March Madness meet December Disorder.
On Wednesday news broke that former Detroit Pistons second-round pick James Nnaji had enrolled at Baylor and is immediately eligible to play college basketball.
Nnaji, 21, went 31st overall in the 2023 NBA Draft. He never signed an NBA contract, and instead has been playing in Europe.
International pros moving over to American college basketball is nothing new. In fact, Indiana has a former international pro on its roster. Aleksa Ristic was a three-year professional player for KK Dynamic in the Serbia KSL, the top league in Serbia. Down the road, Illinois is basically a European pro team playing in Champaign.
But the real story here is how Nnaji was approved to play for Baylor after being drafted in the NBA, and the precedent that sets.
Just days later we found out.
On Saturday evening, respected recruiting insider Joe Tipton reported Chicago Bulls two-way player Trentyn Flowers was drawing interest from at least 12 college basketball programs, including Indiana.
So we went from a player drafted in the NBA signing with a college, to a player who has seen the NBA floor on the college radar — in a matter of four days.
Flowers has played in eight NBA games over the past two seasons after bypassing college basketball in 2023. He had signed with Louisville and even arrived on campus there before deciding to play professionally.
In the case of Flowers, it was pretty clear the Saturday evening news was an agent pumping out a list through Tipton. And hours later Tipton clarified Florida, Michigan, Clemson, Indiana, and Texas Tech are not involved with Flowers.
But if Flowers is eligible to play college basketball, who isn’t? Nnaji was granted four years of immediate eligibility by the NCAA. Not under some iron clad rule, but rather an unnamed committee made an interpretation — probably to avoid a lawsuit.
There is an actual NCAA rule that pro-to-college cases must take place within five years of high school. So Trayce Jackson-Davis can’t use his final year of eligibility if you really believe such NCAA rules still have meaning.
Flowers might not be a perfect fit for Indiana’s roster this season, but you know who is? Kel’el Ware. And he has college eligibility left. Jalen Hood-Schifino has eligibility remaining too. They are both within that five-year window. And what does “remaining eligibility” even mean here at the end of 2025?
You can see the arguments supporting a return to college basketball for players like Nnaji and Flowers.
In what other aspect of life can a professional not decide to return to college?
And why should international pros be allowed to play in college, but not NBA players?
In this revenue sharing and NIL era, if playing college sports is now a job, why shouldn’t basketball players be allowed to job hop like everyone else? In some cases there is more money to be made in the college basketball than the G League or overseas.
The real issue is an NCAA that is unwilling to establish and enforce a clear set of rules because it has never seen a lawsuit it can’t lose. And the NCAA is in that posture because virtually every legal ruling to this point has suggested it was running afoul of antitrust laws, creating an existential crisis. So can you really blame them?
It’s not clear where this is going. Perhaps Congress can save the NCAA with legal protection. Perhaps the NBA and NCAA can work out a new arrangement.
But one thing seems certain — in the interim it’s going to be chaotic.
For complete coverage of IU basketball, GO HERE.
The Daily Hoosier –“Where Indiana fans assemble when they’re not at Assembly”
- You can follow us on X: @daily_hoosier and find us on Facebook and Instagram
- Seven ways to support completely free IU coverage at no cost to you.
