John Jenkins, Junior, Shooting Guard, Vanderbilt
Overview:
When a player averages 42.3 points per game during their senior year of high school, it gets the attention of the basketball world. John Jenkins garnered plenty of awards in his native Tennessee for his prep play, but the question was how long it would take the Hendersonville native to get things rolling at Vanderbilt. The answer turned out to be not very long. Jenkins spent most of his freshman campaign coming in off the bench, but few players in the nation provided as big of a spark as Jenkins. On the year he averaged 11.0 points per game and connected on an amazing 48.3 percent of his attempts from long range.
By his sophomore season Jenkins was ready to diversify his offensive attack. He still took a lot of three-pointers, of which he connected on 3.1 per game, but he also got more comfortable using his 6-4 frame to attack the basket. Jenkins could use his size to bull through the lane against smaller defenders or simply run around the bigger ones. The result was a lot of layups and plenty of trips to the charity stripe.
Final Projection:
After averaging 19.5 points per game as a sophomore, there is not much else Jenkins has left to prove in the scoring department. He is a decent defender and rebounder, but Jenkins will hear his named called on draft day as a pure shooting guard who has the size, strength and the shooting ability to be a superb scorer in the NBA. If he keeps up his impressive numbers at Vanderbilt, and becomes a leader of the team that should make a tournament run, Jenkins should be a solid first round selection whether he opts to enter to the 2012 NBA Draft or wait until 2013.
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