So let’s see, Duke has 3 first-round draft picks, whereas the entire rest of the ACC has exactly 1 (Terquavion Smith), yet Duke has ridden that talent all the way to… 6th place in the conference.
That Jon Scheyer is a miracle worker. Why would a recruit want to play for a 2x National Coach of the Year when they could instead be taught by Jon Scheyer?
Duke had 25 players on NBA rosters at the start of the season - second to Kentucky’s 27.
There’s the short answer for you.
Correction- Coach K had 25 players on an NBA roster…Out of the current roster at dook the *only player that is worthy of a first round pick is Filipowski…the others-based on how they’ve played so far are not.
Brand matters more than Coach. If it didn’t then Scheyer wouldn’t have been handed the job.
Duke is a brand. Kids were and are going there for the exposure and stage they get to play on to showcase their talent for the NBA, not because they think they’re going to get way better player development there than elsewhere. That will continue. Several years of consecutive underperformance may erode it over time, but it’ll last for a while as much as folks may hate it.
And out of those 52, at least 50 would be in the NBA no matter where they went to school.
35 is in the very midst of “who knows if he stays or goes” range
I get it’s one game but Reece did not look like an NBA player on either end of the floor today.
Last comment on Jayden. For the love, can JWilly teach him a jump stop and a hook or floater rather than setting the charge record. It happens once a game without fail
Cattoor’s gravity hurt us a lot today with Reece being pulled out on the perimeter all game. Made it hard for him to cut off drivers and get his usual steals. I thought his overall defense was good.
Offensively though he just doesn’t do enough at times to take over when you think he might
Nope, his go to is the power drive or catch and shot 3. No midrange and can’t create his on 3
I think a lot of Reece’s draft value is being placed on the expectation from scouts that he’ll be much more comfortable in an open court type of game. He’s got a lot to work on but I’d imagine an NBA GM would be more than happy to take a flyer on his potential in the early 2nd round and stash him for a year or two.
And it only takes one
I am bullish on Reece as far as his long term NBA prospects. He is somewhat unique for us in that many of Tony’s NBA guys have an elite shooting tool but significant flaws whereas Reece’s strength is that he is good at a lot of things and not really weak in any one area now that he can shoot.
Very good defense, good size, good rebounder, takes care of the ball, shooting the three at a high level. Excellent free throw shooter which bodes well for his long term shooting profile. Honestly I don’t see any reason why he won’t have a solid fairly lengthy NBA career. One of the smarter teams will see it.
Obviously I like UVA basketball and really like winning UVA basketball, so I hope he stays, but ultimately I think some smart NBA team is going to take him late first or offer a contract in the second. Boston, Utah, somewhere like that. We will see.
Maybe I’m crazy but I thought Reece looked good today. Locked Catoor out completely (didn’t score any points with Reece on him the first 25-30 minutes of the game) and went ISO ball to score on like 3 or 4 possessions in the second half. Thought he was our most solid player today by a lot.
Agree. I know some people were dumping a little on Reece and a lot on Gardner during the game chat, but both of them gave incredible effort all game long (Jayden with 6 O boards), even if they made some mistakes.
Gardner did what he is made to do … we are our at best though when we don’t need so much Gardner and others are producing consistently.
Right: I feel like when Gardner puts up big stat lines we probably didn’t play well. Could be wrong but it seems that way
So true. 20and 8 Gardner on this team means something went wrong on the offensive end. It’s great to have that depth that we can turn to him but it’s wven better that he can be option 2 or 3 unlike last season when it was all him.
Bennett has been National Coach of the Year THREE times, not two. Only John Wooden has more.