Texas Tech offered Cloud County Community College point guard Devon Thomas a few weeks ago and Howard College shooting guard Rob Gray this past week. Tubby Smith knows that he needs some creators and scorers on his team and Thomas and Gray fit this description. We’ve got video of both players (from high school) and analysis on how they could impact the team.
Devon Thomas (6-0) Point Guard, Cloud County C.C.
Thomas, a 6-0 point guard that played a year at Missouri State and then transferred to Cloud County C.C. where he’s been really terrific as a point guard and maybe, more importantly, as a scorer. The first thing that I look at when I look at JUCO stats are the shooting percentages. Yeah, the shooting percentages because of all of the things that end up translating to Division I basketball is shooting percentage and that’s what we have here.
Thomas shoots an incredible 52% from the field, including 31% from the three-point line. Obviously, the three-point shooting could use some work, but I think we can all agree that Texas Tech needs scoring and Thomas does that in spades. Thomas averages 17 points a game So, not only does Thomas score, but he is shooting 52%. Think about that efficiency. In looking at his game log there is only two games where he doesn’t score in double-figures.
Want another part of his game that’s encouraging? Thomas averages 6.3 assists a game and he turns the ball over only a shade over 2 times a game with an assist to turnover ratio of 2.5, which would be so huge for this team.
This is film from Thomas’ senior year in high school, so it’s a bit dated, but you get the idea that he can score from just about anywhere. His outside shot is a bit slow and that makes sense considering his shooting from the outside, but he’s darn nifty inside.
Rob Gray (6-2) Shooting Guard, Howard College
Gray is a bit more of a mystery, at least in terms in finding out how he got to Howard College. We won’t concern ourselves with that right now other than Gray is originally from North Carolina and that’s about all I know.
Gray is a scorer, and he does it in bunches, averaging 18.3 points a game, on 48% from the field, which is simply fantastic, and 35% from the three-point line. Gray also averages 80% from the free throw line, which emphasizes how good of a shooter he is. Not only that, but as a shooting guard, Gray is also averaging almost 6 rebounds a game.
Gray probably isn’t the creator that Thomas is, but Gray does average 2.5 assists a game and is on the positive side of a ledger in terms of assists to turnovers, 59 to 47 for the year.
Let’s take his last four games:
vs. Odessa College: 8-11 FGM-A; 2-3 3PM-A; 3-3 FTM-A; 6 REB; 2 AST; 1 STL; 3 TO; 21 PTS
vs. New Mexico Military Inst.: 6-13 FGM-A; 1-5 3PM-A; 8-11 FTM-A; 5 REB; 1 AST; 0 STL; 2 TO; 21 PTS
vs. New Mexico J.C.: 9-23 FGM-A; 2-6 3PM-A; 6-8 FTM-A; 9 REB; 5 AST; 3 STL; 2 TO; 26 PTS
vs. Western Texas College: 7-11 FGM-A; 1-2 3PM-A; 11-11 FTM-A; 9 REB; 0 AST; 0 STL; 1 TO; 26 PTS
It’s pretty clear that Gray can fill it up, and other than the NMJC game, he’s shot the ball incredibly well, gets to the line and generally finds other ways to fill up the box score.
The only video I could find of Gray is from his AAU days, I think he’s #0 in the video, and this is from the 2011 season, so it is some time ago, but this is all I have: