Jamar Wilson

In what turned out to be the last game of his collegiate career, Jamar Wilson got off to a start that he probably didn’t anticipate. The two-time America East Player of the Year missed his first 6 shots from the field in a losing effort against Virginia. As cold as Wilson was early on, some credit is due to the Cavalier defense who gave plenty of attention the Great Danes leading scorer. Wilson missed a couple of short contested jumpers early as well as a few lay up attempts in the lane. The speed of J.R. Reynolds and Sean Singletary made life very difficult for the speedy Wilson.

The fifth year senior got more comfortable in the second half and began to show off the skills that made him such a prolific scorer during his time at Albany. Wilson knocked down a couple of outside shots (he’s a 38.2% shooter from behind the arc), but did a lot of his damage getting to the basket and scoring. The speedster has a great first step and can blow by a lot of defenders. He really excels though at using his body to shield the basketball when he goes to the rim. As a 6-1 combo guard, Wilson is very undersized, even for the college game, but still manages to get off a lot of tough shots against much bigger players simply because he has great body control while in the air. He also showed the ability to create scoring by himself. Late in the game Wilson was being hounded with the ball well beyond the three point line with the shot clock winding down. Rather than panicking, he proceeded to beat his man off the dribble, weave through three more defenders draw a foul and hit a spinning lay up as the shot clock expired. Showing that kind of poise and ability against a fast team like Virginia certainly must have caught some scouts’ attention.

Despite his scoring prowess, Wilson is at best a long shot for the NBA. He is severely undersized for life in the NBA as a shooting guard, and he turns the ball over too much to be an effective point guard. This particular game didn’t change his stock in any way; he got off to a slow start but had a strong showing in the second half to finish with numbers comparable to his season averages.