The “Would Miami beat the Bengals?” thread gave me this idea. I’ll leave it to the individual to define “impact” so that the answer is a debatable opinion, not a fact.
The '76 Indiana Hoosiers: Scott May, Kent Benson, Rob Abernathy, Bob Wilkerson and Quinn Buckner were all drafted in the 1st round, but none made much of an impact.
'82 UNC had Michael Jordan and James Worthy–not much depth but two heavyweights, for sure.
I hope you folks can do much better than this.
1996 Kentucky Wildcats
Antoine Walker
Ron Mercer
Derek Andersen
Tony Delk
Walter McCarty
Nazr Mohammed
^^^all active NBA players
Mark Pope
Wayne Turner
^^^brief NBA careers
Current LSU Lady Tigers!!!
I think Mark Pope is still bouncing around. The Knicks (or someone) put him on injured reserve about a week ago.
The one guy I’m surprised has had a significant career is McCarty. Seemed like he had a lot of ankle problems. And he was always too thin.
But I’m not surprised that Turner didn’t make it. Great passer, great decision maker, great slasher … but ask him to shoot from 18 feet or more and you were asking for a miracle.
The 1979-81 Notre Dame squad had 4 guys who had long and successful NBA careers: Kelly Tripucka, Orlando Woolridge, Bill Laimbeer and Bill Hanzlik. Unfortunately, they didn’t have a point guard and had Digger Phelps as coach, so they didn’t make much of dent in the NCAAs.
The Michigan team of 1989 had Glenn Rice, Rumeal Robinson, Loy Vaught, Sean Higgins, and Terry Mills.
BTW Lorenzo, Sam Perkins was also on that 82 Carolina team, arguably a heavyweight (15 year NBA career).
What about the U of Mich “Diaper Dandies:” not as much depth as other teams already mentioned, but Chris Webber and Jalen Rose have had impact careers, both making huge contributions for playoff teams. Add Juwan Howard, somewhat of a disappointment but nonetheless a lengthy NBA career, oftentimes as a starter.
Eric Riley was also on that Michigan team - brief NBA career.