the other guy a lot better.”

The “other guy” at Syracuse right now is redshirt freshman Ryan Nassib. Marrone named Nassib the starting quarterback on the second day of spring football practice, simultaneously sliding Andrew Robinson to tight end. Two days later, third-stringer David Legree quit the team and the Orange was down to two quarterbacks (Nassib and Cameron Dantley).

Incoming freshman Charley Loeb will help, but Paulus would generate a buzz the SU football program has been missing for years.

Paulus may be days away from diving head-first into a new college sport. As Casamento said, why not? The verdict may come soon.

“So many ‘experts’ are in the media, talking about how this can’t be done and he shouldn’t be doing this,” Casamento said. “My point is, why would you criticize a kid for trying something he wants to do? He wants to try something, he’ll try it. I think that takes a lot of courage.”