NBA Draft 2011: Kemba Walker, Prospects Who Helped Their Stock in March Madness
March Madness provides the biggest stage and the brightest lights in all of college basketball. The players who get a chance to play during this wonderful month have a chance to leave lasting impressions, for better or for worse.
Take your team farther than expected and you will be immortalized. Suffer through a bad night and an early exit, and you will be remembered for all the wrong reasons.
Kemba Walker is one of those players who absolutely belongs in the former category. But who are the other nine?
Harrison Barnes
1 of 10
Harrison Barnes' draft stock was sky high at the beginning of his freshman season when he was selected to the preseason All-American team. But then he actually had to play and people started to realize that there would be a bit of an adjustment period.
At the end of the season, Barnes picked up his game and played out of his mind during the ACC tournament. Of course, his draft stock started to climb back up from the murky depths of the end of the first round.
A strong March Madness performance has continued to elevate it back into the lottery range, assuming, of course, that he does declare for the draft. Barnes averaged 21.0 points, 8.3 rebounds and 2.0 assists per game during the tournament.
Kenneth Faried
2 of 10
College basketball's all-time leading rebounder had proven that he was a double-double machine over the course of the regular season. But that was against a pretty weak level of competition in the Ohio Valley Conference.
Questions remained about whether or not Kenneth Faried could remain successful against a higher-caliber team. After all, Faried stands just 6'8", but he is supposed to play either power forward or center in the NBA.
All of those questions were answered when Faried put the Eagles of Morehead State on his back and engineered an upset of Louisville in the first round thanks to his 12 points and 17 rebounds. Faried couldn't carry the Eagles past Richmond in the next round of the tournament, but his 11 points and 13 rebounds gave him yet another double-double.
Now, Faried should be drafted in the early 20s of the upcoming NBA draft.
Jimmer Fredette
3 of 10
The tournament's biggest celebrity drew more scrutiny than any other player during the NCAA tournament. But scrutinized or not, Jimmer Fredette could probably drop his last name and dwell in his first-name fame.
It's no longer uncommon to watch a basketball player drain a long-range three-pointer and hear someone exclaim, "He just Jimmered that!" or "That was Jimmer-range!"
I'm guessing that I wasn't alone in expecting the Brandon Davies-less BYU Cougars to be eliminated fairly early in the tournament, but Jimmer would have none of that. He scored 32 points in the Cougars' first game against Wofford, then 34 against Gonzaga. But 32 wasn't enough against Florida, and he looked tired and ineffective at times. Still, an impression was left all the same.
Fredette should now be taken in the first half of the first round in the draft. He's a fringe top-10 prospect.
Kyrie Irving
4 of 10
No one was even sure if Kyrie Irving would be able to play in the 2011 NCAA tournament, but play he did.
Irving actually led the Duke Blue Devils in scoring during the No. 1 seed's first game of the tourney, when he dropped 14 points against Hampton in an easy 87-45 win. Irving played only 20 minutes in that game and saw his minutes increase to 21 in the next matchup. This time, against Michigan, he scored 11 points, none of which were more crucial than the game-winning runner in the final minute.
Playing 31 minutes against Arizona, Irving couldn't help the Blue Devils take down Derrick Williams and the Wildcats. But he did score 28 points and prove to NBA scouts everywhere that he was healthy and hadn't lost his ability to dominate on the basketball court.
Now he's a potential No. 1-overall pick yet again.
Brandon Knight
5 of 10
Somewhat surprisingly, Brandon Knight ended up being the best freshman during the tournament for this year's edition of John "One-and-Done" Calipari's Kentucky Wildcats.
Knight was absolutely horrific in the Wildcats' second-round game against Princeton. He shot 1-for-8 from the field, putting up just two points, two rebounds and five assists. But rather than let that mess with his mind against West Virginia two days later, Knight exploded for 30 points.
Then, against Ohio State, the point guard scored just nine points, but hit the game-winner to knock off the tournament's top-overall seed and advance to the Elite Eight. He couldn't lead his youthful, free-throw-missing team to the finals, but his 17 points, eight rebounds and five assists at least kept the Wildcats in the game against Connecticut throughout the night.
Knight's draft stock has been steadily rising all year and should now place him comfortably in the top 10.
Shelvin Mack
6 of 10
Perhaps no player helped his draft stock more than Shelvin Mack. The Butler guard carried his Bulldogs through the tournament until they fell at the hands of Connecticut, falling one game short of the championship for the second straight year.
Mack was simply unstoppable at many points throughout March Madness. He only scored 14 points in his first game, a last-second win against Old Dominion, but then he destroyed the Pittsburgh Panthers with 30 points to advance to the Sweet 16.
After another decent-at-best performance against Wisconsin, in which he only scored 13 points, he dropped 27 against Florida and 24 against VCU to advance to the finals.
A disgusting 4-for-15 performance against Connecticut kept his team from winning, but then again, it wasn't like anyone else on Butler could score either. If he'd shot better, he'd be the hero of the tournament.
But for now, he'll have to settle for moving his draft stock up into the middle stages of the first round.
Markieff Moris
7 of 10
Everyone knew that his brother, Marcus Morris, was a great basketball player, but Markieff Morris still flew a little bit under the radar before the tournament. He was simply the other twin. But now he's begun to make a name for himself.
Morris got off to a fairly decent start by scoring 15 points and pulling down eight rebounds in a tournament-opening, 19-point beat-down of Boston University. He then proceeded to knock down 10 of his 13 shots against Illinois en route to a 24-point, 12-rebound double-double.
The forward only received limited minutes in an easy win against the upstart Spiders of Richmond, but proved he didn't have arachnophobia by scoring five points and grabbing six rebounds in those 17 minutes. In the final game of his season, Morris had one more double-double, recording 13 points and 12 rebounds in a loss to the red-hot VCU Rams.
Now Morris has propelled himself into the same realm as his brother: the lottery.
Jamie Skeen
8 of 10
Precious few around the country had even heard the name Jamie Skeen before the tournament. Then Skeen's VCU Rams were a surprising inclusion in the field of 68 and went on a historic run to the Final Four.
Skeen was easily the most important player in that run. He showed over and over that he could do anything on a basketball court. He plays defense, he is virtually unstoppable in the low post and he can even drag his 6'9" frame outside the arc to rain three-pointers down on his opponents.
The forward played efficiently throughout March Madness and averaged 17.5 points, 6.7 rebounds and 1.3 assists per game. He went from unheard-of to draft-able in just six games.
Trey Thompkins
9 of 10
Trey Thompkins only got one chance to shine during March Madness because the Georgia Bulldogs fell in a tight game to Washington to open their tournament experience.
But in that game, Thompkins proved that he can truly be a star. I, among others, had questions about his mental toughness and drive in big moments, but Thompkins played his heart out against the Huskies.
Playing a whopping 39 minutes, the power forward scored 26 points and grabbed 11 rebounds on 11-of-14 shooting.
Thompkins was once a sure-fire lottery pick, but slipped down many draft boards as the season progressed. Now, he's back up where he started.
Kemba Walker
10 of 10
No player was better throughout the tournament.
Kemba Walker led the Connecticut Huskies all the way to the finish line without even sitting down on the bench over the course of the last four games.
Walker was simply incredible, scoring 18, 33, 36, 20, 18 and 16 points in the six games he played. There are no words to describe the greatness that was No. 15 over the course of the last few weeks.
Walker was once a fringe first-round prospect. Now he's a fringe top-10 pick.
