11. Utah Jazz
Gradey Dick | 6-8 wing | 19 years old | Kansas
Gradey Dick has a case as the best shooter in the class. He’s a teenager who drilled 40.3 percent from 3 in the Big 12 this season while averaging 14 points and taking nearly six 3s per game. He’s tremendous as a shooter with a quick trigger and a high release point at 6-foot-8.
But there is a bit more to Dick’s game than meets the eye. He is smart at using the threat of his shot to drive and cut to the rim, and he’s a sharp processor of the game. He finishes at the rim and has plus positional size for his role. He’s also a useful team defender, with quick hand-eye coordination and reactivity, but he did have some issues navigating exchanges on and off the ball this season. Teams also have some general concerns that he might be a target for opposing lead ballhandlers.
It’s hard to imagine a better fit in Utah’s offense, which is based around all sorts of off-ball movement and dribble-handoff actions. Dick would be a nightmare to cover. He’s seen as a very likely lottery pick.
12. Oklahoma City Thunder
Jordan Hawkins | 6-5 wing | 21 years old | Connecticut
Jordan Hawkins has been terrific throughout Connecticut’s run to the Final Four, but don’t mistake this as a spike up the board due to an end-of-season shooting surge. Hawkins was No. 15 on my pre-Tournament Big Board a month ago, and has been rising throughout the process this year because he’s the best movement 3-point shooter in the class. Connecticut has him fly consistently off screens to create 3s, and he reciprocates by catching quickly and firing with ease. Measurements will be important, but he has real size, and has even improved his ability off the bounce this season.
The issue right now is that he’s extremely skinny and does not maintain the advantages he creates going toward the basket due to his lack of strength. If an NBA team believes they can get him stronger and into the 200-to-210 pound range, he should probably go somewhere in the top-10. If not, he might project more like someone the Thunder currently have on their roster: Isaiah Joe. Joe was also skinny when he entered the NBA and couldn’t really do anything for his first couple of years, but he’s quickly morphed into one of the most lethal 3-point floor-spacers in the NBA, hitting 42 percent on over five 3s in just 18 minutes per game this season.
Hawkins has a little more game than Joe did entering the NBA, and Joe is cheap for another two years for Oklahoma City. But you can never have enough floor-spacing, especially if you’re Oklahoma City and building around Shai Gilgeous-Alexander and Josh Giddey moving forward.
13. New Orleans Pelicans (via LAL)
Jalen Hood-Schifino | 6-6 wing | 20 years old | Indiana
Jalen Hood-Schifino embodies many of the characteristics teams currently search across the basketball landscape to find. He has great positional size as a 6-foot-6 guard. He can handle the ball and process the game at a reasonable level. He has potential to shoot a high percentage from deep and has a penchant for midrange shot creation already. Defensively, he’s terrific and switchable onto a variety of different player types. He’s one of those guys who is tough-minded and won’t take anything off the court for his team if his shooting translates to the next level. Hood-Schifino was the Big Ten Freshman of the Year this season and averaged 13.5 points, 4.1 rebounds and 3.8 assists per game on his way to an All-Big Ten nod. He helped the Hoosiers to a second-place finish in the league as the second-best player on the team. He’s one of the few freshmen who positively impacted winning this season.
The Pelicans tend to love these kinds of players with plus positional size, great defensive acumen and the potential to be versatile positionally. If he shoots — Hood Schifino’s marks off the dribble should give real hope — I think he can play with someone like 2022 first-round pick Dyson Daniels in the backcourt.
14. Los Angeles Lakers (via NOP)
Dereck Lively II | 7-1 center| 19 years old| Duke
Dereck Lively had a monster end of the season that reminded scouts and decision-makers why he was so highly rated coming out of high school. By the end of the season, he was arguably the most impactful defensive player in the country, as a 7-foot-1 center with a 7-foot-6 wingspan who was an elite rim protector, a versatile ball-screen defender and contested rebound retriever. This culminated in a virtuoso performance in the first round of the NCAA Tournament against Oral Roberts’ top-25 offense in the country, in which Lively and Duke held the Golden Eagles scoreless in the first seven minutes of the game on their way to a blowout. Lively’s offense needs work, but he’s a tailor-made defensive center for where the NBA is headed. Offensively, his game should be a bit better out in the space of the NBA, especially if he can get paired with a terrific guard who can feed him on rim-runs where he can use his athleticism and length to high-point the ball and dunk.
The Lakers have tried to fill a void in the middle next to Anthony Davis for a little while now. It’s why they took a shot on Mo Bamba at the trade deadline, a move that has so far backfired, as he wasn’t making all that big an impact prior to spraining his ankle. On top of that, the team’s other moves at the deadline to acquire players such as D’Angelo Russell and Malik Beasley have given the Lakers actual backcourt depth for the remaining years of LeBron James’ prime if they want to retain each this summer.
15. New York Knicks (via DAL)
Keyonte George | 6-4 guard | 19 years old | Baylor
We’re firmly into the range of players who are all over the map for teams. Some really like Keyonte George due to his creativity off the bounce. The name of comparison that comes up most often with George is Mavericks guard Jaden Hardy, who went in the second round last season, but has recently shown he should have been taken higher. I had Hardy at No. 20 last year and have George in a similar range. Having said that, George also shot 38 percent from the field and 34 percent from 3 this season, had a negative assist-to-turnover ratio and was all over the map with his defense and decision-making.
My bet is that George ends up somewhere in the top 20, but not all NBA teams love these high-usage, low-efficiency guards, even if they showcase tremendous talent at a young age. The Knicks could use another creative scoring guard to develop around Jalen Brunson and Julius Randle. The Knicks’ offense has been terrific this season, but they are a bit short on supplementary offensive creation. The team’s offensive rating has plummeted when Brunson and Randle are both off the court.
16. Atlanta Hawks
Nick Smith Jr. | 6-4 combo guard | 19 years old | Arkansas
It’s hard to have a much worse ending than Nick Smith did after returning from injuries that held him out for a majority of the season before mid-February. He scored just 17 points in 68 minutes during Arkansas’ three NCAA Tournament games, and the team was often better with him off the court. In Smith’s 17 games, he averaged 12.5 points, but shot just 37 percent from the field and 33 percent from 3. His defensive play was consistently messy — something not all that surprising for a player who didn’t get any real time to mesh with his teammates and build cohesion.
Smith was one of the top recruits in the 2022 class and proved at lower levels that he can be a terrific tough-shot maker and instant offensive creator. Given his injuries, there are real, built-in excuses for why he struggled. But he has some work to do during the pre-draft process to rehabilitate his stock.
The Hawks could use more instant offense in the backcourt behind Trae Young and Dejounte Murray when the team staggers them off the bench, especially with Bogdan Bogdanović beginning to age. Smith’s ability to play as an off-ball cutter and mover would play well next to either of those two guards.
Nick Smith Jr. (Joe Camporeale / USA Today)
17. Utah Jazz (via MIN)
Leonard Miller | 6-10 forward | 19 years old | G League Ignite
NBA evaluators are all over the map on Leonard Miller. Some think his feel for the game is extremely limited – he’s a 6-foot-10 four who doesn’t really shoot it well enough yet and still is working through learning how to play defense. They often aren’t sure his game will translate to the NBA. Others around the league, however, see an uncut gem with terrific tools such as a 9-foot standing reach, an ability to grab-and-go to lead the fast break and skill to finish on the interior.
What’s undeniable, however, is the production. Over Miller’s final 13 games of the G League season, he averaged 20.3 points, 13 rebounds, 2.4 assists and a steal and a block per game while shooting 54 percent from the field. That made him a top-25 scorer and the No. 2 rebounder in the league over that time. The shot needs some work, and he needs to live in the film room for the next couple of years to improve his defensive reactivity. But it’s difficult to find teenagers with this kind of size who can play on the wing and produce.
The Jazz have a lot of first-rounders and can take a risk on the plus-positional-size, plus-skill intersection at which Miller resides.
18. Golden State Warriors
Kyle Filipowski | 6-11 big | 19 years old | Duke
Kyle Filipowski was Duke’s best, most consistent player this season. He’s a tough rebounder and has intriguing ball skills for someone who is nearly 7-foot tall. He can create his shot and has real coordination with the ball that has the potential to make him a matchup nightmare. I also think he’s an underrated defensive player; he plays upright, but he has agility and can slide his feet reasonably well. The issue for Filipowski is that he’s a big who is neither a rim protector or a shooter at this point (he made just 28.2 percent from 3 this season). But he has real upside as a shooter, with nice touch and some workable mechanical flaws.
The Warriors love guys like this who are smart and know how to move with and without the ball. If the shooting comes around, he could be something of an answer at the center position who actually fits well within what Steve Kerr asks of his big men.
19. Houston Rockets (via LAC)
Brice Sensabaugh | 6-6 wing | 19 years old | Ohio State
Brice Sensabaugh declared for the draft over the weekend, noting that he’d be retaining his collegiate eligibility. Much like all of the players in this range, he is a bit polarizing for scouts. Some worry about his lack of defensive acumen; Ohio State often had to remove him for critical possessions because of his struggles off the ball and issues when involved in on-ball actions. However, most scouts think his offense outweighs those concerns. Sensabaugh is a three-level scorer, as he averaged 16 points per game while shooting 48 percent from the field and 40 percent from 3 this season. He’s a terrific shot creator in the midrange already, with a deep bag of tricks to separate and get the extra space he needs to fire up a consistent look. The Rockets have tended to value scorers and guys who produce at younger ages under this Rafael Stone-led front office.
One note with Sensabaugh: He missed Ohio State’s final two games of the season with a knee injury from the Big Ten tournament, and there has not yet been a substantial update. Teams will want to confirm the injury is not serious in any way.
20. Brooklyn Nets (via PHX)
Kris Murray | 6-8 wing | 22 years old | Iowa
Kris Murray is considered one of the safer bets in this class to be a solid rotation player. He’s not his brother, Keegan – Kris’ shot isn’t quite as versatile and he’s not quite as fluid athletically as the current Sacramento Kings rookie. But Kris is 6-foot-8 and averaged 20 points, eight rebounds and two assists per game this season, plus has enough touch to where you should be able to project him as a solid spot-up shooter moving forward. Per Synergy, he made 41 percent of his catch-and-shoot 3s this season. That’s a projectable skill, even if he’s not going to necessarily be running off wild actions and creating them himself.
The Nets love these big wings who have good positional size and can shoot. Murray will also bring some strength, rebounding and transition play to the equation as a combo forward as well. If Murray’s catch-and-shoot jumper translates like it should, it’s hard to see him failing.
21. Brooklyn Nets
Kobe Bufkin | 6-4 guard | 19 years old | Michigan
Kobe Bufkin rose up boards this season as he began to outperform most freshmen in college basketball. Bufkin is a sophomore, but he’s actually younger than his teammate Jett Howard and hit college a year earlier than necessary. That fostered some real growth, as Bufkin is in the process of becoming the kind of guard who can successfully play both on and off the ball regularly. He averaged 14 points, 4.5 rebounds and 2.9 assists this season while shooting 48 percent from the field, 35 percent from 3 and 85 percent from the line. No freshman this season averaged at least 14 points, 4.5 rebounds and 2.5 assists, and only Colorado guard K.J. Simpson joined Bufkin on this list among high-major sophomores. Bufkin needs to work on his frame, but he is becoming the preferred Michigan prospect between he and Howard.
The Nets have a couple of picks this year and already have a lot of younger depth players under contract, so they can afford to take a swing on a young guard who could become a starting-quality player in time.
*INGRAM*ALLSTARSEASON* Wemby is HIM - Top 5 Player this year
