NBA Draft Prospects to watch in the NCAA Tournament South Region
The South region is going to pack some punch in this year’s NCAA tournament.
It features probably the best No. 4 and 5 seeds in the entire bracket, with both Kentucky and Arizona playing their best basketball and peaking right as the calendar flips to the most important month of the college basketball season.
Virginia, which just lost one of its best players in De’Andre Hunter for the whole tournament, may have to go through annual offensive powerhouse Creighton, one of Arizona or Kentucky, and either the SEC regular season champ (Tennessee) or AAC regular season champ (Cincinnati) just to get to its first Final Four under coach Tony Bennett.
However, with all the matchup intrigue aside, the South also has quite a few NBA draft prospects worth watching.
Virginia
De’Andre Hunter (No. 47 on our big board): Hunter is an athletic menace, and if there is such a thing as a perfect NBA player at this point in the league’s shape-shifting, all-everything era, it looks a lot like Hunter. His physical attributes and statistical impact are nearly symmetrical with those of two-way game-changers such as Kyle Anderson and Otto Porter. The thing is, he’s even more athletic than those guys. Unfortunately, Hunter will miss the tournament, as mentioned above, with a broken wrist.
Devon Hall: Hall is a big senior point guard who could really use a big March. His 3-point efficiency and assist rate both skyrocketed this year, perhaps as a result of more consistent chunks of minutes and a strong Virginia squad. Regardless of where it came from, the fluid lefty will need to keep it up throughout the tournament to entice NBA teams looking at him near the end of the second round.
Creighton
Khyri Thomas (32): Thomas is not even the player you notice most watching Creighton — that’s probably Marcus Foster, who orchestrates Creighton’s high-octane offense quite efficiently. Yet Thomas is the best NBA prospect because of his two-way game, which is not something you can often say about Creighton players. The junior guard is a Marcus Smart type player, but with a more efficient offensive profile. He plays well with and without the ball, and may end up the best point guard defender in this class.
Arizona
Deandre Ayton (2): Based upon the level of scrutiny placed on Ayton and the Arizona program, there is perhaps no prospect answering to more negative voices this spring than the Bahamian big man. All year, two conversations on the periphery of Ayton’s mind-bending freshman season have seemingly dominated his story. On one side, many are hesitant to crown Ayton a top prospect based on the things he does not consistently do, such as protecting the rim or boxing out, rather than the plethora of ways he contributes to winning basketball already. On the other, the FBI investigation that has consumed Arizona for large parts of the season has loomed quite large over Ayton particularly, who was referenced in a conversation about the payment of $100,000 from an agent to the school. He can silence all of that in this tournament.
Allonzo Trier: I haven’t seen it in Trier this season. But the junior is another guy who falls under a tantalizing NBA archetype, like Hall. He combines secondary ball-handler-level passing with sweet pull-up shooting and strong driving ability. Somewhere inside him is a versatile defender, but it’s tough to find that player when watching Trier.
Rawle Alkins (51): The sophomore got a nice draw as someone looking to impress scouts this spring. He could face Kentucky’s Kevin Knox and Virginia’s Kyle Guy on the wing in rounds two and three if things break that way, followed by (maybe) Lonnie Walker IV or Jacob Evans in the Elite Eight. Alkins shot 37 percent from deep this year after missing several games early, and played hard on defense. With the abundance of combo guard/wing types available throughout the draft this year, Alkins has a lot to prove the next couple weeks.
Miami
Lonnie Walker IV (21): Over at The Ringer’s One Shining Podcast, Mark Titus and Tate Frazier dug deep into the guys they believe have the highest 2011 Kemba Walker potential. For what it’s worth, I think Walker is one of the guys with the potential to do that this March, coincidental name overlap and all. The freshman’s game grew as the season moved along, and he enters the tournament with more offensive responsibility and a team that plays within itself. Powered by pull-up shot-making and athleticism, Walker can score at will when he’s locked in.
Bruce Brown (33): Brown would have been a great guy to watch against top-level competition in the tournament if he were fully healthy. At this point, it would be surprising to see the versatile sophomore wing play at all in the tournament.
Anthony Lawrence Jr.: Lawrence is a long-term prospect who shot 43 percent from distance in his junior season and looks the part of a switchable defender across four positions. Without Brown, Lawrence does have an opportunity to seize added responsibility, but he hasn’t really done it thus far.
Next: The Step Back's 2018 NBA Draft Big Board -- Pre-Tournament Edition
Texas
Mo Bamba (8): Bamba is lucky to be healthy to start the tournament, and Texas might be the luckiest No. 10-seed in the country, drawing a very weak No. 7 Nevada squad to open the weekend. Big men don’t typically post numbers as gaudy as their smaller counterparts during March Madness, but Bamba can fill up the defensive stat sheet in a hurry and truly control games as a rim protector.
Kerwin Roach Jr.: Roach is another interesting long-term prospect who shot well from distance this season. He projects as a bigger combo guard able to defend with length and energy. Shaka Smart is the perfect coach for Roach, it’s a wonder he hasn’t already broken out.
Cincinnati
Jacob Evans (20): Evans is one of the more interesting prospects in the country, possessing a rarified skill set that could set Cincinnati up as a sleeper to go far. He is another guy who can shoot and create well enough to put a team on his back for a few March wins. To NBA observers, the junior looks like a legitimate two-way point guard prospect, which is sort of unicornish in its own right.