2017 NBA Draft: The Biggest Winners From The NCAA Tournament’s Opening Weekend

Analyzing the five biggest NBA Draft prospect winners from the opening weekend of the NCAA Tournament

It is the one of the most wonderful time of year, folks – March Madness – where you get to watch the same commercials over and over again, and become anxious rooting for non-NBA teams you normally pay zero attention to.

Personally I have watched a lot of basketball, and by that I mean just about every single game that’s happened over the course of the past couple of days, because you can never have enough basketball. While my brain is still processing all the action I’ve seen over the past couple of days, there’s still a lot of basketball to be played; and that means the inevitable – opinions are going to change.

Change isn’t always a bad thing, but it can really harm (or help) a prospect’s NBA Draft stock once their team is done in the tournament.

I think another viable reason that they call it March Madness is because scouts go crazy trying to evaluate prospects. Take for instance Marial Shayok, Virginia’s (I guess you call him?) 6th man. He scored 23 points (8-14 shooting, 3-5 from 3-point land) in the first round in a scare from UNCW. Then in the next round, Virginia only managed 39 points as a team, and Shayok scored just 7 points (2-9 shooting, 1-3 from 3); which is closer to his season scoring average of 8.9 PPG.

Now to be fair, Virginia’s awful offensive showing against the Gators was a mixture of strong defense on Florida’s part, and Virginia as a team just being ineffective; but Shayok is just one case out of many that scouts will have to decide – is Shayok the guy that showed up against UNCW, or the guy that disappeared against the Gators?

Again, and I cannot stress this enough, the tournament is a small sample size for any casual fan or NBA scout alike – whether the prospect’s team gets bounced in the Round of 64, or wins the national championship – they’re only playing a maximum of six games, and (obviously) a minimum of one.

Some guys don’t even make it into the Round of 64, but a big game (even in the play-in games) can start turning peoples’ heads. For instance, I had never heard of Miles Wilson until the other night, and I live less than 30 minutes away from Mount St. Mary’s. They might have lost to Villanova, but don’t think someone didn’t write his name down just because they lost.

Speaking of Villanova, while I am genuinely surprised they are no longer playing (credit to the Badgers), Josh Hart will still probably be drafted in the 1st round. Not every loss is really a loss, but there can be hollow victories. Are you picking up what I’m putting down reader?

The final couple of case studies are Buddy Buckets, Kemba Walker, and Shabazz Napier. Buddy Hield wasn’t really on anyone’s radar until he propelled Oklahoma deep into the tournament the past few years, and did so on increasingly impressive three-point shooting. Who can forget Shabazz Napier and Cardiac Kemba’s runs? Those UConn teams were fun. While the then Bobcats took a risk on Kemba, he turned out to be a starting-caliber PG. Napier is mainly riding the bench in Portland and is on his third team already despite only being 25. Buddy Buckets is trying to find his footing after being traded in his rookie season. Nothing is guaranteed, even when you get to the pros.

With all of that being said, I’m here to sort out who are the winners from this weekend – not the literal winners – but instead, those prospects that have really boosted their NBA Draft stock.

I’m going to break it down position-by-position.

Without further ado…