Markelle Fultz turns pro after a season destined to soon be forgotten
He averaged the sixth most points of any player in the country. He earned first-team all-league honors. He delivered powerful dunks, dazzling assists and silky 3-pointers almost every game he played.
Washington’s Markelle Fultz achieved everything you could expect from a projected No. 1 pick in the NBA draft with one notable exception: Relevance.
Fultz announced on Twitter on Friday that he’s turning pro, concluding a college career played almost entirely outside the national spotlight.
There’s a good chance you know less about Fultz than Lonzo Ball, Jayson Tatum, Josh Jackson or many of the other heralded freshmen that probably will go after him in the 2017 draft. Fultz’s spectacular individual feats seldom garnered as much buzz and attention because his 22-loss team was too far off the radar to merit it.
When Fultz chose Washington over Louisville and Arizona in August 2015, he expected to be the centerpiece of a young, talented roster capable of resurrecting a once-proud Huskies program that has fallen on hard times. Those dreams evaporated when Dejounte Murray and Marquese Chriss both developed more quickly than expected as freshmen and entered the 2015 draft, leaving Fultz with an overmatched supporting cast that seldom demonstrated consistent effort or defensive discipline.
For all Fultz’s individual brilliance in coach Lorenzo Romar’s freewheeling system, he could not elevate the players around him into a competitive team.
Washington surrendered 98 points to Yale in a season-opening home loss. Two weeks later, the Huskies dropped back-to-back games against TCU. One of Washington’s few games with national significance was a Dec. 7 matchup with Gonzaga, and the Huskies fell behind by 21 after eight minutes en route to a 98-71 shellacking.
You had to make an effort to find Washington on TV during conference play, and there was little reason to do so. The Huskies finished 2-16 in Pac-12 play and 9-22 overall, their season ending amid little fanfare Wednesday night when they lost to USC in the opening round of the Pac-12 tournament.
Fultz led the Pac-12 with 23.3 points per game and also averaged 5.9 assists, 5.7 rebounds, 1.6 steals and 1.2 blocks. He played sparingly down the stretch, missing six of the past eight games due to a sore knee.
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What’s strange is that Fultz didn’t endure anywhere near the backlash last year’s No. 1 pick Ben Simmons did for failing to lead his team to the NCAA tournament. Whereas Simmons became a polarizing figure when talent-laden LSU nosedived down the stretch last season, Fultz has just largely gone ignored.
If Fultz is taken No. 1 overall in next June’s NBA draft as many expect, he will achieve that feat in spite of enjoying maybe the least team success of any comparable prospect in the one-and-done era. Simmons’ LSU team won more than twice as many games last season as Washington did this year. Nerlens Noel’s Kentucky team reached the NIT even though he missed the last month of the season due to injury. Even the Washington team Chriss and Murray were part of last season won 19 games before settling for a NIT bid.
It’s a testament to Fultz’s immense talent that NBA scouts don’t seem worried at all about Washington’s season-long struggles.
At 6-foot-4 with a long wingspan, explosive athleticism and good court vision, Fultz checks nearly every box for an elite point guard prospect. He can accelerate past defenders, knock down catch-and-shoot jumpers or sink an array of shots off the bounce.
Really, Fultz showed the ability to do everything at Washington with just one exception.
Not even he could propel a sinking Huskies program from obscurity to national relevance.
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Jeff Eisenberg is the editor of The Dagger on Yahoo Sports. Have a tip? Email him at daggerblog@yahoo.com or follow him on Twitter!
