Point guard class looks terrific
The depth of this class can be found in how terrific the point guards are. On this board, I have four point guards ranked in the lottery — albeit potentially lower in some cases than where others will have them — and two others in the top 21. But is that right? In an era when the Atlanta Hawks’ Trae Young — a point guard who is more talented and gifted than all of these players with his ball-screen passing and overall gravity as a scorer — might not be good enough to be a franchise building block, should we value lead guards as highly as what this board says?
On some level, I think you need to just take what the board gives you. If a player tells you they’re an NBA player in an era when about 20 players per draft class end up becoming difference-makers or real rotation players, that’s a good sign. If you believe in a player being an NBA rotational guy, having them somewhere 12th to 20th on the board is probably about right, although it is worth noting that every evaluation lives on a continuum of upside and downside, and that you need to consider the expected value of what happens if a player hits their perceived ceiling. Is that player, such as a Carr from Baylor or Thomas Haugh from Florida, more valuable than some of the score-first guards we see here? Probably, because of the positional value portion of the equation. Still, I think there are several guards here who profile as good NBA players.
• Kingston Flemings is my highest rated of the bunch at No. 5 because he has done the best job of showcasing star-quality upside blended with the proven ability to play both on and off the ball. He’s a tremendous athlete who has scored from all three levels and has shown strides as a ball-screen passer and defender this season. He’s been excellent, but scouts want to see where the shooting lands.
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• Mikel Brown Jr. comes next for me, even though his performance has been more up and down. He’s averaging 16.6 points and 5.1 assists, but he’s been inefficient largely because his jumper has bizarrely abandoned him. He’s only made 26.8 percent of his 3s. I haven’t talked to a scout yet who is concerned about Brown’s shooting once he gets to the NBA, and Brown is dealing with a lower back injury that has held him out of multiple games over the last month. He needs to improve on defense, but Brown’s intersection of explosiveness athletically, shooting and passing looks pretty special.
• Darius Acuff Jr. has been remarkably productive as a freshman, averaging 19 points and six rebounds per game for John Calipari’s Arkansas team. But he might be the most Trae Young-adjacent player here, as he’s been ball-dominant and poor on defense. And yet, he’s a skilled shot maker and scorer who is starting to show better passing flashes. He looks poised to go somewhere in the top 20, with a high ceiling and low floor on draft night, depending on how SEC play goes and if there is an executive who falls in love with his skill set.
• Labaron Philon was the final player to choose to return to college last season after a dalliance with the draft process, and all he has done is improve in every category across the board. He’s averaging 21.5 points and 5.4 assists while shooting 53.6 percent from the field, 38.6 percent from 3 and 73 percent from the line. He’s an athletic player who gets to the rim, creates high-level kickout opportunities for teammates and makes the right play. On top of it, he showed last season he can capably play off the ball when starting next to Mark Sears. There’s rightfully a lot of excitement about Philon’s growth.
• Bennett Stirtz is a basketball savant who runs Iowa’s offense to a crisp tempo and drills shots from the perimeter. Christian Anderson is one of the most productive guards in the country as a dynamic ballhandler and creator, averaging 20.5 points and 7.5 rebounds on terrific percentages. Vanderbilt’s Tanner is this year’s analytics darling while running the Commodores’ offense, with his blend of shooting percentages, rim finishing, assist-to-turnover ratio and steal rate. They all feature in the 20s because of size and potential defensive issues.
Why I’m bullish on Iowa State’s players
Iowa State has been one of my favorite teams to watch this year. Ranked third in the country with an unblemished 14-0 record, the Cyclones have taken a massive leap on offense this year while still being the elite defensive program that they’ve always been under coach T.J. Otzelberger. Why has that leap occurred? First, the team is protecting the ball better than it ever has under Otzelberger, posting a 14.7 turnover percentage that is top 50 in the country. It’s also getting better ball movement, shooting and spacing improved; Iowa State is drilling 42 percent from beyond the 3-point arc.
That’s why you’ll see Joshua Jefferson, Killyan Toure, Tamin Lipsey and Milan Momcilovic ranked higher here than you will in other places. I have Jefferson and Toure in the top 30 and then both Lipsey and Momcilovic in the top 50. Jefferson and Lipsey are the only two players here guaranteed to be in the class as seniors, but I think all four are worth merit as NBA players.
Milan Momcilovic, left, and Joshua Jefferson, right, celebrate an Iowa State bucket against West Virginia.Reese Strickland / Imagn Images
Jefferson is the real standout. The idea here is that he’s a 6-8 do-it-all wing whose lone weakness used to be that he couldn’t hit a shot. However, this season he’s started to show some growth there, making 39 percent of his 2.6 3-point attempts per game.
Jefferson’s superpower, though, is his brain. He thinks the game quicker than anyone else in college basketball on both ends of the court and makes life easier across the board for his teammates. The box score numbers show that, as he’s averaging 17.5 points, 7.3 rebounds, 5.4 assists, 1.6 steals and 0.9 blocks. I think the tape is somehow better. Jefferson throws passes on the move or from the post. He’ll drive from beyond the 3-point line or catch short rolls. He always knows where everyone is on the court and completely understands where help defenders are being sent from. His 5.4 assists per game are terrific, and he throws them with either hand off a live dribble. It’s probably the closest thing I’ve seen to Draymond Green’s Michigan State tape offensively since Green was in college.
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Jefferson has been on the radar since last season, and some scouts tried to persuade their teams to assure Jefferson a second-round spot last year if he stayed in the draft. Iowa State looks great largely because of the way he dictates the game on both ends.
Lipsey is the other driver of play for this team. The easiest way that I can explain him is that he’s a walking turnover battle victory. Every time he’s on the court, Iowa State is guaranteed to get more positive possessions than its opposition. Why? Because he never turns the ball over and is one of the elite ball thieves in the country on defense. Lipsey is averaging 5.9 assists per game versus a paltry 0.8 turnovers, a downright VanVleetian profile that is buoyed by him also grabbing 2.4 steals per game with his aggressive point-of-attack defense.
He can be overaggressive and get beaten at times, and I don’t think he’s nearly the scorer that Fred VanVleet was from an NBA perspective because of his inability to shoot. But Lipsey looks like a good backup guard prospect.
Toure is the big long-term bet, and I think I would wager on him going back to Ames next season. But I think Toure is the best perimeter defender in college basketball as a freshman. He’s so strong and physical at the point of attack and also has very fluid hips and an extremely high-end motor that allows him to fight and recover through ball screens. Toure looks like a Lu Dort starter kit every time that I watch him, and it doesn’t hurt that he’s also averaging 10 points and 2.7 assists per game. The 3-point shooting has been streaky, and he’ll need to show flashes there over the next two months. But I’m not sure I’ve seen a better point-of-attack defender over the first two months of his collegiate career in quite a while. He’s that physical and aggressive.
Finally, Momcilovic looks like the next Steve Novak, an absolute sniper from distance who is drilling an obscene
56.3 percent of his seven 3-point attempts per game while averaging 18.5 points. If you leave him remotely open, it’s over. The ball is going in the hoop. At 6-foot-8 with a powerful 220-pound frame, he has also shown some useful occasional mid-post scoring ability. But this is a score-only profile for a hyper-elite catch-and-shoot player. That can stick on an NBA roster, but you’d love to see him continue to round out his game.

By
Sam Vecenie
Senior Writer, NBA Draft