The 2012 NBA Draft is scheduled for Thursday, June 28, in New York City. As we have done for the last several years, RTC’s team of writers (including Andrew Murawa, Kevin Doyle, Evan Jacoby, Matt Patton, and Danny Spewak) will provide comprehensive breakdowns of each of the 35 collegians most likely to hear his name called by David Stern in the first round on draft night. We’ll work backwards, starting with players who are projected near the end of the first round before getting into the lottery as June progresses. As an added bonus, we’ll also bring you a scouting take from NBADraft.net’s Aran Smith at the bottom of each player evaluation.

Note: Click here for all published 2012 NBA Draft profiles.

Player Name: Tony Wroten, Jr.

School: Washington

Height/Weight: 6’6”, 205 lbs.

NBA Position: Combo Guard

Projected Draft Range: Mid-First Round

Tony Wroten, Jr. Has Plenty of NBA-Caliber Traits, But Needs To Patch Some Glaring Holes

Overview: Tony Wroten heads into the NBA Draft as one of the most divisive figures in recent memory; if you ask two different people their opinion on him, you’re likely to get two (or more) different takes. For instance, in his lone season in Seattle, there were plenty of people who considered him the best player in the conference and a strong contender for conference player of the year, while there were others (me included) for whom Wroten wasn’t even on the radar for second-team all-conference. There is little doubt that he has all the physical tools necessary to become an excellent NBA player, but to this point in time, for every eye-popping positive that Wroten brings to his team, there is one serious negative to go alongside it. He’s got a great first step and a willingness to get into the lane and try to make plays, often drawing fouls along the way, but once he gets to the line he’s flat out a bad free throw shooter. He’s got brilliant court vision and is able to make spectacular passes to set up teammates for easy hoops, but far too often makes the difficult play rather than the easy one, resulting in a nearly 1:1 assist to turnover ratio. He possesses quick hands and good defensive instincts but gambles far too much leaving himself out of position and his team at a disadvantage. His entire “career” at Washington was summed up in the Huskies’ final Pac-12 Tournament game, where Wroten was spectacular in the second half, scoring 17 of a career-high 29 points, only to miss four straight free throws in the final 18 seconds to effectively end the Huskies’ NCAA Tournament hopes. As of right now, that’s what you get with Wroten; you’ve got to take the good with the bad. But, he’s got the talent to clean up his numerous shortcomings and become an impact player at the next level; it’s a matter of seeing who will roll the dice in the hopes that improvement comes.

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The Big East sent more teams (nine) to last year’s NCAA Tournament than any other conference, while the SEC compiled the best winning percentage (.769) during the Big Dance. The two leagues are squaring off next season in the second annual SEC/Big East Challenge, whose matchups were announced on Friday. With plenty to offer in the form of juggernaut teams and program traditions, the idea of this event should provide great intrigue to the non-conference season, something the Big Ten and ACC have done in their cross-conference challenge for the past 14 years. Next year’s slate doesn’t look nearly as enticing as some were hoping for — UConn, Louisville, and Missouri aren’t participating, while Syracuse is in but wants out – and our SEC microsite broke down the lack of headline games on the schedule. Nonetheless, we can’t overlook this event that allows for top conference teams to play true road games against other power leagues. Last season, Georgetown played at Alabama in one of the most entertaining games of the entire non-conference slate, and that game didn’t garner much publicity at all. The Big East came away victorious, 8-4, in last year’s event. Here’s what the 2012 SEC/Big East Challenge presents us.

Mike Brey and the Fighting Irish Like Their Chances Against the National Champs Next Year (AP Photo)

Youth vs. Experience, Kentucky at Notre Dame (Nov. 29) – Notre Dame returns all five starters from last season; Kentucky returns none. But both teams have high hopes next year, as the Fighting Irish bring back the entire core from a team that went 13-5 in the Big East while the National Champion Wildcats showcase the nation’s number two recruiting class of SEC-ready stars. Both programs have decorated pasts with loyal fanbases; each team is ranked in the RTC preseason Top 25. What’s not to love about this matchup? A Kentucky-Syracuse game would have garnered more hype, but this matchup could produce a better game. Who wins out, the young guns or the vets? We should get a great read on the new crop of UK freshmen in this their first real road test.

Seeking Sweet Revenge, Marquette at Florida (Nov. 29) – These two teams squared off in last year’s Sweet Sixteen, when the Gators ended the Golden Eagles’ season and Jae Crowder and Darius Johnson-Odom’s careers. Buzz Williams’ boys are looking for revenge in Gainesville, though both teams will look a lot different from last season. Florida loses its own pair of stars (Erving Walker, Bradley Beal) but Kenny Boynton and Patric Young are back to form one of the nation’s most threatening inside-out duos. Each team must call on a host of young players that showed promise last year but have to step into more prominent roles in 2012-’13. There’s plenty of intrigue in this one, though Florida is the strong favorite at home.

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1. The big news over the weekend was the announcement by Devonta Pollard that he would be heading to Alabama next season. The addition of a McDonald’s All-American is a big deal for any program (ok, they might not go nuts over someone who is “just” a McDonald’s All-American in Lexington these days), but it is an even bigger deal for a Crimson Tide program that did not have a single player signed for the class of 2012. Pollard, who is already 6’7″ and 200 pounds, joins a team that was talented, but erratic last year will be missing two key pieces in the form of JaMychal Green and Tony Mitchell. We do not expect Pollard to jump into that role right away, but in a few years could help them become a similar caliber team.
2. It seems like the media loves to talk about all the incoming McDonald’s All-Americans and the impact that they will have in college. Occasionally we like to talk about the players who are “embodying” the college spirit by eschewing the lure of NBA millions to come back for their sophomore or junior year. We very rarely talk about seniors like that and for good reason as most of the players talented enough to play in the NBA are already there by this point. However, as Andy Glockner points out that does not mean that there are not some seniors who are expected to have a significant impact next season. These guys will not win any national player of the year awards, but they could decide a few conference championships and maybe even the national championship.
3. There are always rumors floating around illegal recruiting at top programs across the country and when those rumors come out we are usually surprised, but never shocked. When the rumors come out of Idaho State we are shocked. According to reports, the school was reported by former interim head coach Deane Martin after he got passed over for the full-time job. Martin reportedly sent a letter to the school’s athletic director informing him of a booster who was willing to pay to bring players into the program. The investigation, which was prompted when the school and Martin reported the allegations, is still ongoing so it is difficult to assess the validity of these statements although it seems strange that the former coach would falsely report violations that occurred under his watch, but we have seen stranger things that have happened.
4. ESPN released a list of its highest rated college basketball metro markets for the past college basketball season. As with all surveys it is important to look for any flaws in the methodology including the fact that it does not include markets like Lexington, which would probably win in a landslide if it were included. Leaving that shortcoming aside for a moment, the list is fairly instructive in that the vast majority of college basketball that is broadcast at a national level flows through ESPN. The top of the list is about what you would expect with the most interesting rankings being the relative order of some of these cities, but the one that sticks out the most is Knoxville particularly with the relatively weak team that they fielded there this season.
5. Some sad news from late last week as two prominent names in basketball yore passed away from complications related to illnesses — Jack Twyman, at age 78, and Orlando Woolridge, at age 52. Twyman isn’t very well-known these days, having played largely in the pre-television era of athletics, but he is a Hall of Famer who once scored 59 points in an NBA game and became in the 1959-60 season the first player in history to average over 30 PPG for a season (31.2). He played at Cincinnati from 1951-55 and became an All-American during his senior season when he averaged 24.6 PPG and 16.5 RPG — to this day, he remains one of only three Bearcats whose jerseys have been retired at Cincinnati, but his contributions beyond basketball may have been his more lasting legacy. Woolridge is better known as both a Los Angeles Laker (where he helped Magic and Kareem’s Showtime Lakers win their last title in 1988) and as a member of Digger Phelps’ Notre Dame Fighting Irish teams (where he helped Phelps make his only Final Four in 1978). He was an All-American in 1981 for the Irish, and became a part of the school’s giant-killing lore by hitting a jumper that year to knock off then-#1, riding a 28-game winning streak, Virginia Cavaliers, in what appers to be one of the earlier RTCs we’ve yet seen. RIP to both basketball legends.

The 2012 NBA Draft is scheduled for Thursday, June 28, in New York City. As we have done for the last several years, RTC’s team of writers (including Andrew Murawa, Kevin Doyle, Evan Jacoby, Matt Patton, and Danny Spewak) will provide comprehensive breakdowns of each of the 35 collegians most likely to hear his name called by David Stern in the first round on draft night. We’ll work backwards, starting with players who are projected near the end of the first round before getting into the lottery as June progresses. As an added bonus, we’ll also bring you a scouting take from NBADraft.net’s Aran Smith at the bottom of each player evaluation.

Note: Click here for all published 2012 NBA Draft profiles.

Player Name: Draymond Green

School: Michigan State

Height/Weight: 6’6” / 235 lbs.

NBA Position: Small Forward

Projected Draft Range: Late First/Early Second Round

Will Draymond Continue To Smile Against NBA Competition?

Overview: Perhaps the best and worst thing about Draymond Green is that he is a basketball player. It might seem like an odd statement to make, but part of the problem with projecting the Michigan State All-American is figuring out exactly what kind of position he will play in the NBA. In college, he did a little bit of everything and to be fair he did it all very well, but there was not one aspect of his game that jumps out at you. Unfortunately, the ability to do everything tends to be undervalued in many ways by the NBA when it comes to drafting players because teams are more focused on finding players with elite level talents to fit into the team game with the exception of a handful of well-rounded superstars. Still Draymond does a couple of things — rebounding and outside shooting, in particular — well enough that plenty of teams will be willing to take a chance on him even if gets passed over by several players who were not near the caliber of player that he was in East Lansing. Green’s all-around ability — averaging 16.2 points, 10.6 rebounds, and 3.8 assists per game as a senior — may not be fully utilized in the NBA, but a few of his skills should be showcased at the next level.

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The conclusion of Wednesday’s NBA Draft Lottery means that the 2012 order has been decided (outside of potential trades), and we can officially start breaking down the potential scenarios come Draft Day on June 28. There are plenty of mock drafts available at this time, and we are compiling our own scouting reports of the top prospects as well. But besides the tough decisions that general managers have to make in comparing and contrasting players, what are the major storylines of this particular draft? What moves will make off-court headlines in addition to adding talent on the court? Today we take a look at some of the most interesting stories that could potentially play out on June 28.

Could Harrison Barnes End Up Back in Carolina, With the Charlotte Bobcats? (AP Photo)

• The Hornets won Wednesday’s lottery, which means consensus top prospect Anthony Davis is surely headed to New Orleans, the city where he just finished winning a National Championship with Kentucky. Davis recently led the Wildcats to two wins in New Orleans in early April while being named the Final Four Most Outstanding Player, and he appears excited to be heading back for good. “I won a national championship in New Orleans, so why not win another one in New Orleans,” he said on Wednesday. “This can kind of bring joy back to New Orleans, I guess I get lucky when I go there.” The honor, opportunity, and paycheck of a number one overall pick is plenty enough to get a player excited, but not all teams are an ideal fit for each year’s top prospect. Davis, though, is quite comfortable with the idea of being the Hornets’ franchise player, where he will man the middle for a team with a nice young roster and brand new ownership.

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1. We loved the Carrier Classic, but we are also hoping that this doesn’t become some sort of fad where the game loses its appeal because there are so many variations on it. Having said that we fully support the idea of involving military schools in these type of games as they appear set to do this season for the All-Military Classic. According to reports, there is a 95% chance that the event will be held on the USS Yorktown this November. The event, which features Air Force, Virginia Military Institute, Citadel, and Army, would be held a day or two after the Carrier Classic, which is scheduled for November 9. Given the possibility of holding the event so close to Veterans Day this one seems like a no-brainer.
2. Brown is set to introduce Mike Martin, a member of the class of 2004, as its next head coach at a conference scheduled for this afternoon. Martin, who has served as an assistant at Penn for the last six years in Philadelphia after following Glen Miller there after Miller left Brown. The Brown administration is clearly hoping for a change of direction as the last coach–Jesse Agel–went 39-79 overall and 14-42 in the Ivy league during his four years at the helm. In contrast, Martin’s senior class went 39-17 during his four years as a player. With the rise of Harvard and the other traditional Ivy League powers it might be too much to ask of Martin to win a conference title in the next few years, but he should be able to make them relevant in the Ivy League again.
3. After a year wandering around Los Angeles UCLA will return to Pauley Pavilion with their opening game in the renovated arena happening on November 9 against Indiana State. In addition to having a set opener the Bruins also released the rest of their schedule for the 2012-13 season. Outside of the home opener the two other notable non-conference games are a trip to Houston to play Texas and a home game against Missouri. However, the thing that we are most looking forward to is seeing the re-opening with a loaded Bruins team playing at home again with what should be a star-studded crowd.
4. It might not be a mark your calendars type of game, but if you are looking for a game that the media will hype up this year you should be aware of a game on December 19 featuring Louisville and Florida International. In previous years, this would have been an interesting enough match-up that featured Rick Pitino coaching against Isiah Thomas, but this year it gets a little juicier as Rick will be coaching against his son Richard, the new coach at FIU. Despite some probably apocryphal or at the very least staged trash talk, we suspect that this game will be a dud as Louisville comes in as a potential #1 team in the country while FIU will be another entity left in the wake of the post-NBA playing career Isiah Thomas.
5. In a sign of its commitment to higher education, the Big 12 reaffirmed yesterday that it is content at 10 member institutions for now. Outside of the amusing fact that the Big 12 will have 10 schools while the Big Ten will have 12 schools in it, we do not believe for a second that the Big 12 does not want to expand, which is something that the conference even admits it would be willing to do if the right opportunity comes. The most logical option for expansion continues to be Notre Dame, which is hesitant to do so thanks to their own lucrative TV contract for football and the ridiculous deal they receive from the BCS, which they have not been able to take advantage of much recently. Of course, if and when they end up at 11 schools you can be sure that the 12th school will not be too far behind in order to balance out the conference.

Who’s Got Next? is a weekly column by Josh Paunil, the RTC recruiting guru. We encourage you to check out his website dedicated solely to college basketball recruiting, National Recruiting Spotlight, for more detailed recruiting information. Once a week he will bring you an overview of what’s going on in the complex world of recruiting, from who is signing where among the seniors to who the hot prospects are at the lower levels of the sport. If you have any suggestions as to areas we are missing or different things you would like to see, please let us know at rushthecourt@yahoo.com.

Lead Story: Top-100 Nigel Williams-Goss Commits To Washington

Class of 2013 Point Guard Williams-Goss Is A Great Pick-up for Washington.

Huskies Off To A Good Start In Junior Class. Class of 2013 point guard Nigel Williams-Goss announced his commitment to Washington yesterday via Twitter and a player blog on National Recruiting Spotlight, giving the Huskies their first verbal in the junior class. Williams-Goss chose the Huskies over Harvard, Oklahoma, UNLV, and UCLA and held offers from a plethora of other schools including Missouri, Arizona and his hometown Oregon Ducks. The Findlay Prep point guard is a standout on the defensive end and has good stop-and-go quickness. He also has terrific range on his three-point shot and is a good passer with matching court vision. Williams-Goss already has plans to hit the recruiting trail for Washington and has named Class of 2013 standouts such as shooting guard Isaac Hamilton and power forwards Aaron Gordon and Marcus Lee as his targets. Head coach Lorenzo Romar is also chasing after shooting guard Jabari Bird and power forward Jordan Bell, among others. Gordon is a Washington lean and Bird is interested in the Huskies so if Romar can close out on those two, Washington looks to have a very good recruiting class in 2013 in the making. Washington fans will have plenty of opportunities to see Williams-Goss next year as his Findlay Prep team will likely play in multiple televised games on the ESPN family of networks.

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The NBA Draft is scheduled for Thursday, June 28, in New York City. As we have done for the last several years, RTC’s team of writers (including Andrew Murawa, Kevin Doyle, Evan Jacoby, Matt Patton, and Danny Spewak) will provide comprehensive breakdowns of each of the 35 collegians most likely to hear his name called by David Stern in the first round on draft night. We’ll generally work backwards, so for the next week or two we’ll present you with players who are projected near the end of the first round, and we’ll work our way up into the lottery as June progresses. As an added bonus, we’ll also bring you a scouting take from NBADraft.net’s Aran Smith at the bottom of each player evaluation.

Note: Click here for all published 2012 NBA Draft profiles.

Player Name: Royce White

School: Iowa State

Height/Weight: 6’8”, 270 pounds

NBA Position: Power Forward

Projected Draft Range: Late First Round

Royce White Turned Iowa State Into an NCAA Team (AP)

Overview: Before Royce White ever played a college basketball game, he made headlines for all the wrong reasons as a freshman at Minnesota. After signing with Tubby Smith’s program, he ran into legal trouble in a theft incident at the Mall of America, earning himself a quick suspension. He never stepped on the court with the Gophers, and he left the school by creating an Internet sensation through a bizarre YouTube video (now defunct). By the time he became eligible  after transferring to Iowa State, White’s bad boy image defined him as a player. And yet it took all of about five minutes for everybody to remember why he was a blue-chip recruit out of high school. In his first collegiate game, he torched Lehigh (yes, that Lehigh) for 25 points and a double-double. As the season progressed, he made a name for himself as a do-it-all point forward, the kind of matchup nightmare that led Missouri coach Frank Haith to compare him to Magic Johnson (to which White called “outrageous,” of course). He stormed through Big 12 play with double-double after double-double, leading the Cyclones to a surprising third-place finish and the program’s first NCAA Tournament appearance since 2005. White was the obvious choice for Newcomer of the Year in the league, as well as first team All-Big 12 honors.

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1. The NBA Draft Lottery was held on Wednesday evening immediately prior to the Eastern Conference Finals between Miami and Boston, and it appears that the winner of the Anthony Davis Sweepstakes will be the New Orleans Hornets. Interestingly, for the eighth straight season, the team with the worst record in the NBA — the Charlotte Bobcats this time around — did not receive the top overall pick. Michael Jordan’s team is relegated to the second slot, where a number of collegiate stars including Kansas’ Thomas Robinson, Florida’s Bradley Beal, Kentucky’s Michael Kidd-Gilchrist, and Connecticut’s Andre Drummond will be in the mix. Keep an eye on NBADraft.net and DraftExpress over the next few weeks to track player movement up and down the board. Also keep in mind that we here at RTC are in the midst of breaking down the top 35 collegians as we head through June into draft season (with an assist from NBADraft.net). We’ve evaluated quite a few of the guys so far who are hovering at the bottom of the first round in most projections, with plenty more to come in the next few weeks.
2. Conference realignment theater is the longest running show in college basketball, and Luke Winn takes the opportunity to examine a question that far too many schools — especially at the mid-major level — fail to ask themselves: Is an upgrade in conference affiliation actually better for our programs, especially our marquee ones? For a strong basketball mid-major from a one-bid conference like Davidson, would Bob McKillop’s program be better to position itself as the dominant program in a weakened SoCon (possibly losing College of Charleston and Appalachian State); or would the stronger play be to move up to the CAA and hope that the conference remains a multiple-bid league even after removing VCU, Old Dominion and Georgia State from its ranks? It’s a very tough exercise in risk assessment, and one that we don’t envy Davidson administrators having to make.
3. From the department of they-take-themselves-way-too-seriously, it appears that Kentucky and Indiana still can’t play nice and learn to compromise with each other in a way that will give college basketball fans (which, at last check, was comprised of legions of UK and IU fans) what they want — a regular series between two regional rivals that rank among the top six programs in the history of the sport. After initial talks stalled, records show that Indiana suggested a four-year deal that included the next two games at neutral site Lucas Oil Stadium in Indianapolis, followed by a home-and-home the next two years. Kentucky rejected the offer, citing problems with the initial dates proposed and other red herrings as reasons to not play the game. All hand-wringingn aside, the bottom line is this — so long as Calipari remains in Lexington, the Wildcats will not return to Assembly Hall in Bloomington. It’s up to you to figure out why.
4. We continue on with our SEC version of the M5 today with news that the league’s head coaches have agreed upon a scheduling format for the new 14-team conference beginning next year. We already knew that the league was moving to an 18-game schedule, but it remained unclear how they planned on instituting the rotation. The answer to that question is that each school will be paired with a ‘permanent’ rival that it will play twice each season, four other schools that it will play twice, and eight schools that it will play once to get to 18 games. The rivalry pairings — Kentucky-Florida, Tennessee-Vanderbilt, South Carolina-Georgia, Auburn-Alabama, Mississippi State-Ole Miss, LSU-Texas A&M, Arkansas-Missouri — make sense with the exception of the addition of the two former Big 12 schools. Forgiving geographic considerations of proximity, it probably would have been better to keep LSU-Arkansas as rivals and pair the two new schools together from our viewpoint. This format will result in an unbalanced schedule, but at least each team will see everyone else in the league once.
5. Finally, one of those SEC schools goes by the name of Auburn, and at least on the hardwood, the Tigers have been an unmitigated disaster for the better part of a decade. If you’re interested in learning how a school with the financial resources of Auburn ($104M in revenue in 2010-11) cannot figure out how to back its way into an NCAA Tournament bid every now and again (last appearance: 2003), this article by AL.com traces its roots of futility back to an athletic department in chaos eight years ago. While we’re sure that there are downstream issues still present as a result of those mistakes many years ago, what is left out of the article is that basketball simply isn’t taken seriously at a place like Auburn. The fans and boosters don’t demand even so much as mediocrity; so a moribund program is what they’ve gotten.

The 2012 NBA Draft is scheduled for Thursday, June 28, in New York City. As we have done for the last several years, RTC’s team of writers (including Andrew Murawa, Kevin Doyle, Evan Jacoby, Matt Patton, and Danny Spewak) will provide comprehensive breakdowns of each of the 35 collegians most likely to hear his name called by David Stern in the first round on draft night. We’ll work backwards, starting with players who are projected near the end of the first round before getting into the lottery as June progresses. As an added bonus, we’ll also bring you a scouting take from NBADraft.net’s Aran Smith at the bottom of each player evaluation.

Note: Click here for all published 2012 NBA Draft profiles.

Player Name: Andrew Nicholson

School: St. Bonaventure

Height/Weight: 6’9” / 225 lbs.

NBA Position: Power Forward

Projected Draft Range: Late First Round

Andrew Nicholson Was a Versatile Threat on Both Ends for St. Bonaventure (AP Photo)

Overview: Despite playing four years in the Atlantic 10 and being productive from the minute he stepped on the floor as a freshman, Andrew Nicholson has long been an under-the-radar prospect. That is, until recently, when he led St. Bonaventure to its first NCAA Tournament appearance since 2000 and nearly led the Bonnies to a stunning upset of #3-seed Florida State in the first round — putting up 20 points, seven rebounds, and two blocks, in line with his senior season averages. In that game, the 6’9” beast also extended out and hit 4-5 shots from three-point range, a new skill he’s added to his game that makes him an even more intriguing prospect. Nicholson is a bit undersized for a true power forward/center, but explosiveness around the rim allowed him to average two blocks per game for his college career, and he’s always a threat to throw down dunks near the basket. He was asked to do a lot for his team in college and was always the point of emphasis on opponents’ scouting reports, which perhaps helps explain his struggle with turnovers throughout his career. He was very productive from day one and shot an outstanding 57.4% from the field for his career. Nicholson is a rare senior that’s just now rising up draft boards, as his array of skills provides the potential for great upside outside of the lottery.

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