Upperclassman Spotlight: Oso Ighodaro
Upperclassman Spotlight: Oso Ighodaro
An elite passer and defender, Ighodaro is the type of high-IQ big man it's easy to fall in love with. Will his game fully translate to the next level without a jump shot?
This article is an installment in our “upperclassman spotlight” series looking closely at four juniors or seniors in college basketball who are intriguing potential first-round prospects in the 2024 NBA Draft. Each installment will feature a video breakdown as well as written thoughts and smaller clips detailing my analysis. Those four players:
Trey Alexander, Creighton
Oso Ighodaro, Marquette
Dillon Jones, Weber State
In a year where the potential freshman class is lacking at the top, there are plenty of opportunities for upperclassmen to bully their way into the first-round conversation. Even over the last few years, we’re seeing a renaissance of three-year or four-year college players being selected in the mid-to-late first round. Over the last five years, we’ve seen an average of 4.4 upperclassmen get selected between picks 16 and 30, culminating with seven of them in 2023.
2023 Draft: 7 (Jaime Jaquez, Kris Murray, Olivier-Maxence Prosper, Marcus Sasser, Ben Sheppard, Julian Strawther Kobe Brown)
2022 Draft: 4 (Jake LaRavia, Christian Braun, David Roddy, Wendell Moore Jr.)
2021 Draft: 2 (Trey Murphy III, Quentin Grimes)
2020 Draft: 4 (Payton Pritchard, Udoka Azubuike, Malachi Flynn, Desmond Bane)
2019 Draft: 5 (Matisse Thybulle, Brandon Clarke, Grant Williams, Ty Jerome, Dylan Windler)
Oftentimes there is a reason for that: teams selecting in those areas tend to be competing teams, groups looking for more immediate impact and guys they can count on in the early stages of their rookie contract. While that doesn’t always tend to be the case, the maturity and ability to immediately adjust to becoming a role player is a large commonality among the players selected in this range.
For the 2024 class, there are several players who check boxes in my mind as having the potential to get drafted in the later portion of the first round. As we dive into some scouting reports on those prospects, we’ll have a focus on what will need to go right in order for each player to solidify themselves as a late-first prospect.
One player I’m highest on of the upperclassmen is Oso Ighodaro, a big man for Marquette heading into his senior season. Ighodaro is about 6’9” (the 6’11” listing on Marquette’s website seems very generous) and is a tad skinny for a center, but as a non-shooter and a strong vertical athlete, he’s acclimated quite well to the position. What Ighodaro does well is make plays for others and provide versatile defense, a bizarro mismatch option who has a knack for really fun, high-IQ highlights.
As I’m leaning further into skill and feel being the traits that make it in the modern NBA, I’m willing to overlook some of the size barriers that might, at first glance, really hinder Ighodaro. Undersized bigs who don’t shoot it and consistently stretch out defenses sound like a tough bet to make. However, Ighodaro’s feel and IQ on both ends of the floor, combined with the different ways that he can create a mismatch on the perimeter besides shooting, give me a ton of optimism that his game will translate to the NBA.
Background
Osasere “Oso” Ighodaro is the son of Dawn and Osaro Ighodaro and grew up in Arizona. Both his parents have worked in higher education, with his father serving as the VP of Student Affairs at a local Arizona college. Oso was a four-year letterwinner at Desert Vista High School in Arizona. He was a four-star recruit who received offers from Marquette, Arizona, California, Pittsburgh, Rutgers, Texas, Stanford, and Vanderbilt, among others. He committed to Marquette and played for Steve Wojceichowski his freshman year. Wojo was fired, and when the program brought in Shaka Smart (who recruited him at Texas), Ighodaro decided to stay.
After only playing 38 minutes as a freshman, Ighodaro became a regular bench player as a sophomore in a rather unremarkable role. It wasn’t until his junior year when he moved into the starting rotation and became a staple of Marquette’s attack on both ends.
If you want to get a feel for the type of person or player that Ighodaro is, this interview is a pretty good glimpse into much of what I’ve been told by those close to the Marquette program: intelligent, hard-working, and about being loyal to those around him.
Offense
If we’re going to start on the offense, we’re going to have to begin with the playmaking. Ighodaro is a prolific passing big man, coming off a season where he tallied a two-to-one assist-to-turnover ratio, 3.3 dimes per game, and was central to one of the top offenses in all the land. He’s a passing maestro, with an unbelievable feel for backdoor cutters.