Article
Prospect of the Week: Donovan Clingan, 7-2 sophomore C, Connecticut
(Note: This section won’t necessarily profile the best prospect of the week. Just the one I’ve been watching.)
My travels took me to Hartford, Conn., this weekend to see a showdown between No. 1 Connecticut and No. 4 Marquette in the, shall we say,
well-preserved former home of the Whalers at XL Center. While the trip down memory lane of an authentic 1987 arena experience was an unexpected highlight, the real story was the play of the defending champion Huskies,
who thrashed the Golden Eagles 81-53 on Saturday.
Donovan Clingan had 17 points and 10 rebounds, continuing a dominant season in which he has posted an utterly absurd stat line: 36 points and 19 rebounds per 100 possessions, two assists for every turnover, 65.8 percent shooting and an 11.2 percent block rate. His 35.4 PER is second in all of college basketball (trailing only Purdue giant Zach Edey); his BPM is fourth and his block rate is third among Power-6 players. Clingan won’t turn 20 until this weekend and is having an absolutely dominant season for the best team in college basketball.
I was talking to a couple of scouts before the game about Clingan and Edey, the two behemoth big men who figure to be the most prominent college centers in the upcoming NBA Draft, and going back and forth over their pro potential. Both are giant and can easily use their size to dominate a college game, but I suspect Clingan will have a much easier time at the next level.
That’s because, in addition to his size, Clingan can
move. That differentiating factor should allow him to hold his own on a more spaced-out NBA floor. Marquette tried repeatedly to stretch him out in pick-and-rolls and failed, with Clingan expertly playing a drop coverage and using his size to eliminate windows for alley-oop passes over his head. Our C.J. Moore wrote about
“Cling Kong’s” impact on Saturday’s affair, but I was more concerned with how his game translated for the NBA.
What stood out to me, relative to many other oversized centers, was Clingan’s end-to-end speed, which makes him a threat even early in the clock. Watch below, for instance, in one of the key points of the game during a 13-0 UConn run late in the first half. It starts when Marquette’s Oso Ighodaro (another interesting big man prospect in this draft cycle) settles for a weak sauce floater rather than challenge Clingan at the rim; as Connecticut gets the rebound, Clingan is behind all five Marquette players.
However, he charges up court on a transition rim run and seconds later is at the rim slamming home a dunk after a Marquette defensive mistake; at 7-foot-2 and 280 pounds, and coming near the end of a half, this is impressive stuff.
Clingan is fairly skilled for his size too; he can shoot around the basket with either hand, makes good decisions passing out of doubles and, despite his shaky foul shooting, has shown some nascent touch when he stretches out to the perimeter. Teams will also be digging on a foot issue that caused him to miss time early in the season; it was a tendon, not a bone, but “foot” and “big man” are word combinations that make teams nervous.
Scouts will be over-indexed on UConn anyway in the upcoming weeks given the other likely pros on the roster and the probability of big matchups (such as a rematch with Marquette in the Big East tournament), so Clingan can further cement his status as a lottery big man. In a draft class that’s weak at the top, he could even make a surge toward the top of the board.
theathletic.com
theathletic.com/5283140/2024/02/17/uconn-win-marquette-donovan-clingan/
