Kansas basketball: Ochai Agbaji needs to increase his output this season

Kansas basketball is set to have a solid team next season, and guys like Ochai Agbaji will need to step up and play bigger roles.

Kansas basketball didn’t lose many players from last season’s team, but the ones they lost were some of the best in the nation. All Americans Devon Doston and Udoka Azubuike will not be coming back, and Isaiah Moss is gone too. Some Jayhawks will need to step up, and Ochai Agbaji is one of those Jayhawks.

Last season, Agbaji averaged 10 points and 2 assists per game on 42.8 percent shooting from the field. Granted, many of his attempts were from behind the arc, but he’s still shooting about 33 percent from three-point range. That’s not a bad three-point percentage, but there’s definitely some room for improvement there. Being more consistent from three-point range would also help Agbaji get a step on defenders, making it easier for him to get to the rim and throw down one of his vicious dunks.

One area where Och really needs to get better is his passing. There were a few times that he made some low-IQ passes, and his post-entry passing looked bad too at times. He doesn’t need to average 10 assists per game, Agbaji just needs to be smart when throwing the ball down to either David McCormack or Mitch Lightfoot.

If he could up his average to 13 or 14 points per game this season, that’d be huge. It’d certainly get NBA scouts’ attention considering he has excellent athleticism that could translate really well to the NBA. Agbaji will need to do well to show that he can play in the league too since the 2022 NBA Draft is already being hyped up as one of the best in years.

There will be other Kansas basketball players that need to play bigger roles, guys like David McCormack, Christian Braun, and Marcus Garrett, but Ochai seems like the guy that will really need to increase his output to help make up for the loss of Azubuike and Dotson.