Being raised exclusively as a NBA fan (and attending a “non-athletic school”1) probably has something to do with this, but I’ve always been somewhat dismissive towards collegiate sports in general, with a particular apathy towards college basketball until March rolls around. It’s tough for me to stomach the drop in execution & overall product quality from the NBA, but my biggest gripe by far with collegiate sports is how wildly disparate the level of competition is on a night to night, team to team & conference to conference basis.
Luckily, someone (me) has constructed a dynamic NBA draft prospect watchlist that updates daily with the previous night’s slate of games, so you can peruse through the games that are most informative to your collegiate prospect watching experience.
CBB also has a built-in filtration system: conference play. From the last couple weeks in December to March Madness, the playing field begins to equalize across the 5 high-major conferences2, leaving Q43 warriors with nowhere to hide. This stretch (plus games vs top 100 comp in the preceding weeks) are the best way to validate whether a prospect’s playstyle is viable vs competent opponents, allowing evaluators to parse out the players who may be Sacramento State/Alcorn State/FDU merchants.
This article will iterate through a couple guys playing in the five High-Major conferences + some mid-major gems, identifying trends that I’ll be monitoring in individual prospects over the next couple weeks and whether I believe each player will rise or crumble under the mounting pressure of conference play. In other words, are you a man or are you a mouse?
Let’s begin in the Big 12.
Yessofou currently ranks as the 8th most productive freshman by DRE on The 5th Factor4, 28th among high-major freshmen by BPM + 10th by PRPG!5 and 36th in RAPM overall via hoop-explorer. He’s been productive by any metric you choose, yet I have my questions about the sustainability of that production due to his shot profile, scoring process & level of comp faced thus far.
As of Jan 7th, 12.8% of Tounde’s 2FGA are dunks6, 74% of his 2FGA are at the rim and he converts on 56.8% of his non-dunk rim attempts7 with 35.7% of his total FGA coming from behind the 3-point line. There are 27 players since 2008 with similar shot diets, with the vast majority being either hulking centers or some of the more explosive athletes in recent memory. Tounde’s center-esque shot profile is a direct product of his suboptimal scoring process relative to his size/role AND subpar competition.
Adding in 3-point attempt rate to filter out traditional centers crafts a clear picture of Tounde’s potential trajectory. The most successful non-bigs in this query are Derrick Jones Jr. & Keegan Murray, who were able to dunk/shoot their ways out of the less desirable, more realistic outcomes Terance Mann, Cam Whitmore & Olivier-Maxence Prosper have experienced. While Yessofou is certainly athletic, he isn’t close to DJJ or OMax & his shooting projection is a good bit more nebulous than Keegan Murray. His murky projection becomes much clearer once we filter for competition-level faced.
When we filter for games vs Quad 4 competition, Tounde’s scoring and stock rate ranks in the 87th and 95th%, respectively.
Against T100 comp however, Tounde’s PPG falls by nearly 8 points, he generates 1 less stock per game & his assist to turnover ratio becomes decisively negative. His scoring and stock rate ranks in the 57th% and 88th% in this 5-game sample.
Barttorvik displays that same drastic competition drop, with severe falloffs in TS%, A/TO, FTR and rim-volume. The increase in 3P volume hints at a concerning trend, Yessofou’s rim reliance is a function of heavy transition play & poor comp, NOT an ability to exert constant rim pressure. This is further supported by his anemic FTR & his play-type distribution.
Converting at a high-rate in transition play is great, but Tounde’s shot diet consists of far too many transition gimmies and rim attempts to only be at a 59.3 TS% (41st% via The 5th Factor). This is an indictment on his scoring process that’s persisted since his time as California’s HS scoring champ!
Tounde still has a path to a meaningful NBA role, but it will require him to fully embrace an off-ball offensive role that grinds on defense, a la Lu Dort, Aaron Nesmith, etc. While I project him to continue to struggle as a decision maker and overall scorer in conference play, he’s got an intersection of some interesting drive indicators (14.2 drive frequency, 1.06 PPP) plus the requisite frame to be a closeout destroyer, provided he can continue this volume of 3PA.8
I really love watching Joshua Jefferson hoop. He’s a descendant from one of my favorite player archetypes: defensively tilted bigs w/ length, handleability9 and most importantly, playmaking feel.
Smith & Hendricks are polar bears in the above tweet but the overall point still stands, I’ll always bet on guys that are somewhat in the realm of this archetype. I’m also an adamant believer in trusting production & Jefferson is one of the select few who has produced in various areas of influence his entire career.
It isn’t easy to be a #BoardManGetsPaid guy AND a playmaker who takes care of the ball while ALSO forcing turnovers and exerting positive defensive impact. Jefferson is also on track to post a +10 BPM for his career, which would put him in rarefied air among both drafted players and NCAA players in general.
A peek into Jefferson’s year over year progression reveals a consistent trend of scalability, constantly adding & improving on different facets of his game. He’s at a career-high TS% & USG%, has scaled up massively as a playmaker while reducing turnovers, while also wreaking havoc defensively. He’s even upped his 3-point rate!
The most important development is his growth as a driver. In his 3 years preceding this season, Jefferson has always hovered somewhere between a 15 & 20% drive frequency, but he was leaving a ton of meat on the bone, scoring just .538 PPP on his 93 drives last year. That’s what happens when you turn the ball over on a quarter of your drives and shoot just 26.9%.
From 2022-2025, Josh Jefferson’s driving efficacy was severely dampened by his methodical style, lack of shooting gravity & creativity as a ballhandler. Smart defenses can go under on his screens with confidence, providing a cushion that allowed most defenders to easily cut off his driving angles. J’Wan Roberts suffocates this possession for the 3 reasons I outlined: Jefferson catches & holds on the screen and doesn’t drive decisively, Roberts goes under and Jefferson doesn’t have the bend to shake him out of the way.
These issues also contributed to his high drive TO%, but this also was influenced by HOW Iowa State deployed him on offense. A large portion of Jefferson’s drives came on ball reversals without a paint touch, reverse pivots out of PNR, etc., which essentially meant he was tasked with attacking set defenses that were eager to dig at his handle from the nail. Some of his own deficiencies magnified the turnover issues of course, but it should be mentioned that most of these TOs came without an advantage being created for him.
Iowa State has empowered Jefferson to INITIATE offense, allowing him to bring the ball up, which prevents defenses from sagging off of him and involves him directly in the action. Blake Buchanan (#23) feigns as if he’s going to set an on-ball screen for Jefferson, then “veers” into setting a away screen to trigger curl action. Jefferson sets up his defender by staring down the away screen, then rejects the action and gets downhill. The off-ball movement from the other 4 Cyclones occupies the help (curl action, sink & baseline dive) which leaves Jefferson 1 on 1.
This alignment shift in conjunction with his offensive refinement is paying massive dividends. He’s unlocked more counters with the added weight, evidenced with the way he’s able to carve out space against the defender in the clip below, then pump faking him out the way.
Even on a missed layup in the clip below, you can see the improvement in his driving process. Jefferson slips the screen, pump fakes 1 7-footer out the way on the closeout, euros around a 2nd help defender, then get stopped by the 3rd defender: 7’4 behemoth Daniel Jacobsen. His teammates should’ve helped him out here with a pindown on the weaksie & a better spaced exchange on the strongside, though this clip also showcases his biggest limitation: vertical explosion.
History tells us the NBA is far from enthused with taller players that rarely dunk the ball. Jefferson’s .07 dunk rate10 puts him in Dwight Powell & Johni Broome convos in terms of vertical ability.
Guys who were at least 6’8 and dunked less than 8% of their 2FGA were picked 31st on average (among drafted players), with 43% going undrafted. For the most part, NBA teams were right to fade the guys in the table below.
Strong touch indicators explain Lauri’s success, Olynk/Muscala were super disruptive with evident touch as well, while Monroe’s possession influence on the glass and Powell’s TS% influence (by finishing efficiently) kept them in the league. Kornet underwent a mid-career metamorphosis to become the defensive force & possession battle monster he is today. I can’t really explain how Mo became a viable rotation big11 besides his motor + 3P development.
The overarching point is that the only way to beat having a pedestrian standing vert is with outlier tools or outlier skills. Jefferson doesn’t have the frame of most of the successes despite his burly build, so we’ll have to bank on his outlier skill: slinging the rock.
I am choosing to bet on production + Jefferson’s sustained excellence in conference play last year. His NBA viability is highly dependent on whether the team that drafts him recognizes the gifted, yet conditional offensive player he is.
Philon is another prospect I’ve liked since last year’s cycle. He’s shown one of the traits I desire most in guards: role malleability.
As a freshman, Philon’s ancillary production and turnover aversion was fascinating. There aren’t many freshmen who so positively influenced the possession battle on the glass, with defensive playmaking and turnover aversion.
In his return to Bama, LaBaron’s role was magnified, shifting him more on the ball. His PNR frequency nearly doubled (23% in 2025 -> 45% this year) and his usage spiked above 30%.
All that time on the ball has also led to a 3PAr jump, with Philon taking 54.9% of his jumpers off the dribble this year, a massive spike from the 29% off the dribble jump shot rate from last season. Despite all of this offensive load increase across the board, Philon is a full 8 points more efficient TS% wise than he was in a much smaller role last year. As I mentioned on the podcast and in the clip above, LaBaron has become the engine of the #1 offense in the country by a full 3 points, while facing the toughest schedule in the country.
The question then becomes: how much of this is sustainable?
I’ve been wondering this as each subsequent game passes and Philon remains efficient & effective against tough competition. It took 15 free throws from Peterson to pass Philon as the most productive scorer per 40 vs T100 comp on The 5th Factor.12
Philon’s shot type breakdown doesn’t reveal any unsustainable OTD efficacy (40 eFG% OTD vs 77 eFG% off the catch), but he’s shooting an absolutely scorching 70% at the rim. Bama’s extreme pace is likely boosting this FG%, though Philon is also exhibiting strong touch on runners (also known as floaters). This is continuing a trend from last year, where he shot 59.5%!! on 42 floaters. Floaters are inherently variable, but we could have a real #RunnerRetailer13 percolating.
Philon’s volume + HS priors is nowhere near robust enough for me to confidently say this floater efficacy can translate to the league YET, but as it stands today, he’s one of the more efficient non-rim 2P scorers we’ve seen since 2008.
I think we’ll see Philon’s efficiency drop a bit in conference play, because he started so unbelievably hot and his frame may complicate his ability to consistently finish through & draw contact.
Tanner and Philon face off on Wednesday, leading 2 teams that effectively play the same way despite their handlers’ drastic stylistic differences. Prior to playing the 2 highest-volume PNR games of his career (necessitated by Duke Miles’ absence), Tanner’s #1 scoring playtype came in transition.
He responded to the jump in on-ball responsibility in the way you’d expect a player who went 20 games before recording his 1st career turnover last year, with 14 assists to just 1 turnover. Vandy used him in his more traditional role as a decision maker within the flow of the offense, reading the STS action in the 1st clip and delivering the pass on time to the lifting shooter.
Tanner also threw some beautiful live dribble passes in the 2nd and 5th clip in the montage below. The 2nd clip features a bullet pass with his off hand to his big out of empty PNR, then he throws a lob before crossing the FT line to his big out of Spain PNR Reject.
Tanner also was able to generate 12 points of his own offense on his 11 PNR scoring possessions, regularly getting downhill and generating rim & FTA attempts (10). His athleticism relative to his size unlocks contact finishes most guards aren’t able to reach, then his touch handles the rest.
I was hoping Tanner would at least measure 6’0 without shoes, but according to Sam Vecenie down below, he was last measured at 5’10.75 without shoes.
The good news is Tanner plays like he’s 6’5. There are 11 players in the 90th% in stocks per game on my site (> 2.9). The 10 non-Tanner players have an average height of 6’10.
Stl% is an important metric for every player, but it’s of the utmost importance for guards as both a “feel” proxy and a sign of potential defensive viability in the NBA. Tanner’s feel has been evident in all other facets AND his ability to steal the ball. We’ve yet to see a player get drafted with a combination anywhere near Tanner’s 3.7 AST/TO and 4.7 STL%, with the closest player being Marcus Smart (1.3 AST/TO). In my database going back to 2003, PG’s with a Stl% < 2.5% contributed an average of 14.4 career eWins. PG’s with a Stl% > 2.5% doubled that average, contributing 28.2 eWins over the course of their career.
When Tanner maintains that steal rate & turnover aversion through conference play, it would be contradictory for me to not have him lottery, given my emphasis on the possession battle. His rim FG% should be discounted a bit due to Vandy’s transition frequency but he should also be applauded for being such a reliable decision maker in a high-pace offense that necessitates live dribble passes & quick processing speed.
Aday Mara is the tallest player in my database who’s on the glass (> 10 OREB%), passing (> 15 AST% + > 1 A/TO) and blocking shots (11.7% BLK%).
His tape is loud as a passer (especially the outlets) but he’s also an extremely functional passer who should be a viable hub/big to big connector.
Mara has answered my most pressing questions about his physicality but the minutes load is still low and his turnover issues have been nearly as dramatic as his assists. Curiously, High TO% also isn’t the death sentence you’d expect for bigs.
The more pressing issue in my opinion, is his somewhat problematic explosion off the floor. He’s missed 6 of his 30 dunk attempts this year in the following ways: hitting his head on the backboard, getting blocked from behind 2x and flubbing a couple lobs.
Some of these plays are just looney tones, Shaqtin’ A Fool moments but they also suggest his tendency to play functionally smaller than 7’4 depending on where he catches the ball around the rim. Depending on the angle of delivery, he doesn’t quite get vertical enough.
MICH’s guards also constantly deliver him the ball far after he’s reached an optimal angle. They’re good for 2-3 occasions per game where they miss him on a lob or deliver the pass late.
In addition, the FT% might just be completely untenable. He’s regressed to 41.7% (as a career 54% FT shooter) despite making a leap in other touch indicators (69.4 on 2s). Only 3 players carved out a meaningful NBA career with a FT% below 45% in their pre-NBA collegiate season, Steven Adams, Aaron Gordon & Andre Drummond.
I fully anticipate Mara’s historic 2P dominance on both ends to carry over into conference play. MICH holds their opponents to a ridiculous 39.5% at the rim with Mara on the floor plus they attempt FGA at the rim 8.6% less, Michigan attempts MORE shots at the rim with Mara on14 and they’re more efficient as well. This is the power of being 7’4 and an elite offensive rebounder and passer, despite the deficiencies at the line.
There’s only 1 player in the top 5% in both offensive rebounding AND defensive rebounding on The 5th Factor: Hannes Steinbach.
Steinbach is at a 15.8 OREB%, 78% at the line, 62% on 2s and 50% on far 2s with a 1.0 A/TO. Prolific freshmen-aged offensive rebounders have strong staying power in the league, particular those who exhibit any approximation of feel.
There are just 14 NBA players who recorded a OREB% > 10 with an A/TO > 1 and a FT% > 70 in my database.
FT% is a great baseline approximation for not just touch but skill, and Hannes is elite at the line for his archetype. I’d also argue that offensive rebounding is a key sign of skill & spatial awareness, which is ultimately an extension of positioning, processing and feel. This awareness is what allows a player like Dyson Daniels to minimize his struggles as a spacer, which I touched on in the video below, but it should also allow Hannes to transcend his concerns as a “tweener”.
I discussed how a player, in general, can transcend either the limitations of subpar measurements to play the 5 or a lack of mobility/ball skills to play the 4 as long as they have a “superpower” in the video below.
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As established above, Hannes’ superpower is undoubtedly his near unparalleled ability to generate extra possessions for his team on the glass. He’s also mobile enough to play next to another big with real potential to shoot it based on the FT% and non-rim 2%’s (50%) in addition to the smooth shot mechanics, while also boasting outlier coordination as a handler and driver relative to his size. Most of these moments have came in transition thus far, where Steinbach’s fluidity shines attacking scrambling defenses. We cannot normalize a 6’11, 230 lb teenager casually dipping into a high gather drive through traffic and finishing on the other side of the rim.
Transition effectiveness is another example of strong spatial awareness15, so it makes sense that Hannes is excellent at punishing cross matches on the break, regularly beating opposing bigs on the floor and attacking decisively before any help can arrive.
Steinbach has only driven on 8.2% of his scoring possessions, a rate that will certainly need to grow this season as his defensive viability hinges strongly on his ability to coexist with a rim protector. The limited FGA that have came out of these drives look promising and will only become more potent if he’s able to draw defenses out to the 3P line.
A 2.8 Blk% and 1.8 Stl% as a big essentially dooms Hannes’ defensive viability as the sole big tasked with anchoring a defense unfortunately, as there isn’t a single big man who fell beneath these benchmarks that anchored a defense at the NBA level.
Steinbach was better protecting the rim in the BBL at 18 years old, so there may be a glimmer of hope. Washington plays zone pretty heavily and is a low-turnover environment globally as a result (258th in OPP TO%) but this doesn’t quite excuse how much lineups are getting blasted at the rim with Hannes on the floor.
In 508 possessions vs t225 competition, Washington is allowing opponents to shoot 62.7% at the rim (a bottom 60 ranking). WASU’s lineups with Steinbach is suppressing opponent rim FGA to a degree, but that’s almost negligible with how efficiently opponents are attacking the basket. Washington’s rim defense improves by nearly 9 points with Hannes off the floor.
Steinbach’s defensive evolution would need to follow Sengun’s development trajectory, who was also a more prolific rim protector in an international context, then entered a more competitive league and struggled to anchor a defense. Bigs with subpar length (Sengun has a +2 WS, Hannes will probably be in this realm) have to lean into their mobility & disruption to survive.
We don’t have deflections tracked on the collegiate level, but the steal rate & the tape clearly shows Steinbach isn’t nearly active enough with his hands. He has a tendency to defend like a scarecrow, holding his arms out in front of him rigidly while shuffling on the perimeter. Sengun’s innate disruption is what allowed him to develop into a viable rim protector once HOU reinforced their backline with personnel that enabled him to step away from the perimeter and play PNR coverages that were better suited to his skillset.
It’s also worth mentioning that I’m shuddering at the thought of Steinbach’s athletic testing numbers at the combine. I believe in the touch, but his inability to elevate caps his ability to carve out space without bumping defenders off their spot. The 1st couple clips against Seattle U is a prime example of his struggles, as Seattle’s bigs crowded Hannes on the catch, preventing him from taking a dribble and forcing him to try an finish over and through multiple defenders. This is the 65th best rim defense to be fair16, though this will continue to be a problem as Washington faces defenses of this level.
Shooting 66% at the rim simply isn’t good enough for a big man who isn’t bombing away from deep. 48 players shot below 67% on “Close 2s”17 while attempting less than 15% of their FGA from three, with just 6 providing above replacement value career impact.
In a lot of ways, Hannes is the antithesis of what I would typically look for in a big man. He isn’t protecting the rim, he’s just barely clearing my feel thresholds and he’s not very efficient despite his feathery touch. The case for Steinbach is rooted in him being an outlier offensively, with the frame to hopefully get to neutral at worst on defense. This is the type of highly variable bet I would usually avoid, but I really do wholeheartedly believe in his potential as a driver, offensive rebounder, DHO hub an d eventual shooter.
Thank you all for reading. Part 2 will contain thoughts on some ACC & Big East prospects, some mid-major guys I’m tuned into and some quick hitters on prospects across the NCAA!
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About the author
I’m a lifelong basketball enthusiast who blends film study and advanced analytics in my independent coverage of basketball and the NBA Draft across Tiktok, Twitter, Youtube, Substack and Instagram. I’ve also covered the Hawks for ~2 years as an accredited digital journalist for Afro News, and I am a member of the Atlanta Hawks’ Creators Collective.
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