Credit to Markus Howard for zagging.

While seemingly a new college basketball player — every hour — is announcing their intention to declare for the NBA Draft and/or merely test out that process, Marquette’s superstar announced on Friday that he will forego all the flirting and stay put in college. Howard, who will be the leading returning scorer in the sport next season, posted this to Twitter:

Howard’s return will almost certainly lock Marquette into preseason top-10 status in every major college basketball ranking/poll. Howard should see teammates Joey Hauser and Sam Hauser back in the fold, in addition to Theo John, Ed Morrow and Sacar Anim. Marquette’s coming off a 24-10 season and should be better next season.

Howard, a CBS Sports Second Team All-American (see all of our 2018-19 awards here), averaged 25.0 points, 3.9 rebounds, 3.9 assists and shot 40.3 percent from 3 last season. With 1,955 points in his career, Howard might even have a distant chance of hitting the 3,000-point career mark, which only 10 players in history have ever accomplished at the men’s D-I level. 

He’ll probably wind up competing with Michigan State’s Cassius Winston for preseason National Player of the Year status.

The Golden Eagles are ranked seventh in CBS Sports’ Way Too Early Top 25 And 1 for 2019-20.