Canada's Prosper looks to raise eyebrows at NBA Draft Combine

For Olivier-Maxence Prosper, the time is now.

Like, this week.

The rangy six-foot-eight wing from Marquette — by way of the NBA’s Academy Latin America, prep school in Chicago and before that Montreal — is in Chicago this week taking what he hopes will be his first major step up on draft boards across the NBA.

After the hype around the draft lottery Tuesday night settled down, the gritty work of proving yourself as an NBA prospect began Wednesday in earnest with live workouts and scrimmages under the watchful eyes of front-office staff from every team at the Draft Combine at Wintrust Arena.

Victor Wembanyama, the slam-dunk No. 1 pick from France, wasn’t on hand, running up and down. In fact, none of the prospects projected to go anywhere near the lottery — the top 14 of the draft — are expected to do much other than get weighed and measured and possibly put up some jumpers in open workouts hosted by their agents on the weekend.

The thinking is that those already assured of going in the top two-thirds of the draft have more to lose than gain by scrimmaging.

But for someone like Prosper, there is nothing to lose and everything to gain. He gets to compete against a collection of his peers trying to prove they deserve to be one of the 58 players drafted on June 22.

“Absolutely, absolutely. I really can't wait to go out there and really show who I am and the type of player that I am outside of the college setting,” Prosper said to me in a recent interview before the combine. “Just be myself out there and really surprise some people that are interested but now will go 'oh yeah, we want this guy.' Move up to get me.”

After more than a decade where it seemed like there was always at least one Canadian prospect, if not more, considered a lock for the lottery or at least the first round, the 2023 draft has a little more uncertainty.

All the pre-draft projections suggest that seven-foot-three Purdue centre Zach Edey — the NCAA player of the year this past season — is likely going to be a mid-to-late second-round pick with teams wondering if the paint dominance he demonstrated in college will transfer to the NBA and the modern 'space-and-pace' brand of basketball prevalent across the league.

There are some encouraging signs that Leonard Miller, the six-foot-10 wing from Toronto who excelled this past year with the G-League Ignite, will make his way into the first round and perhaps even the lower reaches of the lottery. He was a late scratch for the scrimmage portion of the combine Wednesday, suggesting that he might have a promise from a team in the first round at least.

But if Proper has his way, he’ll hear his name called on draft night, and maybe even in the first round though projections from the likes of Sam Vecenie of The Athletic and Jonathan Givony of ESPN have him going somewhere in the bottom third of the second round.

One way or the other, Prosper is determined to change some minds.

“I believe in my ability, I believe in my game and to be honest, I'm a competitor,” he said. “So going to those games (at the combine) and playing five-on-five, I'm like, 'I'm gonna show you that I’m better than you.' I'm gonna show people that I don't care how high you are on draft boards, I'm gonna take your spot and that's my mindset going in; and I’m excited to go out and do that.”

He didn’t waste any time. In his first scrimmage of the combine on Wednesday, he put up 21 points, seven rebounds and two assists with a steal and blocked shot in 22 minutes of action coming off the bench in a win. 

Those that have worked with Prosper say his ambition is far from misplaced. He starred as a do-everything-energizer for a Marquette team that won the Big East regular-season championship and end-of-season tournament and set a school record for wins with 29 against just seven losses. Prosper averaged 12.5 points and 4.7 rebounds and showed promise as a shooter, with his three-point percentages improving from 31.7 per cent in 2021-22 to 34.9 per cent in 2022-23 on a higher shot volume. That combined with his six-foot-eight, 230-pound frame and willingness to dig in defensively has earned him some attention from NBA teams desperate for big, versatile wing defenders who can space the floor offensively and lead the break in transition.

“He’s definitely a specimen, he fits the bill of what NBA teams are looking for: he can defend multiple positions, he’s an athlete and I think the biggest thing is he has a big-time motor. He plays hard,” says Nate Mitchell, the former Raptors assistant coach who has worked with Prosper in his role with the Canadian men’s national team program.

“He defends hard, he does everything hard. And I think all those things reflect his work ethic and what he’s willing to do to become a better basketball player. He’s a really humble kid and he knows what he wants, and whatever he wants to be in the league, I think he can do it.”

Prosper believes it, too. His role models are O.G. Anunoby and Mikal Bridges — elite wing defenders who have expanded their game offensively as they’ve earned responsibility in the league.

Closer at hand, one of his closest friends is fellow Montrealer Bennedict Mathurin. They played together at the NBA’s Latin American Academy and dreamed of sharing the NBA stage. Seeing Mathurin’s success — the No. 6 pick in the draft by the Indiana Pacers last year went on to earn first-team all-rookie honours — has encouraged him. Similarly watching another Montrealer, Lu Dort, earn himself a place in the NBA with the Oklahoma City Thunder as a defensive specialist after going undrafted out of Arizona State has been noted.

But mostly Prosper — whose sister Cassandre is a top women’s player at Notre Dame — found himself watching NBA games this past winter and believing he belonged.

"As the season was going along I was looking at the NBA and thinking, 'I can guard this dude' or looking at how guys my size were playing in the NBA and thinking, 'I can do what this guy does, I can rebound the ball, I can push it, I can shoot the open shots he shoots,'" said Prosper. "I felt like if I can do all that stuff right now, there's no reason I can't be that. That's what I was telling myself. I know I’m ready because I could take that guy’s spot."

This week is just the beginning. After spending six weeks in Los Angeles training, doing individual skill development, strength training and daily physiotherapy and massage, the next month promises to be a marathon full of sprints as he travels between cities for pre-draft workouts and a chance to prove what he so strongly believes: he belongs in the NBA.