Stephon Castle: Fitting the Mold
Two-Way wings are constantly in demand in the modern NBA, and no team has made that more obvious than the recent NBA Champion Boston Celtics. Does UConn product Stephon Castle fit this mold?
Stephon Castle walked into the town of Storrs, Connecticut a young man, and walked out a key piece of one of the best teams in NCAA history as UConn breezed their way to a repeat title win, winning every single game in the tournament by double digits. Pieces across this team will be remembered for years to come, with Alex Karaban returning to school and hoping to solidify himself as one of the best players in school history. Donovan Clingan will likely go down as one of the best defensive bigs in recent collegiate memory. Cam Spencer, despite only spending one year at the program, will likely go down as one of the most firey and loved players in the history of college basketball. The Most Outstanding Player for the NCAA tournament, and joining Karaban as one of two players to start on both Husky championship teams, Tristen Newton, solidified himself as one of the impactful transfers of this early portal era. But the most intriguing player in the legendary starting lineup was the lone Freshman in the starting lineup, Stephon Castle. Castle hails from Georgia, growing up playing both in the USA Basketball Program, but also staying at his local high school of Newton. Coming into the season, Castle had a lot of questions as a prospect, with scouts being concerned if he was simply a point guard by necessity at the lower levels and was more suited to play as a connective wing. Coming out of this wildly successful season, these questions still exist for Castle and are brought up like clockwork, but I and many deem him worthy of a top 5 pick, so what makes Castle tick?
Offensive Maestro or Offensive Disaster?
If you ever find yourself in a debate on Twitter about Stephon Castle’s projected role in the NBA (I can’t recommend this), two instant things are brought up. Can he shoot, and is Castle a point guard? The first question is quite simple. Right now Castle isn’t an effective shooter. He entered the season outright not being guarded by teams, being dared to shoot by the likes of Butler and Xavier, but once Castle showed an ability to shoot the ball at a clip better than the outright worst shooters in college basketball, teams began to respect him a bit more, and he seemed to hesitate a lot less when he shot. That being said, Castle still only shot a measly 27% from distance this season, never once making more than two threes in a single game. He ranked in the 28th percentile on his spot-up possessions and was often the guy who teams preferred to have the shot go to in scramble situations.
All this being said, I tend to believe in Castle getting to a level as a shooter where he can leverage at minimum average shooting to get inside the lane. He was a 75% shooter from the charity stripe and his form looks solid despite the percentages, as well as having all the indicators of good touch inside the arc.
The former question in the endless debates of Stephon Castle is whether or not he is a point guard. Castle played virtually zero point guard this season at UConn, but regardless of his ability at the position, this was due to UConn having two other college basketball veterans in Tristen Newton and Cam Spencer at the guard position, so Castle was often limited to 2nd option touches at best. Despite the on-ball reps coming in a limited capacity, Castle has quality statistical indicators of his ability as a passer, posting an assist rate of 18% to a turnover rate of 13%, being in the 74th percentile as a pick-and-roll ballhandler, along with the tape showing Castle as someone who can either fill the role of a creator or connective passer.
Throughout the entire season, Castle was an unselfish teammate who was always willing to make the correct pass, whether that be a simple swing pass in a scramble situation, coming down in transition, or operating in ball screens. Transition in particular was where I found Castle to shine, and he was constantly able to use his vision to dime up and create easy points for his teammates at all levels of the floor, whether that be to cutters, rim running bigs, or trailing shooters. The numbers back this up, as Castle was 81st percentile in transition possessions, despite playing for a UConn team that played at a slow pace, ranking 315th in the country in pace. Watching the tape, one could make the case that UConn’s potent but limited transition attack came from Castle alone, as with all due respect to his teammates in the backcourt, neither Newton nor Spencer was willing to run the floor much during the season.
As a pick-and-roll ballhandler, Castle also showed the craft and understanding of space of a future NBA point guard, often knowing how to probe into open space, and either hit a big man for a lob or dump off, or take the ball to the rim himself and score, where Castle finished at a rate of 63% all season, a quality rate that gets better when you take into account his lack of shooting gravity. Castle is an incredibly strong player, particularly for a freshman, and he was able to play some bully ball around the rim, as well as not getting knocked off balance. This strength in Castle’s lower half and core will make him more ready to play from the jump in the NBA, as he won’t have to go through the growing pains of adjusting to the physicality of the NBA, as Castle was often the player initiating contact against defenders, and using it to his advantage. He utilized a bevy of bumps and bangs to create space and often did so off of two feet.
Castle also has a quality handle, and that understanding of space I mentioned also applies to the Georgia native’s ball skills. He rarely turned the ball over as a result of his handle and has the ability to alter the speed of his dribble to manipulate defenders. I believe Castle has the acumen as a passer, craft, and finisher to operate as a point guard at the next level, but the only place I do have concerns in Castle’s ability to create at the next level is his separation. Stephon Castle is a player who doesn’t outright possess elite separation skills. This makes him easier to guard when combined with his lack of shooting gravity, and this lack of separation means he isn’t walking paint touch à la John Wall or Rajon Rondo, two guards who carved out quality careers despite a lack of shooting. If a team can’t throw Castle the ball with 5 seconds left on the shot clock and tell him to go create a shot it can severely limit his ability to play as a primary creator in the NBA and move him down to the wing.
So what if Castle slides down to the wing and plays a role similar to what he did at UConn this year where he is asked to be a secondary ball handler? Despite his lack of shooting, Castle is still a player who knows how to play off the ball. He can use his strong frame combined with a great eye for open space to cut to inside the lane to score. This applies in both the halfcourt and transition as well, where Castle can fill a lane in the open floor for a bucket.
This rare ability to pass and cut makes me more certain about Castle’s ability to stick in the NBA, as he cleanly slots into a role either on or off of the ball. All of this comes back to Castle’s shooting. His passing and cutting means he likely only has to become around a 33% shooter to impact winning, as he will positively impact offense in pretty much every way other than his shooting. Plenty of players have been developed into quality shooters through the years, and Castle won’t have to undergo some huge overhaul in his form, unlike some other players in history and this draft class.
Defensive Brilliance
I’ll come out and say it. Stephon Castle is the 3rd best perimeter defender in this entire class. The only names in this class that I would put above Castle are Jamal Shead and Ryan Dunn. Castle possesses a higher defensive ceiling than Shead due to his age, higher level of athleticism, and size. Dunn is an entirely different discussion who may have his own breakdown coming soon, so stay tuned for that in the coming week before the draft. I mentioned Castle’s strength when talking about his ability to get inside the lane, and nowhere is this more apparent than on the defensive end, where Castle stonewalls defenders with his chest, along with having the elite lateral footspeed to beat ball handlers to the point. He has incredibly active hands and was excellent at getting his hands in passing lanes. He gets steals both on and off the ball, and his burst may be limited on the ball offensively, but this shows better on defense, where he can jump lanes when combining this skill with his high feel for the game to create easy opportunities to score. Castle was also elite at chasing players off the ball. Both times the UConn side saw Creighton this season Castle was assigned the matchup of Baylor Scheierman, who was a member of the All-Big East teams and projects to be a 1st round pick. Coach Greg McDermott runs Scheierman off a staggering amount of off-ball screens, and Castle was attached to Scheierman all game in both contests, giving Scheierman the gift of 2 of his 3 lowest scoring performances of the season.
Castle is someone who could make an All-Defense team one day, and he was UConn’s best perimeter defender on the number 4 defense in the country last season. Castle should be able to step into the NBA right away and play minutes due to his defense. He is also a quality rebounder who won’t give up boards and uses his strength to high-point balls and outmuscle defenders.
Outlook and Projection
So what does all of this mean for Castle? Ultimately I believe Castle will stick in the NBA for a long time. The shooting is a concern, but nothing has indicated that his shooting profile is worse than other players who struggled to shoot as freshmen, and his ability to impact the game in multiple ways makes me think he has a likely outcome as a winner in the NBA. A team drafting Castle can be looking for either a two-way wing or a bigger point guard who can play alongside next to a superstar along the wing or in the frontcourt. No team I think makes more sense for Castle the San Antonio, who look to compete early in the Victor Wembanyama era. Victor was arguably the best defender in basketball last season, but despite that the Spurs let the floodgates open to points when the Frenchman went to the bench, and adding Castle who can serve as a point of attack defender or wing stopper depending on the matchup would be beneficial. San Antonio is also not attached to a particular guard and can let Castle play point guard while having the ability to fall back on his wing skills if that fails. I consider Charlotte to be the furthest Castle could fall, as he would make sense next to LaMelo and Brandon Miller who already shoot but struggle on the defensive end. Their transition attack with the trio would be must-see TV, and I would put the odds he slides lower than 6 to be minuscule.