Four games. Five days. A total of 102 points scored, and 74 shots attempted. You ready to drop your top five NBA Draft pick on that?
Four games is the basis of what we think we know about 18-year-old Australian guard Dante Exum. He hasn’t been toiling in the European minor leagues, or even the D-League. He spent last year at the Australian Institute of Sport, and was not expected to land with an American college until next fall.
And he would be preparing to do just that — getting ready to enroll at Indiana or North Carolina or Michigan — if it were not for those four games last July.Those games changed everything. “Around this time last year, I didn’t even think I would go into the NBA Draft,” Exum said. “It wasn’t 90-10. It was 100-0.”
When scouts and general managers talk about Exum as a top four pick, with the talent to wind up perhaps the best player among a generally talented crop of incoming players, it’s worthwhile to note that the assessment is based on a very, very small sample size. Mostly, it is the four games in which Exum lit up the U-19 World Cup tournament in Prague, from July 3-7.
That’s when Exum sealed his reputation as a dynamic, high-scoring guard who is quick with the ball and capable of breaking down his man with ease. It’s when his name became a staple of NBA mock drafts. It’s when he garnered the attention of Rob Pelinka, agent for Kobe Bryant.
But since then, Exum has been seldom seen. While scouts and front-office types have been nitpicking the play of Andrew Wiggins, Jabari Parker, Joel Embiid and friends for months, Exum has been off the radar. All scouts have to remember him by are those four brilliant games he played to close the U-19 tournament.
“I guess they all have an idea what I am about,” Exum said. “But they have seen some of the college players play a 40-game season, so I guess, when they are trying to look at tape, they can’t see a lot of tape of me. It has its advantages and disadvantages.
"They have not seen me since last year July, so I guess I have stayed hidden away. It works both ways.”
About those games from last July: Exum was legit.
Yes, he was playing fellow teenagers, and sure, the U-19s in that tournament were nothing special. There was also Exum’s lackluster start to the tournament, in which the Boomers struggled and Exum managed a scoring average of 12.4 points, displaying the kind of game that seemed to badly need some NCAA work.
The bottom came in a 94-51 loss to the U.S. in which Exum scored seven points in just 11 minutes, committing four turnovers as he was manhandled by the likes of team USA’s Marcus Smart.
But then the Australian coaching staff pulled Exum aside. The team was 2-3 and would not make it to the knockout round without beating Russia in the finale of pool play. Exum needed to be more selfish. If his team was going to stick around this tournament, he would have to carry the load.
He scored 20 points with six assists to get past Russia. Then came the game that elevated Exum into the draft’s upper reaches: An 87-76 defeat of top-ranked Spain. Exum was magnificent, scoring 33 points on 9-for-18 shooting, going 12-for-13 at the free-throw line.
“In Prague, it was an up-and-down tournament for me,” Exum said. “And I think, looking at my team, we realized I needed to step up if we wanted to do something with the tournament. I think I stepped up in the quarterfinal to beat Spain, who was the first-ranked team. Definitely, that was a time that opened up an opportunity for me.”
Australia would land in the bronze medal game, losing to Lithuania in overtime. Exum’s tally for the final four games of the tournament: 25.5 points per game, 44.6 percent shooting, 4.8 assists, 4.0 rebounds. Oh, and a gaggle of hyperventilating NBA scouts.
Problem is, we have not seen Exum since. In fact, very few NBA decision-makers have actually watched Exum play — because the U-19 tournament coincided with the outset of free agency, virtually no general managers were even in the crowd in Prague.
If you’re an NBA general manager with an Exum fascination, you’re no doubt more fascinated by the idea of what Exum could be, with his 6-6 frame and 6-9.5 wingspan, than by what you’ve actually seen.
“In that tournament, he was breathtaking at times,” said former NCAA coach and current ESPN analyst Fran Fraschilla, who was there in Prague. “At times, he looked like a college freshman, doing dumb things, making turnovers. But when you watch him, it is easy to get enamored with him. He does have an, ‘it,’ factor that can take your breath away. He is capable of making some moves that make you do a double-take.”
Fraschilla points out that one of the things we don’t know about Exum is how he will respond to more physical play, because he’s, “never really been punched in the mouth.” Certainly, against Team USA last July, Exum didn’t seem to handle adversity well. But that was a measly 11 minutes of action. Not much can be extrapolated from that.
Exum’s limited exposure just means his workouts in front of teams will be all the more crucial. He has been in Southern California since February, working with renowned trainer Rob McClanaghan.
“Going into the workouts, it is going to be important for me to perform because, yeah, they have seen me a couple times, but I need to build up and catch up to the exposure the other guys have had,” Exum said. “So I think the work I have been doing with my trainers at the moment, I think I am ready for them when they come along.”
But even the workouts figure to be controlled environments in which Exum is mostly going up against orange cones and a stopwatch. There won’t be much useful information to come out of those sessions, and with the draft a month away, information on Exum is at a premium.
“He is potentially a transcendent player,” Fraschilla said. “But you’re rolling the dice. He doesn’t have the resume of games that other players in this draft have. It is going to take a leap of faith.”
A leap of faith and a very high draft pick — for four games.