Kansas Jayhawks add familiar face to 2023-24 basketball team as non-scholarship player

Patrick Cassidy, a former manager for the Kansas men’s basketball team, has been added to the 2023-24 squad as a walk-on non-scholarship player, KU coach Bill Self confirmed to The Star on Monday.

Cassidy is a 6-foot-0 senior point guard from Columbus, Kansas. He also played football at Columbus High School.

During Cassidy’s senior year, sportsinks.com’s Chet Kuplen wrote of Cassidy: “Columbus senior Patrick Cassidy is one of the top multiple sport athletes in the Southeast Kansas area. Cassidy has put his name on the map over the last couple of seasons as one of the rising basketball players in Class 3A and the CNC league.”

Kuplen pointed out that Cassidy scored 92 points over three games helping Columbus High to a St. Paul Tournament title. He had a career-high 39 points in the title game.

“Cassidy, who has unlimited range as a shooter, averaged 18.2 points per game as a junior last season on his way to earning Sports in Kansas 2nd Team All-State honors in the loaded 3A classification,” wrote Kuplen. “He also averaged over 14 points per game as a sophomore back in 2017-2018.”

As a senior quarterback Cassidy earned honorable mention all-state honors after totaling over 1,500 combined yards of offense and 25 touchdowns.

“Cassidy, who is also a key member of the baseball team, is known to be an outstanding golfer (2 handicap) to many around the Southeast Kansas area despite not competing in it at the high school level. He would likely be one of the known golfers in 3A if the golf and baseball season didn’t run at the same time during the school year,” Kuplen wrote.

Cassidy had a perfect GPA in high school. He is the second non-scholarship player to join KU’s team in the past week.

Justin Cross, a 6-foot-9, 215-pound junior forward from John A. Logan College in Carterville, Illinois was added to the squad Friday. KU has six walkons and 10 scholarship athletes on the team. Walk-ons are Cassidy, Cross, Charlie McCarthy, Michael Jankovich, Wilder Evers and Dillon Wilhite

Scholarship players are: returning starters Kevin McCullar, Dajuan Harris and KJ Adams, incoming freshmen Marcus Adams, Elmarko Jackson and Jamari McDowell and transfer portal additions Parker Braun, Hunter Dickinson, Nick Timberlake and Arterio Morris (Texas).