If the NCAA remains the royal road to access the NBA as a big “prospect”, especially since the introduction in July 2021 of the NIL, which allows student-athletes to sign sponsorship contracts, other alternative avenues are taking scale for several years, and are more and more popular.
The 2023 Draft was of course the most indisputable proof of this, since four of the first five choices of the ceremony have never played the slightest on the university circuit this season (Victor Wembanyama in the French championship, Scoot Henderson in the G-League and twins Amen and Ausar Thompson in Overtime Elite).
At the top of the list of these alternative options, there is obviously the Ignite Team, formed in April 2020, a real training center for young talents within the NBA antechamber and which today clearly appears as the rival NCAA leader in the field of recruiting the best “prospects”.
The latest recruitment, won by Team Ignite? That of Matas Buzelis.
Tipped as the potential first choice of the 2024 Draft, the 18-year-old Lithuanian winger has indeed decided to turn professional in the G-League at the start of the school year to prepare for the NBA, rather than opting for the NCAA where certain behemoths had tried to recruit him (Kentucky, UCLA, North Carolina, Kansas, Duke and Arizona, among others).
A profile… too modern for the NCAA?
Guest of the last episode of the show “The Old Man & The Three” by JJ Redick, who questioned him about this decision, Matas Buzelis thus gave the why and how behind this choice.
” I think I am a particular player. University is obviously a great option. Most players who are drafted go through a university. But I think that compared to my style of play, the option of a professional league is the best decision. », he explained. ” And then at the end of the day, I want to go to the NBA, I want to end up professional in any case. »
What the native of Chicago means is that he is part of a line of “freaks” with physical dimensions and mind-blowing technical qualities, a bit like Victor Wembanyama, whom it is difficult to fit into boxes.
In his case, Matas Buzelis is thus a 2m10 winger, trained younger as a playmaker and who kept the “skillset” of this position as he grew up. And the university circuit, where the game is still sometimes very “old school”, is actually not the best context to fully exploit its qualities and potential.
An observation brilliantly summarized by JJ Redick.
” When I looked at the NBA when I was younger, there was point guard, guard, winger, power forward and center. Positions were clearly defined, so players were largely placed in roles, in boxes. And in some ways, college basketball still operates with the same pattern today. “, he noted as well, before finding that a boy like Matas Buzelis embodies more broadly a structural change, in progress, in the way of playing basketball in the NBA. ” guys like [Matas Buzelis]like Giannis [Antetokounmpo]or as Victor [Wembanyama] years from now will inspire a generation of kids who will watch the NBA, and will witness an era in which there will be virtually no positions left, and in which every player can play in the way that puts the most highlight their respective qualities. »
And therefore an era during which the NCAA could lose its luster, faced with the uninterrupted modernization of the profiles of players at the professional level…
