Louisville basketball: No combine invites makes for a tough decision

After not receiving an invite to participate in any NBA Combine event, Louisville basketball’s Steven Enoch has a tough decision to make.

Last week we learned that Louisville basketball sophomore wing Jordan Nwora was one of the 60+ prospects to be invited to the upcoming NBA Combine, which was a huge sign of where his NBA Draft stock stood. What we didn’t find out was whether big man Steven Enoch was on that list of players invited, but we could only infer that he was not.

In past years that would mean Enoch’s only hope would be to impress at least one team in pre-draft workouts – but for the junior big man, this year is a bit different.

A few months back the NBA announced their first ever G-League Elite Mini Camp, a three-day scouting event that takes place ahead of the NBA Combine where 40 more potential draftees would be invited to work out as voted on by G-League teams. This group of invited players would be made up of what ESPN.com’s Jonathan Givony said were “not chosen in the top 60 for the NBA combine.”

This would give a guy like Steven Enoch another chance to catch the eye of NBA scouts and potentially heat up his draft stock or at least earn his way to a Two-Way contract come 2019-20, should he stay in the draft.

Unfortunately for Enoch, he will not get that opportunity as the name of the invitees for the 2019 G-League Elite minicamp was announced yesterday afternoon.

Notable players who missed the Combine invite list but were asked to participate at the Elite camp included Tyus Battle, Luke Maye, Bryce Brown, Phil Booth, Amir Coffey (ugh), Ethan Happ, and Tacko Fall.

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While several of these guys are and should be on the NBA Draft radar, many of them are not, but with a strong performance they could see their stock go up and potentially do enough to be a second rounder, which can be the beginning of a long career in the league or a potential lucrative overseas deal.

Now Enoch will be forced to make a difficult decision; stay in the draft and take the chances of going undrafted and either play in the NBA G League or return to school, post-graduation and play out the end of his college eligibility.

For most players in Enoch’s shoes returning back to school makes little sense. At 22 years old, the 6’10, 250-pound big man, is considered “old” by NBA standards as over the last several years, NBA teams have begun drafted older juniors and seniors less and less while taking chances on younger players with “potential.” Not to mention, Enoch is set to graduate from the University of Louisville in the coming weeks.

However, even though he’ll be entering his fifth season of playing college basketball – we all know that the game of Steven Enoch still has room for improvement by leaps and bounds. After rarely ever playing under Kevin Ollie at UConn, we saw the potential of Enoch this season under Chris Mack and assistant coach Mike Pegues. Whether starting or coming off the bench, the big man showed flashes of dominance on several different occasions, with the one that sticks out the most being the 17 points, 11 rebound performance against UNC.

Now what NBA GM’s, coaches, and scouts have to figure out is what Enoch would they be getting at the next level. 17 points, 11 rebounds Steven Enoch or 0 points, 4 rebounds Steven Enoch.

Enoch has already been through at least two workouts since leaving Louisville, one with the Atlanta Hawks and the other with the Oklahoma City Thunder, and according to the Athletic’s Jeff Greer, he’ll have several more before having to make a final decision.

Couple NBA Draft workouts scheduled for Louisville’s Steven Enoch in the next two weeks: Atlanta, Oklahoma City, LA Clippers and Boston.
— Jeff Greer (@jeffgreer) April 30, 2019

NBA personnel will love the fact that at 6’10” 250-pounds, Enoch can play with back to the basket and from outside, shooting at 36 percent clip from deep, while also having a body ready to bang with multi-year veterans from day one.

But what I would assume they’ll be conflicted with is his inability to rebound at a high level consistently (averaged just over 5 rebounds per game in 2018-19), the lack of protection he provides around the rim (0.6 bpg) or the struggles to move his feet while playing defense, leading to foul trouble quite frequently.

With one more season at Louisville, maybe Enoch could improve on those areas of weakness especially considering the fact that it’ll be just his second season playing more than 15 minutes per game on the year. Or, does Enoch take his diploma and professional ready body and shooting stroke and head off to the NBA, the G-League, or maybe even overseas and begin earning a good chunk of money for what he’s been blessed to do?

That’s the decision that the 22-year-old will have to make in the next month. For Louisville fans, all we can do is sit back, wait, and trust that if Enoch returns his improvement will be a big boost to a team with Final Four aspirations, or that Mack will be able to use guys like Malik Williams and Aidan Igiehon to fill the hole that is left void by his departure.

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