All eyes are on Otega Oweh as he begins his NBA Draft Combine journey in Chicago, 5-on-5 scrimmages officially underway with the Kentucky star among the first to take the floor. Will he keep his name in the draft or pull his name out and return for one final season in Lexington? These games will help decide that with the event set to run through May 18, followed by the draft deadline on May 28.
Prior to his on-court debut, Oweh spoke with ESPN to open the broadcast where he dug a little deeper on his draft decision, highlighting his mindset playing in the games this week, but more importantly, what he hopes to get out of the process.
There, he made it clear he’s in a good spot no matter what he chooses to do once he leaves Chicago and figures out his next steps.
“The main thing for me is just finding the best situation,” Oweh told ESPN. “Obviously my goal is to play in the NBA. If I go through this whole process and I’m getting great feedback and I can go all the way, then I’ll do that, 100 percent. But either situation I’m in, it’s a great situation. I just got to thank God for it. I’ve got a good situation back at Kentucky if I do choose to go back. Either way, I’m just thankful to here.”
That decision comes later. For now, though, his goal is to win the games he’s playing in — just as he does every time he steps on the floor, no matter the format.
“First thing’s first, I’m trying to win,” he said. “We’ve got two games, so we want to go 2-0. We know that if you win, everyone on the team is going to win.”
Oweh’s comments come a day after Mark Pope opened up about his star guard as he goes through the draft process. There, he pointed out things the All-SEC standout does better than anyone else in the country — along with things he can improve to not only dominate in his final year of college, but as a future pro.
It starts with his physicality and ability to create and embrace contact on both ends.
“Otega’s physicality, is elite. His physicality on the offensive and defensive end, that shows up in a lot of ways,” Pope said Tuesday. “It shows up in contact, it shows up in his explosiveness, it shows up in his first step, it shows up in his ability to kind of navigate guarding guys off the ball through screens and on the ball through screens by creating space with his chest.
“In those ways, he is as good as you’re going to find. He’s really special. He grew so much last season in terms of kind of winning the point of attack over and over, whether it was on the ball or off the ball defensively.”
As for areas of growth, there are plenty — just like every player in basketball. If he hits on those things, he can be among the most prominent faces in the sport en route to surefire first-round status a year from now.
“Like all of us, he has so much room to grow,” Pope said. “I think his ceiling as a playmaker, he hasn’t even begun to tap into that. I think he can become an elite, elite-level playmaker. Something that he’s talked a lot about is his ability to get his shot off more quickly. He shot the ball really well last year at 36, 37 percent from three, but to get it off quicker and get more attempts, I think is a big deal for him. On the defensive end, his ability to kind of neutralize bigs on the glass and bigs on switches is a place where he can really excel. I think he has a chance to grow into one of the elite steals guys in the country.
“He’s got a ton of room to grow. He’s an unbelievable player who had a great season last year. It’s pretty fun to talk about.”
Pope said ‘a lot of his heart is back here at Kentucky’ and ‘if he does return, he will return as the presumptive SEC Player of the Year.’
We’ll see if the Draft Combine changes things this week.
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