The coronavirus pandemic has turned the sports world on its head and one of the groups being impacted is the swath of college underclassmen that have declared for the NBA Draft, but have retained their eligibility. Michigan State has two such players in Xavier Tillman and Aaron Henry.
The NCAA has started the process of clearing up some of the confusion, setting boundaries for the deadline for those underclassmen to withdraw from the draft and retain their eligibility. The NCAA says that underclassmen will have until August 3 OR ten days after the NBA Combine to make their decisions; at whichever date comes first.
The NBA Combine was originally set for the weekend of May 21, but was postponed along with everything else in the NBA. The combine has generally been about one month before the draft and with the new NBA Draft date of October 15, it seems like a safe bet the combine won’t take place until the very end of summer. No date has been set for the combine, but preliminary discussions have hinted at the end of August being the time. Things could very well change, especially now that the NCAA has weighed in, but it’s hard to see the NBA holding its annual scouting combine right as the league resumes its regular season and postseason at the end of July. In that case, the August 3 deadline the NCAA set would be the actual deadline.
The original withdraw date of June 3 was just a couple weeks before the original NBA Draft date, but keeping that same time gap with the new October 15 draft would be impossible with college basketball programs ramping up for their regular season. Last year MSU played its first game on October 29, an exhibition game against Albion and programs can’t go late into September wondering if they’ll have key players on their teams or off to the NBA.
By the looks of it, prospects like Henry and Tillman won’t be getting the chance to participate in combine events before they have to make their NBA decisions. However that could change if the NBA decides to prioritize the combine, making sure it gets done before the August 3 deadline set by the NCAA.
As with everything right now in sports, it’s a fluid situation. We’ll have more on this story as it develops.
