Egor Demin’s name is on the tip of scouts’ tongues

Another name I’ve gotten extremely positive feedback on from scouts is Russian guard Egor Demin, a 6-8 guard who will play this season at BYU after a late commitment. It’s hard to overemphasize how positive the feedback has been given that quite a few sources had questions about him following his decision to take the collegiate route. The 18-year-old has real point guard skills at that size, with a tremendous ability to run ball screens as a playmaker. He can really pass the ball, and all four of the scouts I spoke with who attended BYU practice were extremely impressed with his poise and comfort level attacking defenses.

“I absolutely love him,” one scout said. “I went into their building having watched clips of him (beforehand), but I wasn’t sure what to expect in person. He has elite positional size for his role and is a tremendous playmaker out of ball screens. He shot the ball really well. I was told after that he hasn’t been a great shooter in Europe, but he definitely made them the day I was there, and I thought the shot looked good. We’ll see what happens when the games start, but (BYU coach) Kevin (Young) and the rest of the staff were glowing when speaking about him. He looks the part of a lottery pick.”

I’ve always had several questions about Demin’s ability to score efficiently. In Europe, he did not shoot the ball well and tended to be a bit more turnover prone than you’d like to see even in youth-level competitions like the Next Generation Tournament and in international under-16 competition. Those questions along with concerns about him on defense produced much more mixed feedback than you’d expect entering the season for a player as highly touted in Europe as Demin had been. But if scouts are proven right, he has every chance to end up being selected very highly, and BYU has every chance to be a top-25 team in Young’s first season.