The Drake Powell Predicament

UNC's Drake Powell checks important boxes, but his production at North Carolina still raises questions about his NBA upside. Maxwell dives into the predicament present by Powell in the 2025 NBA Draft.

Close your eyes and imagine your ideal complementary wing.

He probably has long arms. He can jump out of the gym. He makes his open threes. He has a positive assist-to-turnover ratio. He can guard a variety of positions.

This sounds a lot like UNC one-and-done Drake Powell. The 19-year-old measured 6’5.25” with a 7’0” wingspan at the NBA Combine. He also posted the event’s best max vertical leap, flying 43” off the floor. This past season at North Carolina, he drilled 37.9% of his threes, averaged 1.1 APG to only 0.7 TOV, and often took on one of the toughest defensive assignments. Sounds great, right? Open and shut case, yeah? Folks, in the draft world, it’s never that simple. While the big picture idea of Drake Powell is enticing, there are fair reasons behind the fact that he’s often mocked more toward the end of the first round or the top half of the second. A big part of that was his minuscule offensive role for the Tar Heels, which will come up consistently throughout this article. Today, we’ll dig into The Drake Powell predicament, and we can all draw our own conclusions as to how we feel about him going forward.

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Shooting

Drake Powell hit 37.9% of his threes this past season, including 40% of his catch-and-shoot attempts. This is the type of thing you love to see, particularly from a freshman with Powell’s athletic traits. When you start to dig a little deeper, though, things get a bit dicey. For starters, Powell only took 95 threes on the year, so we’re dealing with an unusually small sample for someone who projects to play at the two and three positions in the NBA.

Additionally, there’s little dynamism to his shot diet. Of those 95 threes, Synergy classified 85 of them as spot-ups, the most basic shot type of them all. Then, there’s the rest of his shooting indicators. Powell shot 30.4% on pull-up twos, 0-for-5 on pull-up threes, and 64.8% at the charity stripe. His form is a bit funky, too. His motion feels like it takes place in two parts. Part one is him bringing the ball up to chest level, and part two is where he jumps and goes into his follow-through. It’s a janky process, and the energy transfer is far from seamless. Sometimes his shot looks more seamless and fluid, but often, there’s a pause on the way up before getting into “part two.”

Still, there are reasons for encouragement. While his overall number of attempts was on the lower side, Powell’s three-point attempt rate of .450 shows a real willingness to shoot. Additionally, Powell puts himself in the right spots. He knows how to relocate, and crucially, his hands are always ready. I also think he gladly would have put up more threes if teammates found him more consistently. Going through full games, it was frustrating how often he was open and prepared to shoot, but teammates forced difficult, tough shots instead of rewarding him. Plus, Powell shot the rock well during his final high school season, connecting on 40.9% of his threes and 81.7% of his free throws there, per Synergy. The past sample, confidence, and Powell’s age make it difficult to dismiss the premise that Powell could turn into a solid, reliable shooter. If he can create a degree of gravity to his game, that could open things up for him at the basket.

Finishing

The rim is where Powell is at his best, at least on the offensive end. Per Synergy, Powell made an incredible 68.2% of his halfcourt rim attempts this past season. When he gets an opening as a driver, he gets to the cup in a hurry. He has an explosive first step, he takes long strides, and his preposterous vertical bounce enables him to fly off the floor. His straight-line drive is tremendous. Plus, his strength enables him to convert through contact, and he still has the coordination to adjust mid-air when a rim protector takes away the easiest path to a bucket. Lastly, Powell does a good job of finding cutting opportunities. His physical traits enable him to capitalize on the scripted, easy-to-make reads, but beyond that, he can identify spontaneous openings in a defense. This gives him additional utility within an offense. My one knock on Powell in this respect is that he seems to prefer jumping off two feet too often, which gives defenses an extra fraction of a second to recover.

Shot Selection

One area where Powell will need to grow offensively is with regard to his shot selection. In the video above, you’ll see four contested mid-range pull-up shots that Powell took early in the clock. You may also notice that these four clips also came from the same game. There are a few issues here. The first is that Powell can be too content to seek these shots as opposed to spot-up threes. The larger, overarching issue, which we will get more into in a minute, is that he’s not a dynamic ball-handler. As a result, he’s often forced into more difficult looks. If he could develop a simple counter game, he’d at least get to the rim and draw fouls more consistently. His .256 FTr is a disappointing one given his tools. Lastly, Powell can be too prone to tunnel vision in these scenarios. It feels like once he’s decided he’s going to hunt a bucket, the hunt commences regardless of whether or not he should go for the kill. Given that he’s not a particularly good mid-range scorer (30.4% on pull-up twos this year), this leads to inefficient, frustrating possessions that reward the other team more often than not.

Ball Skills and Playmaking

Let’s circle back to Powell’s handle for a moment. Again, when Powell has a straight line to the rim, it’s all gravy. His defender can’t recover once he gets a step, and rim protectors have to be on their toes once Powell has a step on his man. Heck, even if they are, he might still put them on a poster. However, when things get more complex, Powell has a hard time adjusting. It’s a two-fold issue. The first is that Powell doesn’t exercise a high level of command over the ball. The rock tends to get too far away from his body, especially when he’s attempting to counter or string together multiple dribble moves in combination. This makes it easier for defenders to get into his handle, but it also saps his explosiveness and allows defenses to recover, as he has to slow himself down to regain control of the ball. Lastly, Powell’s recognition and anticipation need to come along. Occasionally, he’ll beat his man off the dribble or get into the paint, only to be unprepared for what comes next. As a result, he’ll end up picking his dribble, plowing into help defenders, or getting stripped. He’ll need to get more comfortable operating in tight spaces.

The good news is that overall, Powell is a reliable standstill decision maker. When the game is simple, he can make the right play. He’ll keep the ball humming around the perimeter. His floor mapping off-ball is pretty solid, and at times, he’s shown capable of making quick, sharp decisions when he gets the rock. I was most impressed with Powell’s pass placement. He takes a great deal of care with his deliveries, making sure to use the right type of pass given the context of the court and executing at a high level. Rarely will he turn it over because he tries to do fancy nonsense or because he’s being too casual. These are great connective playmaking traits that should help Powell find his footing in a professional role.

Defense

Powell’s defense is what he’s likely to hang his hat on at the next level. He is a nightmare to deal with at the point of the attack. He’s got long arms, quick feet, and excellent reaction time. The dude is tough, too. He’s not afraid to use his body to prevent opponents from getting to their spots. But generally speaking, his speed, length, and mirroring ability make it difficult to create any sort of advantage against him. He responds to everything at warp speed and refuses to cede ground. His contests are exceptionally potent, too, as he gets off the floor both high and fast. Powell gets a little overzealous with his reaches at times, and he can also be too content to play behind the ball. But still, those are correctable tendencies, and he’s on point more often than not.

The clip above is one of my favorites. There’s nothing otherworldly here, and it’s just good, simple defense. Powell picks up projected lottery pick Kon Knueppel early. Knowing he can win the foot speed battle, Powell plays him tight, and Knueppel passes the ball. When he gets it back on the wing, Powell closes out hard but still has his balance under him. When Knueppel drives, Powell slides in response to Knueppel’s stride. Powell manages to win the bump battle against the physically powerful wing, forcing a dribble pickup in a tricky area of the floor. This ability to lock down his man, make opponents uncomfortable, and stifle potential advantages through his tools and discipline is an exciting, projectable area of his game.

Powell can make his impact felt within a team construct, too. He anticipates switches well. His ground coverage is elite, as few on earth can get from Point A to Point B as fast as Powell. His length can help him get into the ball when he executes a well-timed dig from the perimeter. He’s also going to offer much more positional rim protection than his peers, as evident by his 2.8 BLK%. He has sharp instincts as a helper around the basket, paired with the timing and bounce to turn opponents away at the rim. My one knock on Powell off the ball is that I wish he were a bit more aggressive, particularly in passing lanes and with his digs. His 1.6 STL% feels like a let-down in light of his tools. Still, he’s rock-solid fundamentally and with the physical tools to reach a high-end outcome in this respect.

Conclusion

At the present moment, Drake Powell often finds himself mocked in the early portion of the second round. I wish I could leave you with a spicy take, but that feels about right to me. There are real hangups. He was an extremely low-usage college player (13.8 USG%), and typically, it’s guys who did a lot in college who scale down best into NBA roles. His shooting resume is a bit spotty, he’s a limited ball handler, and he’s a bit smaller than you’d like a wing-stopper to be. Given the confines that the current collective bargaining agreement places on teams, it’s understandable for NBA organizations to look at those shortcomings and say, “we don’t want to guarantee a bunch of years and dollars to that type of player.”

Still, that doesn’t mean he can’t work. To be clear, I do think a front office will be best served to utilize patience with Powell. But he’s an excellent point-of-attack defender, a phenomenal athlete, a solid ball-mover, and a willing shooter. Given the rarity of his physical traits and the value of those skills within a 6’5.25” frame with a 7’0” wingspan, there’s reason to believe that Powell can put the pieces together and become an eventual NBA contributor. Given that he’s only 19 years old, that’s a very reasonable bet to take at a certain point in the draft, especially a depth-depleted one like this class. Personally, I’m leery of higher-end outcomes given his shot mechanics and creation issues. A lot would have to go right for him to evolve into a top three offensive option for a team. If he can get his shot right, though, he has enough valuable role player skills that he could be a valuable rotation piece if things swing right.