Atlantic 10 Basketball: 5 key questions heading into 2021-22 season

Is Hyunjung Lee the next Davidson star?

Davidson’s time in the A-10 has been marked by the presence of star guards, from Tyler Kalinoski to Jack Gibbs to Jon Axel Gudmundsson to Kellan Grady. With Grady and his backcourt mate, Carter Collins, graduating and transferring to Kentucky and Murray St respectively, Coach Bob McKillop will need to lean on returnees in the frontcourt, led by junior Hyunjung Lee.

Lee, a 6-7 junior forward from South Korea, was a star in the 2020 portion of the season, scoring 17.4 points per game behind 53% shooting from 3 over his first nine games. Unfortunately, his performance turned with the calendar and in his 13 2021 games, Lee scored 10.7 ppg with a still decent 37.3% from 3. His all-around game suffered with his offense, his rebounding dropped from 4.6 a game to 3.7 and his assist numbers dropped slightly, although they were brought up by a career-high 9 in the season opener.

The eye test certainly provides enough evidence to believe that Lee can repeat his full-season 44.2% 3 point shooting, but it is concerning that the 37.3% second-half performance basically matches the 37.7% number Lee put up in his freshman season.  Staying above 40% consistently from 3 is critical to Lee’s success this season, but to become Davidson’s next in an illustrious line of All-Conference players, he will have to diversify his offensive game.

With Grant Huffman being the only returning rotation guard, Lee will likely be asked to share in the ball handling and play-making duties but more importantly, he will need to create far more offense for himself.  That starts with getting to the rim, where Lee only attempted only 21% of his shots last season according to Matt Rhein of a10stats. This is dwarfed by all of his returning teammates, including by Mike Jones, a skinny 6-5 guard known mostly as a shooter, at 31.4%.

Lee has also failed to consistently get himself to the free throw line, with just 99 attempts across his 100 game career.  Not only is the ability to generate free points both the best indicator of an aggressive scorer and the easiest path to becoming an offensive leader, but Lee’s great shot has easily translated to an excellent 88% at the line.  This may be the key to Lee becoming an All-Conference player on this current Davidson roster, he will need to start getting to the line 6-8 times a game to best produce when the offense is bogged down.

This summer, we got a preview of what a more aggressive version of Hyunjung Lee could look like.  On a roster of veteran professional players, Lee was the primary source of offense for South Korea’s national team in the FIBA Olympic qualifiers. He put up 17 points in a close loss to Venezuela and scored 11 to go with 4 assists while battling foul trouble against a far superior Lithuania team.  What stood out was a relative confidence in handling the ball and a much stronger willingness to shoot, which even included a pair of off-the-dribble 3s, a non-existent shot in Lee’s time at Davidson.

Heading into his junior year, Lee will need to take the skills he showed with the national team and not only incorporate them into the college game but also find a way to create shots for himself at the rim. He is Bob McKillop’s latest attempt at turning a role player into a star, a task that may be necessary to provide Davidson the offensive leadership that the team needs.