
Each year in the NCAA, it is not uncommon for a player to improve his NBA rating by returning for one more season on the university boards. This year, for example, players like Jordan Hawkins, Kobe Bufkin or Brandin Podziemski secured their place in the Top 20 of the 2023 Draft by signing a high-quality “sophomore” season, after a more discreet “freshman” campaign.
On the other hand, it is much rarer for the opposite effect to occur, that is to say that a player returns to university when his rating was already high, and especially that this ultimately plays against him.
This is unfortunately the case with Terquplane Smith This year. Author of a good “freshman” season last year (16.3 points, 4.1 rebounds and 2.1 assists), the NC State leader had registered for the 2022 Draft while maintaining his university eligibility. Very convincing during the Draft Combine, he had continued to climb in the pre-Draft projections, to the point of having probably secured a selection in the first round. But finally, to everyone’s surprise as his decision seemed illogical, he went back to playing his “sophomore” campaign with the Wolfpack.
” If everything goes as I hope, I won’t have to go through the Combine box again in the same way. Everyone will see my games this season, and together with my team we will make it special. The NBA can wait another year, because I still have work in the ACC first he said at the time…
Drafted by the Sixers
A year later, despite a statistically slightly more productive second college season than the first (17.9 points, 3.9 rebounds and 4.1 assists), his ratings did not hold and he was not drafted, in a much denser and deeper vintage than that of 2022, especially on his position… Difficult then to consider his choice to return, as commendable as it was for his team, other than as a bad calculation.
However, nothing is lost for Terquavion Smith, who signed in stride a “two-way” contract with the Sixers. Better than nothing, of course, but that’s still little compared to the contractual guarantees and financial security he could have enjoyed as a (probable) first-round pick last year…
In the end, the most important thing is that the young leader keeps the motivation and the desire to make this opportunity a reality. Even if we imagine that his case will undoubtedly make precedent, in the future…
” I dreamed about it since I was little, it means a lot to me “, he thus concluded. ” It’s an opportunity I’ve been waiting for, and I’m going to keep working. You can never work too hard. »