.
8. Ben McLemore — The 6-5 Kansas shooting guard could go as high as No. 1 or 2 this year.
From Kotoch, who has him No. 3 on the Big Board in Mock 1.0: “Unfortunately, McLemore failed to deliver the March performance many expected, or at the very least, hoped for. After a nightmare first week, McLemore rebounded to have a nice performance against Michigan in an overtime loss. McLemore is a great complementary scorer but never showed the dominance to be an alpha dog.
“In my opinion, McLemore is the top player on the second tier of this draft class.”
9. Aaron Harrison — A 6-5 shooting guard, Harrison will share time in a loaded backcourt at Kentucky next season.
We recommend a clickthrough to this story by Adam Himmelsbach of the Louisville Courier-Journal: “Aaron and Andrew don’t have other siblings, but they recently assumed the role of big brothers after their aunt, Sheryl, died in Baltimore following a long battle with cancer. After she died, the Harrison family took in her two teenage sons, Khalil and Hakeem Butler, who moved from Maryland and enrolled at Travis High School in Richmond, Texas.”
10. Marcus Smart — The Oklahoma State freshman point guard is considered among the best point guards in the 2013 group, along with Michigan’s Trey Burke and Syracuse’s Michael Carter-Williams.
Kotoch has him at No. 2, but that’s OK. We speak with many voices here at SheridanHoops.com
11. Noah Vonleh — The 6-9 Indiana-bound power forward is projected as a one-and-done and has a huge ceiling.
Nice profile page with videos on insidethehall.com, a nice IU-themed site.
12. Anthony Bennett — The 6-5 UNLV freshman just announced Monday that he will enter the draft.
He will be a lottery pick this year, and he will be a member of the next second-tier international powerhouse, Team Canada, whose 2016 Rio lineup could include Bennett, Wiggins, Tristan Thompson, Robert Sacre, Andrew Nicholson and Kelly Olynyk, currently No. 16 on Kotoch’s Top 30 Mock 1.0.
Folks up north have a #nashtriano2016 hashtag thing going on Canadian Twitter, from what I’ve seen from our talented fantasy writer, Kent Williams.
13. Otto Porter Jr. — Syracuse coach Jim Boeheim called the 6-8 Georgetown star the best small forward in the history of the Big East. And yes, that includes Carmelo Anthony.
14. Victor Oladipo — An athletic dynamo, Oladipo outshined his teammate, Cody Zeller, for much of this season while leading Indiana to the No. 1 ranking for much of this season. He is still undecided on his immediate future.
Kotoch and others on the staff have been high on Oladipo, too.
It is not often that a defensive player is drafted in the lottery unless he is 7-feet tall, but true NBA chanpionship contender has one terrific on-the-ball defender.
For the Mock Lottery picks of two NBA scouts, keep reading …
NBA SCOUT NO. 1:
1. Andrew Wiggins
2. Nerlens Noel
3. Ben McLemore
4. Julius Randle
5. Andrew Harrison
6. Jabari Parker
7. Anthony Bennett
8. Otto Porter
9. Victor Oladipo
10. Cody Zeller
11. Shabazz Muhammad
12. Trey Burke
13. Michael Carter-Williams
14. Marcus Smart
NBA SCOUT NO. 2:
1. Andrew Wiggins
2. Nerlens Noel
3. Jabari Parker
4. Julius Randle
5. Ben McLemore
6. Marcus Smart
7. Aaron Gordon
8. Otto Porter
9. Andrew Harrison
10. Cody Zeller
11. Anthony Bennett
12. Alex Len
13. C.J. McCollum
14. Trey Burke
Adam Zagoria of Zags Blog covers the future stars of the NBA for SheridanHoops.com. His columns appear Saturdays. Follow him on Twitter at @AdamZagoria.
I like to see this rule in next CBA. HS player can declare for NBA after senior year . HS player opts for college he has to stay for 2 years minimum.
If the OAD rule never existed, a few of those players would already be in the NBA.