Gonzaga Basketball: Breakdown of Brandon Clarke’s Summer League debut

Film & Analysis

Seventeen minutes. One. Seven.

That’s all Brandon Clarke needed to make his impact felt, to wow the fans in attendance at the Thomas & Mack Center for the last Summer League game of the evening between the Grizzlies and Los Angeles Clippers.

Though 17 minutes in what amounted to be an 87-75 Grizzly victory, the 6-foot-8 big man posted 17 points (7-11 FG, 1-1 3PT, 2-2 FT), four rebounds, one assist, two blocks, and was a game-high plus-23. He simply dominated the game in the opening minutes before getting his first rest of the night, scoring eight of Memphis’ first 13 points, scoring on a duck-in dunk, a transition throw-down, a post-spin into a soft floater, and a pair of free throws borne from a Mfiondu Kabengele foul on a strong drive from the perimeter. He was everywhere on offense, going a flawless 3-of-3 from the field and 2-of-2 from the line in six minutes of action. That is how you make your presence known in Las Vegas.

He was spectacular, and while that may have came as a surprise to those who overlooked Gonzaga’s real best player (sorry, Rui), it was no different than what he had put on display over and over again as a Bulldog this year.

Whether he was cutting toward the basket, streaking on a run-out in transition, or barreling toward the basket as the diver and lob recipient, Clarke’s 40.5-inch max vert and violent above-the-rim athleticism manifested themselves on the court on three such occasions, with the rim being the victim of a bevy of rim attacks.

Memphis’ ball handlers repeatedly ran pick-and-roll sets with Clarke rolling or slipping to the rim, hoping to take advantage of the defense with his elite vertical spacing and finishing ability. The Clippers did what they could to counter those sets, sending bodies at Clarke to deter entries and lobs and hoping to clobber him on cuts and shot attempts to knock him off balance (specifically with the 6-foot-10, 256-pound Mfiondu Kabengele as the clobberer), and while it was somewhat effective, Clarke often capitalized once he received a pass.

His elite touch, which led to the big posting unmatched percentages as an at-the-rim finisher and two-point jump shooter, was put on display, with Clarke using other aspects of his game to finish at the rim instead of his mesmerizing bounce and thunderous dunking ability.

Running the pick-and-roll with newly acquired Grayson Allen (the second-year Duke guard who was sent over to Memphis from Utah in the Mike Conley trade), Clarke slips, tiptoes out of Allen’s why as he drives, and bursts upward to receive a daring lob that he somehow finishes with softness and ease.

On another set, staggered screens send the curling Allen hurtling toward the rim, attracting three defenders before delivering a little wrap-around pass to a cutting Clarke, who uses a beautiful one-dribble spin to avoid Kabengele before throwing up the softest push-shot that floats right over the outstretched fingertips of Kabengele before cascading through pure nylon. Impeccable footwork intersects with a light touch, a perfect play from Clarke.

He just misses another push-shot (his go-to move around the basket, other than disrespectful dunks) over the top of the defense, but the soft touch is still evident as it barely bounces out.

Clarke only missed four of his 11 field goal attempts, and although they were largely the result of shooting variance (as in, they just missed, as some shots tend to do), Los Angeles did manage to body him up and force one miss in the post. Clarke gets the larger Kabengele on his back on the left block, takes a pound dribble to steady himself, spins to his left and rises up for a perfectly-contested leaning fadeaway that ultimately misses. Shooting over Kabengele is not small task, especially not when it requires an attempt to body him up, something that Clarke isn’t great at given his thinner frame. He’ll need to bulk up more to go against NBA-strength big men in the post, although he certainly has the touch and crafty footwork to hit paint shots anyway.

He did more than merely operate as a play finisher inside 10 feet, though. No, he wasn’t content by simply ending offensive possessions with dunks and floaters and post shots. Rather, he created for himself on the perimeter, too, showing real juice off the dribble. Clarke took defenders off the dribble on plenty of occasions at Gonzaga, but it was truly a sight to see him doing so on several plays in just 17 minutes of action.

Although his shot was sent back, Clarke caught the ball on the move from the right wing, immediately driving to the basket with the slower-footed Kabengele on his right hip. He didn’t get optimal lift on the lefty layup attempt, but given Kabengele’s propensity to foul shooters no matter the circumstance (he committed 5.2 fouls per 40 minutes as a Seminole) and his subpar lateral quickness, Clarke earned himself a favorable whistle and went on to cash his two free throws.

Clarke wasn’t done taking the Clipper bigs off the dribble. He used his outlier positional athleticism to toy with the slower opposing big men, something he should be able to do throughout his NBA career given his speed and above-average ball-handling ability.

He drives left after getting a switch on the handoff, completely dusting Nigel Hayes with a bursty first step and finishing at the rack with a light finger roll.

On another play in the third quarter, Clarke gets the 7-foot Isaac Humphries on him way out beyond, far from Humphries’ comfort zone in the paint. This doesn’t end well for him.

Clarke smells blood in the water. He knows he can obliterate Humphries off the dribble, and knows he can do it quickly. He dribble right, uses a nasty hesitation, and darts back to his left, bursting past the center before he can flip his hips back in time. Clarke ultimately misses his patented push-shot at the rim, but whew, that crossover was something else. That’s a cruel move to uncork as an NBA power forward against fellow bigs that don’t possess comparable athletic abilities. If he can tighten his handle, he’ll be able to attack mismatches (which he could see regularly depending on the personnel he’s facing) on a semi-regular basis.

Brandon Clarke’s biggest swing skill as a prospect is undeniably his perimeter shooting. As a Bulldog, he only canned four of his 15 three-point attempts (26.7 percent, to be exact), rarely taking and rarely making shots from beyond the arc. The paint was his home, although he showed the touch to finish floaters and two-point jumpers that weren’t too terribly far from the basket. His mechanics have been overhauled, with the improvements showing in his percentages from the field and from the line, which bodes well for future growth in that department.

If a player with his tools and intelligence learns how to shoot… whew.

He’s a ways away from truly threatening opposing defenses as a long-range threat, as teams will likely sag off of him whenever he roams along the arc, but as his reps as a shooter increase and he continues to iron out his unorthodox shot mechanics, the makes should follow.

Some detractors don’t believe in his potential to shoot it.

But for those who do, his three-point attempt early in the second quarter was enormous.

Running a pick-and-pop with Keenan Evans, Kabengele shades over to halt a possible Evans drive, leaving Clarke wide open beyond the arc. Evans delivers a pass after immediately recognizing this, and Clarke is left a perfect chance to shoot it.

He drills it.

The shot isn’t pretty. The release was wildly segmented, with Clarke bringing the ball straight up before pushing it outward toward the rim, and the base of his shot changes between the launch and landing, but the triple nonetheless sails through the cylinder unimpeded.

His shot is a work in progress, and will be for some time, which is fine considering where it was at just a year ago. It’s apparent that the current emphasis is on the arc of his shot — he launched a pure rainbow jumper that reached the stratosphere before falling through the net. It’s funky and awkward, but progress is progress, and the makes are what matter at this juncture, and it’s crucial that he builds up his confidence as a shooter by readily attempting threes whenever the defense gifts the opportunities to him.

Unfortunately, on a similar screen action that sees the dropping Kabengele all the way in the paint with Brandon Clarke alone at the top of the key (and I mean alone) with eons of time and miles of space to launch from deep, Clarke spurns the catch-and-shoot opportunity without giving it much of a thought. He’s looking to move immediately upon receiving the bounce pass, favoring an ill-timed deep-two pull-up, which gives Kabengele enough time to get back in the play to contest the shot. The shot clangs off the rim, an unsurprising yet unfortunate result.

He may not be wholly comfortable launching from deep, but he needs to gain as many in-game reps as humanly possible. If he can even shoot slightly below average anytime soon, the threat of his jumper will force defenders to close out instead of sag, which would enable Clarke to optimize his off-the-dribble game. If defenders have to worry about his shot and rush to contest him, he can attack the closeout with swift speed, adding a fully-realized element to his offensive skill set.

But that’s projecting to the future. Something that he readily shows off right now, in addition to all of the soft finishes and high-flying acrobatics, is impeccable timing, technique, and intelligence on the defensive end. He was a stalwart that cleaned up everything for Gonzaga, a big with the bounce to reach the highest shots and the vertical explosion to reach his peak almost instantaneously, plus the lateral mobility to slide his feet along the perimeter. He was the complete package, and that didn’t magically disappear against Los Angeles.

His fluid movement ability was apparent when defending a Kabengele drive, sliding and mirroring the drive without giving up an inch, forcing the Clipper center into a tough, heavily-contested spinning hook shot.

He contained speedy guards on the perimeter, too, sliding step-for-step with David Michineau on the switch, forcing him under the basket and swatting the poor Frenchman’s layup attempt out of bounds, not giving him a chance to get a viable shot up.

His off-ball awareness was present as well, rotating toward a Hayes push-shot before disrespecting him entirely by punching it out of bounds. Its was such a gnarly rejection that you can clearly hear Clarke’s hand slapping the heck out of the ball before it careens out of bounds (toward the Clipper bench, no less).

Just… man.