Luka Doncic can take the worst team you know to a NCAA Championship

For the art of conversation, I present to you, the audience a question. If you woke up tomorrow with the skills of NBA phenom Luka Doncic, what would you do? 

I know exactly what I’m doing, I’m winning the junior varsity basketball team at the University of North Carolina an NCAA National Championship.  

Let’s set the foundations of this argument, Doncic, a Slovenian-born 6 foot 8 point guard has monopolised the game of basketball alongside his European counterparts Giannis Antetokounmpo and Nikola Jokic. In his 6th year in the league, he’s been 1st team All-NBA five times, has averaged over 28 points per game over that span and is also statistically the greatest playoff performer of all time. 

So does this production take a D2/D3 equivalent squad through the cauldron that is March Madness, maybe? 

Before you drown me out with your “college basketball is a different beast” and “it’s the hardest type of basketball to score in” let me attempt to get my point across before you oust me for not being a basketball purist. 

Doncic currently averages 34/9/10 in the NBA, a league that consists of the greatest athletes in the sport of basketball, so the second question I pose to you is what would be his stat line in college? 

From my personal experience in basketball which includes 200+ hours on NBA League Pass watching the Houston Rockets and attending Michael Jordan’s alma mater, I can confidently predict a stat line of 50 points, 15 rebounds and 5 assists.  

“Oh, but Ali the college game is different, there’s no three-second rule and defence in the NBA is non-existent.” 

Please spare me your blushes and let’s see if I have better luck persuading you than I did my friends.  

Hurry up the Frenchman is coming 

Rudy Gobert is on track to win his fourth Defensive Player of the Year, an award warranted for a very good season with the Minnesota Timberwolves. His defensive imprint alongside the franchise play of Anthony Edwards has supercharged the Wolves to a top 3 seed. 

It took a lot for general manager Tim Connelly to procure the former 28th pick in the 2013 draft’s services, with three role players and six 1st round draft picks over the next 8 years, one of those being used to select Auburn big Walker Kessler who in his rookie season was statistically better than Gobert. 

How does this reign into my argument?  

Well, the Gobert trade emphasises the sheer discrepancy in talent within the NBA, basketball is a sport where the significance of one player reigns supreme as there are only five people on the court. Not to hamper on the French pylon but the compensation Gobert demanded would have to be doubled maybe even tripled for Luka Doncic – therefore showing the levels between being a top 5 player in the world, an all-star or even just lucky enough to call yourself a NBA player.  Realistically, if Luka Doncic was ever on the market he’d command an asking price of at least an All-Star and 10 draft picks. 

All this to say, the level between Luka Doncic and an NBA player is astronomical, imagine the collegiate players who have a 99.8% chance to work in accounting.  

That Hight Flyer from Durham 

Zion Williamson was statistically the greatest collegiate player of all time averaging 23/9/2 with two blocks and two steals, his rookie season in the NBA after he returned from injury after missing 44 games emphasised that this was an NBA All-Star playing in the ACC. 

Doncic, a point guard presents a completely different mismatch. Williamson’s dominance arrived mostly from his godly athleticism and ability to get to the rim, however he couldn’t shoot. Doncic can shoot and can also get to the rim with the best of them.  

There would arguably be no player in college basketball that could guard him and when the eventual double or triple team arrives as arguably the second-best passer of the basketball in the world the eventual open shot for his teammates will most likely come. 

What Would It Actually Take? 

The UConn Huskies ran rampant in men’s college basketball this year, their starting line-up consists of two potential top 5 picks as well as 3 second-round picks. The team seemingly sleepwalked through March Madness with an average win margin of 12 points. This would be the level Doncic and his band of JV teammates would have to topple in a national championship game. 

College games last 40 minutes over two halves. Doncic averaged 37.5 minutes in the NBA, we’d probably have to push him to play every dying second as even two minutes is enough for a D1-level team to run up a score against D2 and D3 players. With the average score a D1 team reaches in college being roughly 71 points per game, if Doncic accounts for 51 points he would still need 20 or so points from his teammates – that’s where my certainty dissipates. 

An underground scrimmage between UNC’s varsity and JV teams has taken place before with the score being 45-20 at halftime. A 25-point gap probably is the greatest advertisement for my argument but is it one I believe Luka Doncic can not only make up but exceed that deficit. 

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