2018-19 Villanova Basketball Player Preview: Jermaine Samuels

VUHoops will be kicking off the 2018-19 Villanova Basketball season with an entire month of team coverage. Check in every day for new player previews, schedule breakdowns, team analysis, event recaps, and season predictions as we get closer to the first tip-off of the year!

Profile and Stats: Jermaine Samuels (SO)

Hometown: Weston, MA | Highschool: The Rivers School | Height: 6’7” | Weight: 220

Eric Hartline-USA TODAY Sports

Player Preview

As people have come to realize, Villanova’s roster has been stacked with talent for the past few years. These elite teams have made it hard for certain developing players to get the minutes they need on the court. A current player seriously feeling the effects of this like Jermaine Samuels. In the 2017- 18 season, Samuels was competing for playing time with the number 10, 17, 30, and 33 picks in this year’s NBA draft. And with the new season just around the corner, he’s got to split time with another set of extremely talented newcomers.

Where Are The Stats?

Normally, this is where all of the important efficiency stats from last season would go. The problem is that he only averaged 6.1 minutes per game and missed almost a third of the season (10 games) due to a left hand injury. During his freshman season, Samuels played more than 10 minutes on 7 occasions, never played more than 20 minutes in a single game, and took less than 30 shots the entire season. In the basketball world, it would be the definition of cruel and unusual punishment to judge a player’s outlook based on this small of a sample size.

So, What Do We Know?

Coming out of high school, Samuels drew strong comparisons to Josh Hart - mid-sized 3-and-D player who could do it all. In his freshman year at Villanova, Samuels showed a smooth stroke, an above average IQ, and even created quality dribble penetration on occasion. He has been known to be less aggressive than desired, not strongly calling for the ball and simply allowing the flow of the offense to take control rather than taking control himself. However, it seemed like he turned the corner against DePaul, in which he enjoyed his best game as a freshman, but had the untimely hand injury shortly after.

Best Case Scenario: Looks like the ceiling for No. 23 is a solid role player. At his best, Samuels could be averaging about 15 minutes per game, even more if injuries plague the Wildcats as it did in the 2016-2017 season. If given the right playing time, we could be looking at 8-2-5 coming off the bench.

Worst Case Scenario: Samuels was not truly a part of the regular rotation and that seemed to work just fine. If Samuels struggles, we could see more of his 1.1-1.2-.3 stat line, with plenty of other players capable of picking up the slack. So, in conclusion, the worst case is nothing really is affected by Samuels not producing.

Wisdom Of The Crowds

We are pleased to bring back our Wisdom of Crowds experiment for the 2018-2019 season. In this series, we ask that you consider the points covered in our player preview to supplement your own personal insights and instincts to predict the points per game each player on the roster we score in the upcoming season.