Ven-Allen Lubin Scouting Report
Mobility and toughness are must-haves for today's NBA forward. In the league's transition to positionless basketball, there's a clear role for Lubin on day one after going pro. What's the intrigue?
After putting up a stellar performance in the EYBL circuit in the summer of 2021, Lubin made a name for himself, earning multiple notable offers, whereafter he decided to commit to Notre Dame. One of the areas that stood out is that he already looked physically ready to play college basketball despite being a high school junior at the time.
Lubin earned a starting role in the latter stages of conference play during his first year, where he was used as an energy big early on and played himself to more usage, where he could show his craft as a scorer in the post. In his sophomore year, Lubin transferred to the SEC and committed to Coach Stackhouse at Vanderbilt, where he finished the year as a double-digit scorer.
Physical Profile
At 6’8”, Lubin’s broad shoulders and great upper-body strength stand out. Combined with his 7-foot-plus wingspan, he’s built as a plug-and-play forward for the NBA level in terms of his physical tools.
Lubin has a slower first step but shows great acceleration on his strides which makes it possible for him to switch onto taller wings thus making him able to guard up to three positions in the future.
He plays with a winner’s mentality on the court and doesn’t shy away from contact. This combined with his excellent hips and improving footwork opens up his future scoring potential.
Offense
When evaluating Lubin’s profile, his lack of confidence before the jumper stood out. In conference play teams were keen on letting him open from the far midrange and three-point line, despite him being a 33.3% shooter on 1.5 attempts per game. In the long run, Lubin has to build up the confidence to take open jumpers without any hesitation and punish defenses for leaving him open.
His off-ball movement is good enough to get him open after plays around him force the opposing defense to rotate. In the first play below, he shows the confidence to move to the midrange area but takes too long before deciding to take the jumper or not. In the last two plays, we see examples of how comfortable opponents are in letting him shoot.
The form looks off, however looking at all 39 three-point attempts, Lubin shows consistency with his shooting release. Overall it needs work at the next level as the jumper will be a big factor in him being able to play long minutes. An NBA front office should consider this when evaluating his profile.
A positive in Lubin’s profile is his passing. He doesn’t stand out by executing difficult reads but makes good decisions both as a ball-mover and when he’s asked to create out of the post.
Defenses are keen on leaving him open outside the perimeter, however, Lubin has the face-up game to answer these decisions. That combined with his connective passing opened the pathway to develop into a short-roll playmaker in the future. As of today, his decision-making takes too long. However, a positive that makes it feasible is that the execution of his reads has improved compared to his freshman year.
In the second and fourth plays, we see Lubin creating plays for others out of post-ups. At the NBA level, we don’t see this play type as often as we did a decade ago. However, Lubin shows he’s constantly trying to punish mismatches when he has the chance, which is an NBA translatable part of his passing potential.
The first play is an example of what Lubin has to do more in his junior year—being aggressive in face-up scoring opportunities. As of today, he’s at 230 pounds and added more muscle compared to his senior year in high school. Collapsing defenses while attacking the rim opens up his passing potential in the future.
Lubin gets most of his points as a play-finisher on cuts to the rim. He’s an active off-ball mover who knows how to find gaps in the defense, mostly by utilizing off-ball screens, with the step-up screen in the first play being an example.
The hesitancy to shoot as shown in the second play is still applicable, but Lubin is an efficient finisher near the rim, finishing his sophomore year at 67.7%, compared to 67.1% as a freshman, where his role was more heavily focused on play-finishing, whereas Lubin had more responsibilities as a creator in his second year.
On the contrary to his shooting, Lubin shows quick execution on his finishes at the basket, while putting his fluid hips on display, as shown in the first and third play below. At the NBA level, this comes down to Lubin being an active cutter and screener in sets that are based on motion; a strategy we have seen Vanderbilt use quite often this season.
A way to contribute to keeping an NBA team’s offensive rating at par is by utilizing his ball screens to pick-and-pop opportunities. Taking into account that he’ll have a low-usage role as a frontcourt connector piece, being able to develop into a neutral shooter on low volume is a must-have to stay on an NBA floor.
While Lubin earned a larger chunk of the usage as his sophomore year progressed, we saw Vanderbilt utilize his ball screens combined with dribble drives to collapse defenses. Opponents were okay with leaving him open on the perimeter. However, we saw Lubin shoot with more confidence when the shot occurred after his screening actions instead of him having to shoot as a result of the defense daring him to.
Despite the misses in the first and last play, the process is what matters, and that is Lubin shooting with less hesitancy and being able to show he can take three-pointers with confidence. That’s a good sign of what to expect in his junior year.
With an offensive role that looks limited to play-finishing and occasional face-up scoring, an NBA team will look at long-term potential to determine if they are willing to take a bet on him. Whether it’s him getting NBA minutes to develop or improve via the G League, an NBA roster spot has never been so scarce as of today with the improving level of talent trying to land a job in the league.
Therefore, Lubin’s scoring in isolation is a good feasibility test to determine the level of untapped scoring potential in his profile. The second and third plays below are good examples of what he can do on an NBA floor. With the league’s trend of utilizing big men as playmaking hubs at the top of the key, Lubin uses fakes to explode and attack the rim by using his strength, which is a translatable scoring weapon he can carry to the next level.
An area of development is Lubin forcing his offense too often. The last play is an example. Instead of using the last eight seconds of the shot clock by kicking the ball out, he goes for the tough finish against a double team. In the first play, he takes too much time off the shot clock to come to his offense; a faster-paced NBA game wouldn’t allow that type of freedom often.
Defense
Lubin’s role becomes more clear on the defensive side of the ball. His mobility and aggressiveness translate well into serving as a roaming interior defender between the four and the five. He has the reaction speed and awareness to serve as a weakside rim protector and looks to rotate actively on the ball.
At 2.0 personal fouls in 29 minutes per game, Lubin manages to defend without fouling. However, despite the low number he can get lured into fouls due to his decision-making which needs to get better. The second play is an example where he bites on the pumpfake, with the opponent almost getting an and-one.
In the third play, Lubin is out of position in closing out by putting his pivot foot on the perimeter, leading to his opponent blowing by him to attack the rim. That combined with decision-making are two areas of development in his profile.
When defending against cutters, Lubin looks to make the correct read more often than not. In most cases, the lack of rotations from his teammates led to his assignment getting open looks, as shown in the second play.
Partially that’s on Lubin as well, who is too quick in offering help defense, with the last play being an example. While he covers the baseline to block the drive, his assignment is the more dangerous scorer on the opponent’s team. Combine that with Lubin’s strength being his rim protection, and his betting on challenging the driver at the rim would have been the better decision.
In the first play, he looks more secure while roaming around the painted area. Lubin spent too much time focused on the ball handler but used the entry pass to the mid-post as a moment to scan the court to determine his next move. That’s a plus regardless of being too dialed in on the ball handler in this play. The deflection is a result of him reading the offense.
At the NBA level, Lubin will be asked to serve as a pick-and-roll defender. While drop coverage is the most common scheme, there’s a trend of teams wanting to diversify their pick-and-roll coverages in the future. In Lubin’s case, he plays a drop-coverage-heavy pick-and-roll defense due to his first step not being quick enough to go over the screen more often than not.
We most often see him making ball handlers beat him off the dribble, where his physicality leads to them settling for midrange jumpers, with the third play being a good example. At 2.0 fouls per game, which is a low number, his decision-making as a drop coverage pick-and-roll defender stood out. That’s the most translatable part for the next level.
Dropping too much is a risk for the NBA. Due to the NCAA’s three-point line being at 20-foot-9 versus the NBA’s 23-foot-9, it can be costly for a team’s defensive rating to allow opponents to take off-the-dribble threes with the amount of space Lubin gives up at times. For his junior year, the area of development for Lubin is to diversify his pick-and-roll coverages.
The biggest area of development for Lubin is his decision-making when closing out on defense. While he’s at a defensive rebounding rate of 16.5%, that’s a below-average number. His 6.3 rebounds per game might look good on paper, but in reality, he could put up bigger rebounding numbers due to his positioning and physicality when he’s actively in box-out mode.
In the second play, we see a summary of what Lubin has to improve in his junior year. He’s too late in rotating and has to close out against the wide-open three-point shooter. This trickles down to him not being available to box out for the defensive rebound, leading to a second-chance opportunity for Florida.
In the first play, we see Lubin hesitate to drop or get in his opponent’s face in the midrange area. The simple kickout pass leads to another wide-open three where Lubin’s shot contesting comes in too late. These sequences are consistently there in his defensive possessions, thus causing his low defensive rebounding rate. If his decision-making on closeouts improves, we likely see Lubin being able to average double-digit rebounds next season. In his role as a physical presence, rebounding is a critical addition to his NBA profile as well.
NBA Draft Projection
In Lubin’s case, the sell for NBA teams is his physical profile combined with excellent intangibles such as his hip mobility and a well-filled frame. He’s a young sophomore who’ll be 20 years and 5 months old on draft night, which makes his age a plus in his profile as he’ll continue to be young for his class.
On the offensive end, his NBA role will consist of screening, play-finishing, and providing energy on both ends. At 6’8”, he takes away the lack of size with the other physical gifts he has, with the frame and level of physicality without fouling being the most important ones.
On the defensive end, Lubin has a lot to clean up, making it clear that he should return to school for his junior year. His decision-making on closeouts and experimenting by playing less drop coverage as a pick-and-roll defender are the most important ones.
The biggest untapped potential is his passing. Executing easy reads is something we see him consistently do. What stood out is that he’s not afraid to make high-risk passes if he sees the gap in the defense. That’s another area that’ll likely improve next year.
As an upperclassman production becomes more important. Therefore Lubin must put up better rebounding and assist numbers while seeing a higher usage rate—21.8% as a sophomore.
If Lubin improves the above-mentioned areas and the league’s need for mobile and versatile frontcourt depth, he’ll likely end up as a safe pick in the second round of the 2025 NBA Draft.