The gods of college (and NBA) basketball treated us with an amazing slate of hoops on Saturday, as if to prepare us for amazing basketball Saturdays when the conference battles kick in full gear after the New Year.
Despite the excitement on the court, there was excitement off the court too, as AJ Dybantsa announced his college commitment.
With the NBA desperately looking for a new American basketball superstar, Dybantsa looks like one of the prime candidates to take the mantle from LeBron, Curry and KD, if that’s even possible.
Dybantsa commits to BYU
The cat’s out of the bag – AJ Dybantsa, the number 1 ranked player in the class of 2025, is teaming up with head coach Kevin Young at BYU, a newly-minted NIL era college basketball powerhouse.
Well, the results are not there yet to call BYU a true powerhouse, but the fact that Ryan Smith, the owner of the Utah Jazz, is basically writing blank checks to his alma mater, it’s something to be reckoned with.
Dybantsa is not the first big name recruit in this new era of BYU basketball – that would be Egor Demin, of course – but this is definitely the most eye catching move that the Cougars have made yet.
Money clearly talks and, apparently, there’s a lot of money involved with Dybantsa, with estimates popping on social media ranging anywhere from $4 to $8 million. But taking away all the emotional factors and a desire to see a young future superstar in one of the Meccas of college basketball, i.e. the Chapel Hill in North Carolina, BYU was the right move.
For a while now, BYU has been laying the foundation for a move like this, as they are clearly positioning themselves as a strong NBA pipeline for top prospects, trying to rival programs like Duke and Kansas, who have already nabbed the other two best players in the class of 2025, namely Cameron Boozer and Darryn Peterson.
That pipeline is built upon the talents and connections of BYU’s coach Kevin Young. He wants to play an NBA-like style. Through Young, Dybantsa will have access to players like Kevin Durant or Devin Booker, so the logic of the commitment clearly goes beyond just plain monetary value.
It’s way too early to predict, and BYU will most likely face significant roster turnaround, but it will be clearly built around Dybantsa and his strengths. He will have the opportunity to have a Cade Cunningham-like impact on a basketball program that’s not necessarily known for their success. And that alone will be something to behold in 2025-26 season.
Beyond the turnovers
Illinois guard Kasparas Jakučionis now firmly sits in most people’s top 10 and is even making a strong push for a place in the top 5 on most boards. It’s getting really hard to look away from Jakučionis’ blend of size, next level playmaking, shooting and an ever-improving production at the collegiate level.
The Lithuanian guard raised some eyebrows at the beginning of the season, struggling to generate enough shots for himself, only compensating for that at the free throw line. During some stretches, it seemed like he was a bit hesitant to shoot the three, but he began to turn the corner in the second half of the Arkansas game.
For Jakučionis, off dribble shotmaking was always a question of when, not if, as that skill was apparent in AGNT and FIBA competitions. The amount of comfort that he has in these stepbacks going to his left is pretty darn impressive.
That shotmaking is unlocking new levels of production for Jakučionis. He’s an incredible manipulator of defense, so he leverages his gravity to drive to the basket, draw fouls and set up teammates with his incredible court awareness. He had 5 assists against Wisconsin, but it really could’ve easily been more, as Illinois did have their fair share of struggles making threes from some really favourable catch-and-shoot situations.
A recurring theme with Jakučionis has been his turnovers. He’s still posting a 26% turnover rate, which a bit too high, but it has gone down somewhat. Interestingly enough, turnovers going down has coincided with an uptick in shotmaking. He still commits some avoidable turnovers, getting himself in trouble in traffic or getting caught in two minds. Against Tennessee, his sloppy turnovers at the end of the game were very costly.
But the advanced reads and passes that Jakučionis makes as an 18 year old make it pretty compelling to bet on him as an elite level prospect.
McNeeley’s breakout
This has not been an easy start to the season neither for Liam McNeeley, nor for UConn. They did admirably recruiting players from high school and the portal, but replacing guys from one of the greatest teams in recent college basketball memory and maintaining the same level of play was always going to be a tough ask.
It appears as though UConn is out of its slump, as is McNeeley, who had a a breakout game on Saturday night against Gonzaga, scoring 26 points and grabbing 8 rebounds.
First and foremost, McNeeley is known as a shooter, but even coming out of high school, it was apparent that he’s more than just a three point threat, and he didn’t beat Gonzaga just by making a bunch of threes. At 6’8”, McNeeley is a very speedy and physically developed wing who’s a relentless downhill driver.
Curiously enough, his shooting has been a mixed bag so far for UConn, making just 34% of his threes so far. Still, the gravitational pull hasn’t disappeared for McNeeley and preventing him from shooting threes is high on every opposing teams scouring reports.
He leveraged that gravity to a greater extent against Gonzaga, attacking the basket at will and generating 12 free throw attempts.
McNeeley remains a very good shooter and there’s more than enough reasons to believe that his early season struggles were just a slump. When making shots, the UConn forward does present an interesting high floor case for NBA teams looking to fill out their rosters with a high gravity floor spacer – his positional size is great and projects an improvement on the defensive end. On offense, he doesn’t need the ball in his hands to be effective.
What’s up in Iowa?
For some reason, Iowa vs Iowa State is one of my favorite college basketball rivalries. The teams met in Iowa City last week, with ISU showing the guts to rally in the second half and snatch a comeback victory. It was the first time since 2014 that an away team won in this rivalry.
The game featured a bunch of interesting potential NBA prospects. I wanted to focus on Iowa whose best two players – senior guard/forward Payton Sandfort and center Owen Freeman – who were of interest to me in the NBA context before the season.
Sandfort has uncharacteristically struggled this season. Defense was always the trickiest part for Sandfort, but he hasn’t been good on offense as well this season, shooting just slightly over 31% from three. In theory, his profile has NBA juice – he was a great movement shooter with good positional size and impressive connective passing abilities, but for some reason, it just hasn’t clicked yet for the senior so far this season.
Freeman is an interesting case as well. He’s a highly skilled big who really knows how to cave out space, he crashes the glass and rebounds with purpose. The center processes the game on offense pretty well, and he makes quick reads and has a presence of mind to be in spots where the action is happening. Freeman may not be the fastest or most athletic big out there, but his willingness to run in transition is highly impressive – per Synergy, he’s in the 99th percentile in transition, though, obviously, his frequency is not as high as of the faster guards and wings.
Like with Sandfort, Freeman’s problems lie on the defensive end of the floor. He boasts solid block rates, but I don’t think he’s a great paint defender – his blocks usually come in help situations or tracking down smaller guards, but he struggles to guard bigger players and is often pretty reckless with physicality, picking up unnecessary fouls and limiting his impact on the game.
Freeman is clearly a center, so for him to make and establish himself in the NBA, he’ll need to play and anchor a defense like a center. He’s never going to be the best defending big as his strengths lie elsewhere, but in the modern NBA you simply can’t be a defensive black hole as a center.
Impressive Asa
At this point, I believe Georgia’s Asa Newell has become underappreciated – he’s been putting together solid showings basically every time he’s stepped on the court, and his team has been pretty good as well.
With Newell, immediately recognizing his upside and talent may not be as easy as with other top prospects, as he’s not a player who puts up highlight plays on a nightly basis.
But some of his stats are interesting. He’s in the top 10 among freshmen in BPM, ahead of some draft Twitter darlings like Jakučionis, Labaron Philon, or Jeremiah Fears. Newell is ranked second in all of D1 in dunks (27-28) and has made 76% of his shots at the rim, despite being a below average post player, which is not something that you can hold against him too much when projecting a long term NBA upside.
Newell has an impressive knack for getting easy buckets. Per Synergy, he generates a lot of baskets through cuts, positioning himself to receive the ball in situations where he can make an impact. The Georgia big is a very willing runner in transition, with Synergy ranking him in the 95th percentile in transition situations. One of the main generators of scoring output has been offensive rebounds – Newell posts an impressive 16% off rebounding percentage.
As a defender, Newell is someone who NBA teams clamor for – a versatile, switchable big with serious isolation defensive abilities, as he has that invaluable combination of length, reaction and quick feet. On a limited sample, Newell has been great defending dribble jumpers (0.38 points allowed per shot, 91th percentile).
He faces criticism for poor boxing out skills and defensive rebounding. It’s something to monitor for sure, but I project him as a 4 long term, so he’s likely to play in lineups with another big under the basket, plus there’s surely space for Newell to develop his frame and become a better rebounder.
For someone to fully buy in Newell, one has to believe in his jumpshot evolution, which is not a certainty. Newell has made only 5-23 of his outside shots, while shooting a sub-par 66% from the line so far this season as well.
The Center Hub 
Leave a comment