In the words of the great Jon Rothstein – This is March. One of the most exciting times of the year to be a basketball fan.

The regular season of college basketball has gone by like a blur as the first conference tournaments are going to take place this week. As far as the NBA draft stuff goes, some evals are getting more and more settled and comfortable; i feel like i have my top four pretty much settled in, with the only question being the 2-4 positioning.

So, buckle up for my latest NBA draft notes – this week, I have more stuff for you than in any of the 10 previous collection of my weekly notes (to be perfectly honest, I haven’t checked, but it definitely feels that way).

Ace’s passing and shooting

Everyone who has followed me for the last few months knows that I’m not in the category of Ace Bailey superfans. I see people putting him in number 1 conversations alongside Cooper Flagg, which for me, feels totally crazy. I don’t think there’s any chance that he could go higher than 5 on my big board.

That’s not to say that I think he’s a bad player – if you think that someone is a top 10 pick in the NBA draft, you clearly rate him very highly, just not as highly as some of the other people do. It’s as simple as that.

I watched the Rutgers game at Michigan with the intention of observing two of the most intriguing aspects to Bailey’s game for me. First, it’s the defense. This thing is a floor raiser for Bailey. By now, he has accumulated some above-average stocks – 4% block and 1.7% steal rates. The length and athleticism definitely project Bailey to be an above-average defender.

But I found it weird to see that his defensive box plus-minus stands at just 0.1, since his adjusted on/off defensive splits sit at 7.4, per evanmiya.com, which suggests a clearly positive defensive contribution.

I thought that his defense was pretty good against Michigan. He’s at his best defending in transition, rotating to protect the rim from the sides and disrupting offenses with his length and athleticism – there were a couple of moments where Bailey blew up Michigan alley-oop attempts and turned his defensive playmaking into good, quick offense on the other end. 

During some stretches, he almost played like a 5, tasked with anchoring a defense and protecting the paint. One negative tendency that pops on film is a lack of second effort. There was an occasion where he guarded the initial drive, but on the pass to Vlad Goldin, Bailey just completely switched off. On other occasions, he overcommits on the initial action, failing to recognize what’s going on behind his back.

The second aspect is the passing – this is a ceiling raiser for Bailey. On the season, he’s been poor at passing the ball; there’s no way to hide it. If he harbors any All-Star ambition at the next level, he’ll absolutely need to improve his handle and leverageshooting gravity into opportunities for his teammates.

But I came out of the Michigan game with more optimism than I had before. It feels like Bailey recognizes this himself – he needs to pass more. Actually, in February, his assist rate jumped up to 14%, which, well, actually isn’t bad at all. The tide is somewhat turning for Bailey in that aspect of the game, compared to the start of the season when he was just chucking up long twos without looking for teammates.

He’s certainly playing more within himself and within the team’s system. I’m not going to go overboard and say that Bailey’s ball-stopping tendencies are a thing of the past, but for sure, he’s looking to facilitate more. Michigan began the game by blitzing Bailey on the pick-and-roll, trying to make him into a passer. He did well to read and anticipate those double teams, in one case finding Lathan Sommerville, and fumbling a one-handed pass on the other, more aggressive blitz. I loved his willingness to hit cutters instead of pulling up for shots. 

One thing that’s often lacking is the execution on these reads. Even when Bailey’s looking to share the ball, the passes can be off, forcing his teammates into catches at uncomfortable positions that throw them off their natural downhill or shooting motion.

Sorber’s out 

Last week brought some disappointing news as Georgetown announced that their freshman center Thomas Sorber is out for the remainder of the season due to a foot injury that requires surgery.

Sorber had been out since the February 15th away game at Butler. On paper, being out of the season, considering that Georgetown has only a few regular season and (bar an improbable upset) Big East tournament games, may not seem that terrible.

But foot injuries, especially for big guys, are no joke, so for Sorber, it was probably best to stop for a while and have surgery to fix the stuff that’s bothering him.

This opens up an NBA draft dilemma – should Sorber return to Georgetown (or transfer anywhere else, for that matter), or stay in the draft? The answer for that right now is pretty difficult. Sorber turns 20 on Christmas day and would be 20.5 years old on draft day in 2026. That probably would not be a major hindrance to him as we can see older freshmen bigs like Derik Queen, or sophomores like Collin Murray-Boyles mocked highly in this year’s draft.

For Sorber, a lot will depend on the extent of his injury. Ideally, he’d be back before the NBA Draft Combine, but that’s certainly not a guarantee. NBA teams having concerns with Sorber’s long-term health could conceivably hinder his draft stock in relation to his talent, as I think Sorber is for sure at least a top 20, maybe even a lottery player.

In that case, returning for a sophomore year would allow Sorber to lick his wounds without rushing any of the process of getting to the NBA. If he could come back and dominate next season in college, this would not only prove his basketball ability, but also his health.

And Sorber clearly has a lot of basketball ability. At least in my view, he’s the Big East freshman of the year; I’d take Sorber over Liam McNeeley and I would not lose any sleep over that decision. The center finished his freshman season as Georgetown’s leader in BPM, rebounds, and blocks. With 14.5 points per game, he’s their second-leading scorer behind Micah Peavy.

Sorber is really fun and talented; he showed potential on both ends of the floor this season. For now, enjoy some of his Big East highlights.

Can Robinson shoot?

At the beginning of January, I did a profile on Anthony Robinson II, a stud sophomore guard playing for a rejuvenated Missouri program.

I noted a lot of good things about Robinson II, including his pick-and-roll creation, defense, and ability to get to the line. You can check it out here if you want to.

That was pretty much before SEC play began, and SEC, as you are probably well aware by now, is by far and away the best conference in college basketball. In SEC play, Robinson II had a bad stretch that lasted almost a month, roughly from the middle of January to the middle of February.

But the Tigers guard has bounced back in a big way recently, stringing together an impressive stretch of games where he made a massive impact the way he does best – by filling up the stat sheet and putting a stamp on games with his trademark active defense, passing, and scoring.

I absolutely enjoyed Robinson’s game against Vanderbilt on Saturday. He was pretty quiet for the first half, but as the game went to the wire and, eventually, overtime, Robinson II made big play after big play, whether it’s steals, passes, or three-point shooting. Mizzou ended up losing a game they absolutely should have won, but it was in no part due to Robinson’s performance.

Really, really good game by Anthony Robinson II against Vandy. Started slowly, got going in the 2nd half and made massive plays in crunch time. Defense, passing and, yes, off dribble three point shooting.

— Sheed on the Hawks (@sheedinatl.bsky.social) 2025-03-02T12:05:31.031Z

His three-point shooting is of particular interest because it’s clearly a swing skill for Robinson II. He’s been very good shooting the long ball since a February 15th game at Georgia, but the problem is the low volume.

I don’t really have a clear answer as to what prevents Robinson II from shooting more. He may not be elite, but he has some touch for sure – look at the threes he made in that Vandy game, there’s a level of comfort and arc in those stepbacks that surely indicate a soft touch. Per Synergy, he’s an insane 98th percentile in off-dribble jumpshooting, but the problem is that more than 50% of those shots are from two.

Mizzou has some fantastic shooters in Tamar Bates and, especially, Caleb Grill, who has to be on some sort of a historic shooting heater this season. But it’s not like other guys cannibalize all of the three-point shooting, leaving no more space for other shooters in the Tigers’ rotation – per Bart Torvik, they’re just 111st in the nation in 3-point rate.

So, I’m not really sure as to why Robinson II is shooting just 3.8 threes per 100 possessions. But I know that I like his game a whole lot. 

Newell’s main problem?

With Georgia’s Asa Newell, a lot of the discourse surrounding him this season has been about what can he do on offense besides running the floor, cutting, and crashing the offensive glass?

Newell’s in a tricky spot because he’s not a center – at best, he could play the 5 in short stretches, but that’s clearly not his main position. Knowing that, for him to succeed and ultimately hit his ceiling, the general school of thought is that he’d have to start knocking down threes.

Overall, his shooting this season has been a mixed bag, to say the least. Newell struggled making threes for a large chunk of the season, but in recent games, he has kind of started to turn a corner (I’m employing my words very carefully here). First of all, February brought an uptick in Newell’s 3-point shooting volume – he shot over 7 threes per 100 possessions, making 33%.

That’s still not great numbers, but what impressed me in Georgia’s upset win over Florida on Tuesday is that Newell isn’t really hesitant to shoot anymore. He takes threes under tighter closeouts and even makes off-ball movements specifically designed to get shots from three, instead of just taking them when defense sags off and gives up those shots to him.

Actually, I’m not super worried over Newell’s shooting and I’m pretty confident that he’ll come around at the next level.

it seems like Asa Newell is slowly getting more comfortable with his 3 point shooting, actively looking out for opportunities and taking them under tighter closeouts, instead of just shooting when he's left wide open. Good sign, i'd say

— Sheed on the Hawks (@sheedinatl.bsky.social) 2025-02-26T17:57:02.013Z

At least in my opinion, as a fan of high-feel bigs, Newell’s lack of passing is a more concerning trait, rather than shooting. He has some potential as a straight lane driver because of his above-average burst for a 6’10” player and highly efficient rim finishing, but his driving is limited because he can’t really pass out from these drives.

He does have problems generating gravity in the post. Newell has decent footwork and touch, but clearly lacks upper-body strength needed to back down other guys within his height range. Even if he’s able to get into the teeth of the defense, be it backing down an opponent, or as in this case, rolling to the basket, Newell ends up drawing multiple defenders in the paint, but fails to kick it out for any of the open teammates waiting at the three-point line.

i wish Asa Newell could make passes like this, he's pretty good going downhill and awesome finishing at the rim, but really doesn't turn it into opportunities for his teammates, i.e., on the kick out, like in this clip

— Sheed on the Hawks (@sheedinatl.bsky.social) 2025-01-13T17:16:55.414Z

This is the thing I’m most worried about Newell. Really good NBA coaches are super creative and they can get around having two bigs without a high level of shooting gravity; I highly suggest you look up some videos on how the Cleveland Cavaliers are spacing the floor with some concepts that might seem counterintuitive to the idea of spacing, i.e cutting into already clogged lanes in order to mess up the opponents’ defensive rotations.

But bigs who can’t go above the average feel for the game threshold, I’d say, are trickier than those who aren’t high-volume knockdown shooters.

Shulga was good

If there’s a player that’s had a great month of February in college basketball, it’s definitely Max Shulga of VCU.

The senior guard from Ukraine shot the lights out for VCU last month, making 50% of his threes on a high volume, with his team winning each and every Atlantic 10 game last month.

Shulga to me definitely feels like a draftable 2nd-round player. Though he’s been in college for quite a while, he’s only 22 years old, turning 23 the day before the NBA draft. Shulga has been consistently producing at very good mid-major teams, and his shooting has really come around during his two seasons at VCU. 

In total, Shulga has had three seasons logging 60%+ in true shooting, and the only season he didn’t do that (excluding a freshman year at Utah State, where his playing time was extremely limited), Shulga came pretty close to that 60% mark.

To build around his shooting ability, Shulga has a high feel for the game, manifested by high assist rates, which have been in the 20s for the last three seasons, as well as a career-best 2.3 assist-to-turnover ratio and a 50%+ free throw rate.

Shulga is not very athletic, which is fine at this point in his career – most five-year college prospects are usually lacking in the athletic department; if they didn’t, they would’ve likely made the NBA earlier. But Shulga is also posting a very solid 3.5% steal and a 6.1% offensive rebounding rate. Though this may be counterintuitive, a good offensive rebounding rate is often interpreted as one of the proxies for functional athleticism.