We're two games into the brief college stop at Kansas that Andrew Wiggins is required to make before he enters the NBA and begins showing us whether or not he can come through on the hype that has surrounded him the last couple years. After two games, not everybody is impressed despite him averaging 19.0 points and 5.5 rebounds while making 58.3 percent of his shots. There is one person that is especially impressed so far with Wiggins.
Kevin Durant of the Oklahoma City Thunder likes what he sees out of the Canadian forward. He recognizes how raw Wiggins' game is but he likes his ceiling so much that he told Marc Spears of Yahoo Sports that the Kansas phenom can he "like a Hall of Famer, All-Star, for sure."
"He's raw, but his ceiling is high. He can be like a Hall of Famer, All-Star, for sure. He's good," said Durant before the Thunder's loss to the Golden State Warriors.
Durant said he watched closely on television as Wiggins and Kansas defeated Duke on Tuesday night. Duke features another talented true freshman forward in Jabari Parker, whom Durant also thinks highly of after working with him at his basketball camp last summer.
That's some pretty high praise from the second best player in the world. Considering that Durant is on his way to securing a spot in the Basketball Hall of Fame some day, this might be a scouting report worth noting. Durant had an incredible freshman year at the University of Texas back in 2006-07, averaging 25.8 points in his time there. It was enough to get him the No. 2 overall selection in 2007 draft. It's a brief college career that Wiggins proved to be very cognizant of when he spoke to Gary Parrish of CBSSports.com in September.
Getting to the ceiling that Durant is talking about here would certainly make Wiggins worthy of the hype he's received over the past few years. His explosive presence on the court could use some refined skills but he's so young that it's hard to nitpick what he does right now. That wasn't the only scouting report Durant had for young players impressing the college basketball scene this season.
"That [Parker] kid is amazing," Durant said. "I think he is the best player in the country. Him and Wiggins are like '1A' and '1B.' Those guys are going to do the one-and-done thing, do it early. They are going to do really well in college and lead their teams to, I think, the Final Four. That's kind of like, 'Close your eyes and pick one.' You're good with either one of those guys.
"I love Jabari's game. He's so skilled. He has it all right now. Wiggins is on another level with God-given ability. You look at him, you can tell he's going to be really big and fill out a lot. He's really athletic."
One out of one Kevin Durants agree: Andrew Wiggins and Jabari Parker are really good.
