Anthony Black will go. Nick Smith Jr., too. Jordan Walsh is almost certainly going to be taken. And Ricky Council feels like an inevitability, too.
If those four players are, in fact, selected in Thursday night’s NBA Draft, Arkansas will likely have more players taken than any other program in college basketball. Perhaps more than any other team, period. Only Duke, UCLA and Michigan are teams that have even three projected selections.
It’s made for quite the change in the Razorbacks program. Under coach Eric Musselman, Arkansas has gone from good, usually-NCAA-Tournament-Round-of-32 team, to three straight Sweet 16s. And draftees at a rate unseen since the early 1990s.
Black is a Top-10 talent whose big frame and ball-handling skills make him an ideal point guard in this era of the NBA. Most have him slotted at eighth or ninth.
Smith is a former No. 2-projected pick, but injuries and inconsistent play have seen him slide down draft boards since December. But considering he was the former No. 1 high-school player in the country, his skill is intriguing.
Walsh’s camps and offseason workouts have lifted his stock back to where it was when he first came to a college as a five-star recruit. He’s now likely to go in the early second round.
Council isn’t a shooter or a defender, but his athleticism and ability to simply score from anywhere make him an ideal project with a potential long-term fit on an NBA bench.
Arkansas wasn’t getting all those kinds of players taken before. Yes, Daniel Gafford, Bobby Portis, they were going early. But they in-state rareities at the time. Smith is an Arkansas native this year, but the other three aren’t.
You can bet, regardless, for Arkansas’ representation at the draft to be a talking point on television Thursday.
As well it should be.
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