USC Forward Nikola Jovanovic Stays In NBA Draft

USC forward Nikola Jovanovic will remain in the NBA draft according to CBS Sports. That means two starters are gone (Julian Jacobs, Nikola Jovanovic) are gone. The best player is gone (Jacobs). And part of the bench left (Katin Reinhardt, Darion Clark, Malik Martin, Malik Marquetti).

Steve Lavin told me in February that USC might be a preseason top 10 team in the nation. Now they will be considered a mid-Pac-12 team. It tells you something when neither Jacobs nor Jovanovic stayed even though they might not be drafted. It points to Andy Enfield’s leadership because some felt certain players had a longer leash than others when it came to making mistakes or being emphasized within the offense. And that led to some distrust.

24 thoughts on “USC Forward Nikola Jovanovic Stays In NBA Draft

  1. Both Boatwright and Metu are already better than Jovanovic, who’s already got his degree, can possibly bottomfeed if lucky in the NBA before he gets shipped off to Europe and becomes available for the European Large Men’s Modeling Catalogue. No reason for him to stay and further demonstrate why he’s just not that good. No brainer.

    • Incoming freshman DeAnthony Melton, Jonah Mathew, and Nick Rakocevic look to get meaningful playing time now with all the departures. Only the strong survive. Even in college basketball.

      • All extremely well-put. Jovanovic is a great kid, solid student, and he’ll be a solid bench player in the Euro-league. Obviously, he won’t be playing in the NBA, but he’ll use this experience to help him hitch a ride in Europe.

        • Jovanovic will get pushed around the paint in the NBA. Reinhardt thought he was good enough to play point guard at USC or in college and that was just part of his big ego. Things didn’t turn out his way and he took his ball and went home. I still like the direction of the basketball program.

          • Henderson is 6:10 and 200 lbs. No way will he get pushed around. A mature senior vs a lightweight freshman. I’d stick with Jovanovic.

            Andyain’twinning’s recruits are #’s 84 though 225. What’s to like?

            No doubt these recruits signed because they wish to go ONE and DONE.

          • She’s still mourning Ricky Ticky’s xfer and Mr Dixon’s big house relocation.

          • Having a bromance with a hack blogger is good news for GueyToy. Having Owen watch, even better.

          • Speaking of bromance, what did you do to drive your husband Garry Bleauz away? Was it your Crohn’s Disease or wearing the mauve muumuu again?

  2. Um, of course some players have a longer leash. Russell Westbrook has a much longer leash than Dion Waiters. Better players have longer leashes than inferior players. It’s kind of how basketball works.

    Bennie Boatwright is going to be featured more next year than Jovanovic because Jovanovic has pretty much hit his ceiling. He isn’t really going to get any better next year. If he were to stay, he will still get pushed around by the Utah’s of the Pac-12, and the big men at Oregon are still going to draw him outside the post, hit a few shots in his face, then blow by him when he tries to match-up outside of his 10-feet-from-the-basket comfort zone. NJ is euro-soft!) If Bennie can learn to handle the ball better and play off the ball, and if Metu can develop some semblance of an offensive game, Jovanovic is going to see his minutes decrease, perhaps significantly.

    As for the “bench”, other than Reinhardt, they all played minimal minutes. They transferred because better players were coming on board and were going to steal minutes what few minutes they got. Aaron was going to steal a lot of minutes from Reinhardt, who, in interviews, expressed his displeasure with Enfield not giving him the green light to shoot whenever he wanted, because in 2013-14, an unconscious 30% on field goals Reinahrdt really worked out well for USC. New frosh Matthews is going to make sure than Marquetti never comes off the bench. Martin never did anything of note, or played any significant role in any game in his two years. Clark might be missed, but his offensive game is completely incompatible with Enfield’s system.

    Did you know that Jacobs wanted to go pro LAST YEAR, and that Enfiled he to talk him out of it. Jacobs, apparently, is much more confident of his future prospects than everyone else. More power to him.

    From the best scholarship player to the last one on the bench, USC will have more talent and depth at every position in 10 years. P{layers transferring because better players are coming aboard is a good thing. Sad you refuse to see that.

    It is also a sahme you do not read comments. Yopu might actually learn something. Or perhaps that is why you refuse to read comments.

  3. Sad fact about Jovanovic:

    Starting in February of last year, in a stretch of 12 games in which Nick Jovanovic played 300 minutes, he logged exactly one single assist.

    One assist in 300 minutes. You can look it up. Even J.R. Smith and World B. Free are thinking to themselves “Damn, that there is some selfish ball.”

    Jovanovic has one asset, and that was a post-up game. No one on USC really has or has these skills.

    But he has HUGE negatives. Has tiny hands that make it difficult for him to hold on to contested rebounds or sharp passes, and his hand size (lack thereof) force him put the ball on the floor (to stabilize it) before going to the rim. In Enfield’s slashing offense, that is a huge limitation. Jovanavic is designed for O’Neill’s inside-outside, low post/kick-it-out game. That Enfield and staff were able to get decent minutes out of him tells me that they they are good at what they do.

    • That slashing bozo u offense went 9 – 9 in the Pac-12 schedule.

      Andyain’twinning’s bozos lost 9 of 11 away games.

      bozo u went ONE and DONE in the tournament for the 9th time in 17 appearances.

      And the bozo u no final four appearance continues for a 63rd year. Fireball on.

      • And 2 of those were against the biggest cheating program of all time in the history of ncca sports, the junior college know as U Clows Lose Again.

  4. Andy Nobody is on a very short career path with USC. As they say-One (year) and done.

  5. Have always felt USC’s basketball program needed an experienced long time head coach to get it back as a legit contender in basketball. MG almost got the right man (Rick Mejerus) that would have built the program up at least. You could say MG brought in a head coach that knew how to win in Tim Floyd. But Floyd took too many short cuts that got him & the program into trouble. Bringing in a young head coach with little experience will bring you frustration as in being unable to keep “some” your better players from bolting.

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