With the NBA G League season nearly over and the NCAA tournament around the corner, Oklahoma State guard Cade Cunningham remains atop experts’ big boards for the 2021 NBA draft. The freshman capped off an impressive regular season by being named the Big 12 Player of the Year and Freshman of the Year, as the conference announced in a press release.
Cunningham averaged 19.7 points, 6.3 rebounds, and 3.5 assists per game with a .455/.425/.854 shooting line in 22 contests (35.1 MPG) in his first – and almost certainly only – college season. He’ll get a chance to further cement his claim as 2021’s top prospect in this week’s Big 12 tournament and during March Madness. Oklahoma State was banned from the postseason for a year, but their appeal to overturn that penalty is still pending, making the program eligible for the NCAA Tournament.
Here’s more on the 2021 NBA draft:
- Sam Vecenie of The Athletic takes a look at the top shooters in the 2021 draft class, identifying WCC Player of the Year Corey Kispert (Gonzaga) as the No. 1 option. Joe Wieskamp (Iowa), Sam Hauser (Virginia), Isaiah Livers (Michigan), and Trey Murphy (Virginia) round out Vecenie’s top five.
- The G League Ignite’s season is over, as the NBAGL’s select team – which features projected top-five picks Jalen Green and Jonathan Kuminga – was knocked out of the single-elimination postseason by the Raptors 905 on Monday. Jonathan Givony of ESPN (Insider link) examines what we learned about the Ignite’s prospects in the G League bubble, writing that Isaiah Todd boosted his stock with his play down the stretch, while Daishen Nix struggled a little. Todd is considered a first-round prospect by many NBA teams, but Nix is looking more like a second-rounder than a potential lottery pick, Givony adds.
- The most recent big boards from Givony and Mike Schmitz at ESPN and from Jonathan Wasserman of Bleacher Report have plenty of similarities in the lottery, but there are a few notable differences. Connecticut’s James Bouknight is No. 6 on Wasserman’s board and just 11th on ESPN’s, while Tennessee’s Jaden Springer is ranked 12th by Wasserman and all the way down at No. 39 by ESPN. Meanwhile, ESPN ranks Auburn’s Sharife Cooper and Kispert as top-10 prospects, while Wasserman has them 17th and 18th, respectively.
It’s nice to see Knicks winning again but now they will end up at the end of the lottery. Hopefully Mavs miss playoffs to increase the chances of a top pick.
The point of the league is to win, not to get high draft picks. The NBA Draft is supposed to be a consolation prize for LOSERS, not the end goal for teams.
14 lottery teams are losers. You win by getting high draft picks. Doesn’t mean you tank. You play young players and trade for assets if you can. At some point it’s best to play for next yr. This is the time to give young players mind. To try new combinations. Nothing wrong with building a better product
Never get why fans wanna see their teams suck for years and years just so they can hope they get a high pick. Knicks have drafted plenty of duds over the years. Was it worth losing for guys like Kevin Knox and Ntilikina?
Obviously teams (and their fans) want to win. The Knicks are an outlier as a big market team that has struggled to attract top free agents and also can’t develop talent. The worst thing any team can do is be average…not good enough to win a championship but not bad enough to have a chance at drafting a player that might be considered something close to a star. While I don’t want to speak on behalf of any Magic fans out there, they are basically the perfect example. The Magic haven’t been good enough for a championship the past 5+ years, but not bad enough to have a high draft pick. They’re stuck in this weird spot where they have to decide between competing by building around Vucevic or blowing it all up and trying to find a stud in the draft.
If Cade said that he was foregoing the rest of the college season because he did not want to risk his professional career to a possible injury should that be held against him?
I say no. He has shown what he can do and there is not a whole lot more he has to prove. Why risk generational money for a small chance at winning an “amateur” medal?
Quitting is not a good habit
you could easily argue any one and done is quitting. the big issue is if you can plat basketball. unless it looks like you’re going to be disengaged at the next level then its not a big deal.
It is not quitting. It is a business decision. Agents, coaches, owners, big-time universities all know and treat it as a business. College players are expected to be all sappy and emotional and loyal. Once they went to one and done the next step is less than 1 and done. It’s just business.
It’s quitting on his teammates. Finish the season. You train and play with them all season just to leave them hanging when the tournament comes? That’s weak. If guys don’t want to play then sit out and train like Bazley did. I think guys doing that just teaches them to be selfish and soft. Gonna have a bunch of Karl Anthony-Towns kind of guys coming up.
Dude you should quit while you are behind, right?
I mean you come across as very ignorant when you say stuff like that ’bout KAT, facts!
It will be nice to see Cade on rockets, pistons or wolves. Those teams desperately need talent in a big way. The fit with pistons and grant is a bit weird seeing as they are very similar but who knows
They would trade Grant away
i wonder how teams will view Ignite guys. is it fair to say that the G-League is better competition then anything but high ranked college competition. id tend to imagine most pro competition would rank above most college competition, but you never know.
It’s the future.
1/ Kuminga
2/ Green
3/ Cunningham
4/ Mobley
5/ Suggs
This is a deep draft, deep 1st rd. You can find gems this yr. Top pick could be associated with team need this yr. Top 5 picks could all go #1. Cade is a big talent I see him more as a SF. Suggs is more of a true PG to me. A guy like Roko Prkacin from Croatia could be special. Someone I hope Knicks look at, should be top 20 is Ayo Dosunmu. From Illinois University a big scoring PG. Roko is considered a 4 by some scouts. I see him as a big SF big upside still young.