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Evaluating Tony Carr’s Performance At The 2018 NBA Draft Combine

Penn State guard Tony Carr became the first Nittany Lion to participate in the NBA Draft Combine this past weekend, turning in an inconsistent performance over the weekend.

The Philly native was phenomenal in the shooting drills, but failed to impress scouts in the athletic testing. Carr was one of just two players at the Combine to rank among the top five players in each of the three-point shooting drills, joining Syracuse’s Tyus Battle. This comes as little to no surprise for Penn State fans, as Carr knocked down an impressive 43 percent of his three-point attempts this past season.

Unfortunately, the former Roman Catholic star was unable to match his shooting performance during the various athleticism drills that players went through on Thursday. Carr finished tied for last among all participants in the vertical jump (25 inches), while finishing tied for fourth-to-last place in the max vertical with a score of just 31.5 inches.

He also recorded the second slowest score among guards in the shuttle run (3.39 secs), only beating out Miami’s Bruce Brown. In comparison, first-place finisher Battle finished the same drill in just 2.86 seconds. Carr was also second-to-last among guards in the lane agility tests, with a time of 11.89 seconds – over 1.5 seconds slower than the leading time of 10.31 seconds by Duke’s Grayson Allen.

Carr’s shooting success made up for a lot of these shortcomings, as well as his superior size for a point guard. Of the 13 point guards in attendance, Carr had the second-widest hands (9.75 in.), second-longest standing reach (8’4″), tied for second-longest wingspan (6’8.25″), and third-tallest height with and without shoes (6’3″/6’4.5″).

Carr averaged 19.9 points, 4.8 assists, and 4.5 rebounds per game as a sophomore this past season.

The fact that he had a size advantage over many of the other floor generals at the Combine might be enough to make up for his underwhelming athleticism. Plus, after all of these tests and drills, Carr still had a chance to prove himself in the five-on-five scrimmages on Friday.

However, the former first team All-Big Ten selection was unable to stand out in the exhibition. Jevon Carter, a stingy defender from West Virginia, pressed Carr the length of the floor for the entire contest, as Carr’s team lost 73-64. Carr played the least amount of minutes on his team, shooting 0-4 with an assist, a turnover, a steal, and a goose egg in the scoring column. His minus-7 rating was fourth worst on the team, despite not logging many minutes.

An ankle injury kept Carr out of his team’s second scrimmage on Friday, but luckily that was the last day of on-court activity for the weekend. The rest of the weekend was made up of Carr meeting with teams for interviews, undergoing medical evaluations by team doctors, and more.

While an average NBA Combine performance won’t necessarily make or break Carr’s draft stock, a good performance would have certainly gone a long way in proving the case for why the point guard deserves to be a first-round pick.

For the time being, most of the updated mock drafts from this weekend still have Carr being selected somewhere in the range of the 25th to the 40th pick, a range that has been consistent for the 6-foot-4 combo guard since he declared for the draft.

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About the Author

Mitch Stewart

Mitch is a senior majoring in broadcast journalism from Roanoke, Virginia. In addition to his role with Onward State, Mitch talks about all the #sprots on Penn State's CommRadio. To contact Mitch, feel free to send him an e-mail at [email protected], and if you really don't value your social media accounts, follow him as he yells on Twitter about Penn State basketball @mitchystew.

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