Jacksen Moni Scouting Report
With the NBA's transition to positionless basketball, physical tools gain more importance in draft evaluation. That's where Moni stands out, but there's much more that puts him on an NBA floor:
Introduction
Moni was a Division II standout at Northern University. He has had back-to-back All-Conference First Team honors while scoring over 15 and 20 points per game in his sophomore and junior seasons. Watching him, it became clear he has had a growth spurt throughout his career.
He wisely decided to stay at the Division II level to play high-quality minutes while letting his frame catch up with his growth. The academic standout shows his loyalty by staying within state borders and committing to Coach Richman and the North Dakota State program.
For the NBA, Moni is easier to place in a box as a floor-stretching high-volume shooter who creates advantages with his shooting gravity and his screening. That’s most of the value of his profile and the emphasis of this scouting report.
Physical Profile
At 6-foot-10, Moni has broad shoulders and a well-filled frame. He can occupy both the four and the five positions. He’s adding more muscle to his frame while listed at 235 pounds. He’s tough and doesn’t back away from contact. He has decent verticality, but most of his defensive value comes through his footwork and quick feet.
Moni has a decent wingspan. There is no official measurement available, but I project it to be somewhere at 7-foot-3. More importantly, he has fluid hips and a good core strength. His mobility and ability to maintain balance when the game gets more physical gives him value to play as a five while keeping the floor-stretching character of his game.
Despite his height, Moni still has his mobility from his younger years. Often, it looks like he’s moving like a guard on the floor, where NBA decision-makers should make it their primary focus to keep investing in his body as there’s untapped potential left on that end.
Offense
Pick-and-pop
NBA teams look to play more four, or even five-out-styled plays. To make it work, the center has to be a good ball-mover and, more importantly, a good screener. Moni has the physical tools to set walls for his ball handlers to utilize. He has quick feet and does well to immediately slide after a ball screen to pop out to his sweet spots on the perimeter. He’s a volume shooter, mostly earning his opportunities as ball handlers in dribble penetration look to find him with kickout passes. That gains more value as teams are usually hesitant to switch their interior presence on him to avoid further mismatches inside the arc.
What immediately stood out was Moni popping away to a larger distance. He’s not only forcing teams to make decisions out of the pick-and-roll, but at the same time, he’s forcing rotations. That gives ball handlers more comfort as it decreases the odds of timely help arriving and puts Moni in a better position to be the recipient of kickout passes. He’s quick to set his feet on all four possessions below. Despite taking a tad too long to power up for his jumper, the composure Moni plays with is a value adder. With his size and length, he’s not bothered by incoming closeouts as he can shoot far over the top of defenses with his high-arcing release. That makes his 40%+ three-point shooting more feasible to hold onto in the long run.
Catch-and-shoot
As an active screener and cutter, Moni looks to relocate to his spots regularly. He makes it work with his great hip mobility. That helps him to not always face the rim when he comes in position for his shot. He does well by always selling the opportunity for an off-ball screen. That’s what NBA scouts look for in floor-stretching forwards and centers. For the NBA, this gives him comfort as a volume shooter, regardless of his excellent numbers and efficiency.
Due to his body changing continuously throughout the years, Moni kept his guard-esque shooting motion. He’s bringing the ball to his waist before powering back up. The NBA is much faster compared to the Summit League Therefore it should be a possibility to change his shooting form in the next few years. With NBA defenders closing out much quicker, Moni should bank on his physical advantage, where he’s already strong enough to keep the ball at his chest without needing to power up for his jumper. On the other hand, his shooting motion is fluid and consistent with the numbers to back it up.
At times, he’s too shooting-focused. In the first play, Moni relocates to the weak side, where he can duck in, draw contact, and try to get an easy look at the rim. However, he’s comfortable with his high release to even shoot over interior defenders. One of Moni’s values is his reaction to closeout defenders. In the second play, the defender pivoted far out to impact the driving lane on the weak side. While Moni had the jumper in his mind, he balanced himself out even stronger after setting his feet quickly, which helped him to take on the bump and keep his balance right before the foul.
Another strong attribute is Moni not having unnecessary motion. He’s looking to stay within the rhythm of the possession, but when he’s at his spot, he’s looking to set his feet and immediately pull up off the catch. Combined with his height, length, and high-arcing release, that’s the value hard to take away for defenders, no matter how fast they close out on him. That’s the type of shooting gravity NBA scouts love to see. The main reason for this is forcing opponents to use their sized players to stick with Moni, either leading to luring out opposing fives outside the paint or countering other switches effectively.
Catch-and-drive
Despite being an efficient high-volume shooter, Moni’s main focus is to get his fair share of offense at the rim. As mentioned in the graph above, he finishes over 70% of his attempts at the rim, and his footwork is one of the reasons he’s establishing good positioning. He’s good at using straight-line drives when attacking closeouts or cuts to get entry passes or multiple paint touches when he’s moving away from the ball. For the NBA, his ability to make plays out of closeouts is a better feasibility test due to the team’s running a perimeter-oriented game, whereas an inside-out game is more likely with Moni playing in the interior due to his position.
In the first play, Moni shows good awareness by not banking on the wide-open midrange but ensuring he has two feet inside the paint, helping him to attack his assignment at the rim. He’s pivoting out well, helping him to duck in for the easy finish at the rim. Moni recognizes his defender closing out too far in the second possession, leaving one foot on the three-point line. Hereafter, he didn’t hesitate to utilize the straight-line drive with only one defender inside the paint. He has a weak handle, keeping the ball too loose with his left, forcing him to pick up his dribble further away from the rim. He’s keeping his composure by selling the fake, but on an NBA floor, the help defender strips the ball away from here on that drive.
The third play is another transition opportunity, where Moni fills the spot well by immediately hitting the weak side. He’s getting the entry pass and pivots strongly before using his fluid hips to change sides and attack the rim via the baseline. His weak handle forces Moni to use his physicality to get advantages or space when he’s in the paint. In the fourth play below, he uses a jab step and fake to create space for the drive. The lateral quickness is decent but looks much slower because Moni doesn’t have the offensive creativity nor handles to effectively make a play to beat his defender with craft. Therefore, he throws his head toward the defender’s chest, overpowering his assignment for the angle to finish the playoff.
The handle has to improve in the next few years. In the last play below, we see Moni immediately picking up his dribble after help arrives. Instead of keeping the ball moving, he’s making one of his rare mistakes in shot selection by settling for a long midrange fadeaway. Against better athletes, Moni’s physicality doesn’t compensate enough to cover the handles. This makes it easier to guard his shooting, as he’s not a realistic threat to NBA defenders yet. Therefore, playing more creatively in closeouts and working on improving his handles are two areas for NBA scouts to focus on during his Summit League performances.
Passing and playmaking
The weaker handle puts more weight on Moni’s passing and playmaking. He’s currently leading the conference with 4.1 assists per game, with two fewer turnovers per game. That’s a good first sign. However, the context for the NBA is to understand his role. In the best scenario, he’s a great ball-mover, who shows decent short-roll playmaking. His gravity as a shooter and screener on the perimeter should lead to him diving to the rim, hoping the ball handler hits the roll man. Hereafter, he can force help defenders to arrive. Often, playmaking forwards and centers need to show quick decision-making much better than guards, as defenders will smell blood if the opposing big isn’t a good passer. This trickles down to teams allowing fast break opportunities, hurting their defensive rating.
But Moni is a good passer and a decent decision-maker. He’s good at keeping defenders guessing, with the first play as an example. He’s bringing the ball down after the short roll before hitting the corner shooter. That move was to ensure the weak side helper to arrive and improve the odds of that corner staying wide-open. The second possession shows Moni’s ball-moving as the opponent puts up the pressure in the full court. He’s often composed in these situations, thriving on drawing doubles. Moni knows he has the size and length to bail him out when needed. If the passing angle isn’t there, he can always defer to put the ball over his head and see over the defense. On the perimeter, that’s one of his weapons to counter harder doubles or pressure.
The third play is another example of his composure and decision-making. Moni looked to hand the ball off but immediately changed to a post-up set to draw more defenders to the strong side. He saw help arrive, pivoted to maintain balance, and waited to launch the timely pass to the backdoor cutter. In the fourth play, a lack of motion around him puts Moni in a tough position as he picks up his dribble while far away from the rim. He kept his jabs alive and waited until one of the defenders bit to help before kicking the ball out to the shooter at the elbow. The fifth play shows more composure on Moni after the hard roll to find himself in a crowded paint. His footwork is another standout part. He’s consistent in executing his reads, making it feasible Moni can handle passing or moving the ball in a faster-paced NBA game, a vital part of making his role as a volume shooter in a four, or five-out-styled offense work.
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Defense
Catch-and-drive
One of Moni’s differentiating areas is his ability to be physical inside the paint and offer rim protection on top of his excellent closeouts. He has much stronger footwork on the defensive side of the ball, helping him to close out against wings on the perimeter. In an era of positionless basketball, teams seek to maintain that post presence, but with the preference to often close out to the perimeter as well. Moni can afford to sit and stay put on switches, where he can also opt to close out assignments he knows he can handle.
In the first play below, the made basket is irrelevant as Moni did everything right. He was aggressive in his closeout and placed his pivot on the last step well. He held his balance and slid his feet decently before not backing away from the bump, which unbalanced the scorer before the finish. In the second possession. Moni recognizes the rotation well and already moved toward the elbow. Despite placing his pivot one step too far, he recovered quickly to use his verticality to still deflect the layup even being one step behind. His physical presence at the rim puts doesn’t show on the stat sheet, as he’s averaging under one blocked shot per game.
In the third play, Moni used his length well to take away the pull-up three. He forced the ball handler to drive to the weak side, as he had his help defender placed. However, Moni’s awareness of opponents in the paint costs him the play. He looked to have lost his rotation with the lack of boxing out, allowing the second chance opportunity to happen. That’s a sign of transitioning from a lower-ranked Division to the Summit League. This should be a sign for NBA teams to contextualize and focus on the future value and process when mistakes like these are made. One of his differentiators is the decision-making being well. Often seen with his positional peers on closeouts, they automatically move toward the rim, hoping the ball handler doesn’t pull up from the midrange so they can use their height advantage closer to the basket. Not with Moni. In the fourth play, he quickly reacted with his last step to the midrange pull-up, not allowing the scorer any room. He was reactionary to the drive but kept his position well, with his footwork making it easier for him to execute and not give away the midrange jumper.
Pick-and-roll
NBA teams flirt with inverted pick-and-rolls more often. Outside of the standard drop coverage, Moni has to show he can do more when defending in pick-and-roll plays. The maturity of his game immediately shows in the first play below. He’s in a mismatch favoring him as the smaller guard is the screener to create space for the elbow shooter. Moni knows he cannot be too physical to not give away the foul while using his length to still bother the shooter before he got over the screen. He can play in control, and at 2.1 personal fouls in 27 minutes per game, he shows it so far this season.
In the second possession, Moni tags the screener, who still got his ball handler the separation. He’s quick to switch but was caught ball-watching after the second screener got him in the wall. As a result, Moni, the tallest on his team on the floor, was positioned the furthest away from the rim the moment the shot was released. One of his areas of improvement is to get better at navigating through screens. With the need for more inverted pick-and-roll options, Moni will defend more ball handlers in the NBA than in college.
The third play is an interesting one. Moni does well recognizing the ball handler driving toward him and immediately goes out with his help defense. But the side pass led to him closing out one step too far, coming to the three-point line and thus making it harder to counter the ball handler attacking the weak side. He didn’t see the screen or his teammate, putting him out of the position with a lucky defensive rebound after the boxout wasn’t there. In the fourth play, there’s no screener closer to him, showing the correctness of his stance the entire play, leading to him cleanly contesting the tough three. The basics are there, but the screen navigation is still a work in progress. That’s the most vital part to add to his developmental plan for the next few years.
Post-ups
Regarding Moni’s footwork, it gives him an advantage when he’s playing against more physicality. For the NBA, post-ups still matter for testing his strength compared to his peers. However, it immediately stood out that Moni is playing too reactionary on that end. He’s not gambling for steals by reaching for the ball. That’s positive. But when opponents try to get a good angle against him, he allows space too easily, making it easier for opponents to finish against him regardless of how well his coverage is.
The first play is an example, Moni gets drawn out too far out of the play but corrects himself well before the opponent gets inside the lane and uses the head fake by not ducking on. Moni didn’t bite, thus helping him to contest the jumper more cleanly. The second possession shows an example of the above. He does everything well, from his footwork to not biting on the moves the opponent throws at him, but between the lines, his assignment gets inside the paint as far as he wants, making the contested layin still a high-quality shot given away by Moni.
Regardless of the third and fourth possessions leading to baskets, Moni is consistent in showing him not biting on jabs and fakes while keeping his footwork consistent to keep the advantage. However, NBA decision-makers need to focus on playing with more toughness and physicality the focus to work on for the next few years.
Catch-and-shoot
Moni’s closeouts are one of his differentiators. He’s also good at recognizing his rotations on the defensive end. He’ll scarcely leave a shooter wide-open. That’s what NBA scouts like to see. However, the area of development is that there’s no further action after he puts his hand in the face of shooters. He’s watching the outcome of the play. Moni should either focus on his box out and get closer to the rim or fly to the other side of the court to finish a potential transition opportunity. Partially, it’s a transition from the Division II level, but most of it is a habit of declaring the defensive possession to have ended after he contests spot-up shooters. That has to change on an NBA floor.
In the first play below, Moni does well to keep his assignment on the weak side within his sight. He’s closing the lane for the backdoor cut and keeps his assignment at about 45 to 90 degrees while seeing the ball handler. He was quick to react to the shooter. The second possession is a tough one. Moni looks slow to close out to the shooter. But in reality, he does well because he tries to take away getting burned off the dribble if he closes out too fast. On an NBA floor with more space, he’ll be forced to use his lateral quickness more, whereas relying on his length will give him less insurance.
In the third play below, Moni flirted with the idea of overhelp, but he quickly recovered and kept one foot inside the paint. That was a good decision, as the ball handlers hit the elbow shooter, and Moni was quicker to arrive, decently contesting the shot regardless of the jumper falling. His great feel for the game to recognize rotations gives him comfort to always stick to his assignment, with the fourth play being another example. For the next level, Moni will likely adjust quicker to the faster pace of the NBA game.
NBA Draft Projection
Based on the strengths and areas of development mentioned in this scouting report, I project Jacksen Moni to test the waters this summer. He’s patient with his development and is happy playing close to home. Therefore, I expect him to go through the draft process but eventually opt to return to school to solidify himself and try, and be a first-round pick in the 2026 NBA Draft.
His weak handles and reactionary defense inside the lane are two areas of development. It’s easy to fall in love with the production and consistency, but Moni has a package of skillsets ready to develop into a niche role. But to give his shooting the value it deserves, the handles must improve.
As a passer, he can change the trajectory of his career in the era of four, and five-out basketball, especially if he can add more gravity to his shot. Moni can play a reduced role off the bench today. But it might be in his best interest to use his college eligibility to add more to his profile and be the next mid-major starter for an NBA franchise in the 2026 NBA Draft.