Dawson Garcia Scouting Report
Role scalability is the ultimate sell for Dawson Garcia. But what will he do for an NBA team? Here are 3K+ words on why he'll transform his high-usage role at Minnesota to a feasible NBA role:
Introduction
As a fifth-year senior, Garcia has developed into one of the nation’s best high-usage wings. His combination of ball handling, physicality, and scoring prowess made him the de facto leader of the Minnesota Gophers. As a highly-touted high school prospect, Garcia chose stints at Marquette and North Carolina. Hereafter, the Minnesota-born Garcia returned home to fulfill his last three seasons of eligibility in the Big Ten.
During his five college basketball seasons, Garcia has played several roles, making the case for flexible role scaling. With the NBA prioritizing plus-sized ball handlers in every position, Garcia’s raw profile puts him on NBA radars. Translating his skillset to a wanted and feasible NBA role is the emphasis of this scouting report.
Physical Profile
At 6-foot-11, Garcia is a strongly built, fluid ball-handling wing. He doesn’t have broad shoulders but instead has a long wingspan with a well-filled chest. He has fully grown into his body at 234 pounds, with his excellent hip fluidity and core strength being the main value of his physical profile.
With decent foot speed, Garcia plays with craft and footwork rather than relying on speed and power. He can be physical but prefers to throw in his craft and mobility when attacking the glass. Due to his size, he’s a constant mismatch threat, matching one of the NBA’s other criteria.
Garcia’s toughness is visible when he’s playing as an interior presence, with decent verticality and body control helping him thrive as the weakside helper while he’s an adaptable defender on the perimeter due to his mobility.
Offense
Catch-and-shoot
As a plus-sized perimeter scoring threat, Garcia’s must-have skillset is to be consistent as a catch-and-shoot option. That’ll add gravity and leverage to his interior-scoring skillset. For NBA scouts, his great footwork and fluid hips add positivity to his draft profile. While shooting 37.1% on over four attempts per game, Garcia shows good returns with the volume to prove feasibility.
Garcia widens his feet to ensure his balance before the shot. He has a good habit of immediately positioning his body at 180 degrees of the basket, which makes him adaptable to immediately set his feet on movement while he’s already putting himself in shooting motion when he’s standing still. By flexible usage of his pivot foot, he’s keeping the threat of attacking his closeout alive. In the first play, we see Garcia put up his shot in transition, while he’s immediately getting the shot off from a standstill in the second possession below.
In the third play, widening his feet makes him more effective in throwing in shot-fakes and jab steps to create more space for himself. He’s smartly selling the defense he’ll attack baseline, thus opening up angles on the stronger side for himself. The advantage of fully growing into his body leads to the good habit of Garcia not powering up too much for his shot, as he’s strong enough to keep the ball high. In the fourth play below, he brings the ball down to his waist, which is an area to work on, especially considering a quicker NBA game with less time to get his shot off.
When lowering the ball, it should be immediately followed up by aggressiveness as shown in the fifth play below, Garcia keeps his head down to sell the defense the attack on its chest, creating enough room with jab steps to get the shot off from the elbow.
Catch-and-drive
As a closeout attacker, Garcia has the must-have skillset of playing through contact and being tough and aggressive. He’s great at creating angles for himself but often suffers from tunnel vision, where he's dialed in on finishing on the advantage creation rather than making the extra pass. Regardless, as a closeout attacker, Garcia has enough creativity with the handles to match to help a team sustain its offensive rating.
In the first play below, Garcia stays composed and waits out the closeout defender's bad last step to blow by him with a simple relocation. He’s good at recognizing advantages and how to collapse defenses while finishing off the play strong and aggressive with a layup at the rim. This continues in the second possession below. Garcia immediately attacks the baseline after a jab step, whereafter he uses his physicality to create separation. Instead of finishing through traffic, he had to hit the two cutters on his right with the dropoff pass.
Garcia also has creativity in his arsenal. In the third play, he attacked the closeout via the weak side. Hereafter, he changed hands and nailed the three via the stepback. This continues in the fourth play. Garcia uses the reverse pivot to elevate his burst and immediately puts up the floater while attacking the baseline. His great understanding of angles while making the right decisions in lanes to attack is a feasible part of his plays out of closeouts that will help him in the NBA.
Pick-and-pop
At 6-foot-11, Garcia brings a valuable combination of physicality, size, and perimeter skills. That makes him a no-brainer option to make plays out of pick-and-pop sequences. Considering his reliable three-point shooting, he gives more options to help sustain an NBA team’s offensive rating. However, there are some areas to clean up for Garcia, where NBA decision-makers have to focus on when bringing into their gym for workouts.
Focusing on missed shots, Garcia often rushes his shots. He’s making it too clear that he’s popping away after setting the ball screen. His shooting and scoring heavy part of the profile makes him predictable for defenders, where they can afford to stay attached to him rather than dropping to ensure enough presence inside the painted area. In the first play below, Garcia caught his defender’s pivot foot out of position but still held to his shooting motion despite giving the defender time to close the gap. He has to execute much quicker in a faster-paced NBA game with more motion.
This continues in the third play below. After setting a good ball screen, Garcia could have chosen to attack the closeout or roll to the rim. By prioritizing the elbow, he puts himself on the strong side of help defense and gives them enough room to rotate. We see a similar outing in the fourth play below. Positioning his ball screens is essential to get to the right spot to ensure an open three. That’s an area of attention for his developmental plan for NBA scouts and decision-makers to keep an eye on.
Passing, ball-moving and playmaking
At about two assists per game, Garcia has a positive assist-to-turnover ratio. Considering the high usage and many ball touches, that’s an early sign for his passing and ball-moving in the NBA. Regardless, he’s not used as a playmaker much at Minnesota, which is okay, considering the fewer ball touches he’ll have at the next level. His good handles and consistent decision-making are positives, and his ball-moving and playmaking duties can be scaled up if needed at the next level.
At Minnesota, Garcia mostly makes safe decisions and doesn’t take many risks. Regardless, there is enough evidence of Garcia showing good habits. In the first play below, he makes a good decision with his eye manipulation, faking the pass to the right to hit the cutter on the left. In the second play, Garcia shows a good example of making the right decision and not forcing his creation. He’s bringing the ball up the floor via the post-up, but after good coverage, he’s taking the most out of the five seconds left on the floor where he’s composed before finding the perimeter shooter above the break.
An area to develop is to be less predictable as a passer. In the third and fourth plays below, the recipients of his passes were clear for the defense. Despite good execution, Garcia is best at using deception and creativity, especially considering his experience and consistency in his decision-making. He’ll be more expressive in that role once he enters the NBA.
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Defense
Catch-and-shoot
Garcia often struggles with his positioning on defense. That’s a hurdle for him to overcome at the next level. At 6-foot-11, he’s primarily used as the interior presence on the weak side. That comes with the responsibility to keep good track of the ball and the shooter on the weak side corner. Garcia often keeps one foot in the paint but has a habit of defending the space closer to the basket rather than staying more attached to the perimeter. Considering the NBA’s four, and five-out schemes, that’s an area to work on for Garcia.
In the first play below, he rotates well between the strong and weak side side by keeping his right foot as the pivot to float around. He eventually had enough time and room to respond to the entry pass, heavily contesting the shot. We see a similar outcome in the second possession. His good positioning is followed up by a timely closeout to the elbow shooter.
But the longer the play takes, the more Garcia automatically moves toward the rim. We see an example of this in the fourth play below after Garcia already went too far to the rim on the defensive box-out for the rebound in the third possession. That’s a vital part of his evaluation that needs improvement in the NBA.
Pick-and-roll
Despite having good hips, Garcia plays often too reactive when he’s playing in the pick-and-roll. His defensive footwork needs work, as Garcia has to be more composed. He’s sliding his feet too quickly, struggling to maintain his balance. In the first play, we see an example after the ball handler forces the switch and attacks Garcia’s quick-moving feet to eventually let him hit the deck.
When playing more calmly, Garcia becomes an above-average pick-and-roll defender in NBA terms. In the second possession, he does well to tag the screener. Hereafter, he can bump between both and maintain his tag on the ball handler. He’s composed with his last step and forces the ball handler to beat him off the dribble without faking. The last steps are promising, but this is against ball handlers who play with less tempo. In the third play, we see another aggressive tag by Garcia, who immediately takes over the assignment and switches. Despite his reactivity, Garcia moves his feet much better, using his last step to initiate physical contact, where he has the size and strength advantage over his assignment. That’s the best way to help his defense in the pick-and-roll translate in the NBA.
In the second line of defense, he again uses pushes and tags to force switches. While being comfortable playing drop coverage, Garcia’s quicker feet allow him to go over screens if needed or focus on midrange shooters where he afford to contest shots with more aggressiveness. At 2.5 personal fouls in 35 minutes per game, Garcia shows he can play in control.
Catch-and-drive
When defending against closeout attackers, Garcia does almost everything well except his last move. He’s often struggling to maintain his balance after the last step before contesting shots. That’s where he gives up angles. That leads to teams prioritizing switches where smaller and quicker ball handlers make it their focus to attack Garcia’s feet and force him to tougher last steps. The positive is that once they enter the paint, Garcia can take over by using his physical advantage. But against midrange shooters, Garcia often falls short in keeping the angles closed by keeping his balance after his last step.
In the first play below, Garcia responds excellently to the jab steps and hesitation moves thrown by the ball handler. After the scorer got two feet inside the paint, Garcia immediately took over with his physicality. But he could scale up the toughness as he allowed the opponent to fully attack his chest before the finish. In the second possession, Garcia doesn’t back away to guard further from the basket. However, when dropping his coverage, he gave up too much space on the perimeter, allowing the pull-up three from the elbow.
He has a much better last step when closing out on the third play, using his strong pivot to ensure his balance before sliding his feet. After the scorer picked up the dribble, he didn’t slide his feet well enough, thus losing his balance, which led to his shot contest coming too late. For the NBA, scaling up his aggressiveness to rely less on his last step and balance is a key element to Garcia’s areas of improvement to make it feasible that he can help sustain a team’s defensive rating.
Screen-offs
We see more schemes in the NBA where opposing teams try to free up their shooting specialists at the expense of switching out the big man. Considering the likeliness of Garcia playing as a center, especially in lineups with more shooting on the floor, he has to show the capability to fight around screens away from the ball. In the first play below, Garcia gets lured into the pindown after his assignment relocated to the corner via the baseline out-of-bounds play. Despite some movement on the screen, Garcia showed decent toughness to fight through the contact, but it was too late to fully contest the shot.
In the second possession, Garcia made it an uphill battle for himself to beat the drag screen in transition after he dropped his coverage too far inside the arc. This opened up the gap for the opponents to focus on a transition three instead of the rim, where Minnesota already had enough personnel ready. Therefore, the positioning, especially in transition, is still a work in progress that NBA decision-makers have to help him improve in the next few years.
In the third and fourth plays below, Garcia’s rotations are put to the test. Firstly, Garcia was on the correct end for wanting to keep the assignment at the rim, but he had to take over the switch from a teammate with a decent long stride to close out to the elbow. In the last play, he shows much better rotations after recognizing the relocation to the top of the key. That’s the base to succeed in defending against screen-offs, which will be a vital part of Garcia’s role at the next level.
NBA Draft Projection
Based on the strengths and areas of development mentioned in this scouting report, I project Dawson Garcia to be an undrafted free agent. Regardless, he’ll be in pole position to land himself roster spot. The September 2001-born will enter the league as a 24-year-old with experience, thus most likely leaving his agency with the focus on signing a shorter-term deal to put him in the best position to sign for more money two years into his career.
As a dark horse for Big Ten Player of the Year, Garcia has enough accolades to be invited to the Portsmouth Invitational Tournament. Hereafter, I expect Garcia to be a wanted name for workouts with teams. He has enough potential and NBA-ready qualities to make it to a rotational in his rookie season.