The Wednesday announcement that Phoenix Compass Prep 2023 5-star point guard Kylan Boswell will reclassify to the 2022 class and join Arizona basketball for this coming season is important for a number of reasons.
First, it’s time to fully trust Arizona coach Tommy Lloyd, because he’s been ahead of the curve every step of the way.
From telling the Tucson media before last season that Arizona basketball was going to be really good to predicting a possible conference Defensive Player of the Year for Christian Koloko to showing no worries about filling out the 2022-23 roster, Lloyd has always come through.
Boswell’s commitment, while important for this coming season, is arguably more important for the 2023-24 season when Arizona should have the most loaded roster of the Lloyd era.
For 2022-23, it’s reasonable to expect Boswell to cover the reserve point guard role to the tune of 15 minutes per game, but fans should look at Boswell’s first season as a way to get acclimated to the college game and way of life, as junior point guard Kerr Kriisa and Texas-transfer point guard Courtney Ramey figure to gobble up most of the guard minutes.
But 2023-24 is when Boswell figures to make his mark. There have long been rumors that Kriisa could choose the overseas route at some point, as is many times the case for players with international prospects who maybe aren’t viewed as sure-fire NBA players.
If Kriisa were to bolt, that would leave Boswell with the keys to a roster that could possibly contain Azuolas Tubelis, Pelle Larsson, Oumar Ballo, Henri Veesaar, KJ Lewis, and Kwame Evans Jr.
That team might not be the best team in the country, but it is long on NBA talent, shooting, size, defense and team-first players. Boswell projects as the ultimate conductor for such a well-rounded squad.
Where many 5-star prospects attend school with the possibility of attending college as a one-year stop to chase their NBA dreams, Boswell isn’t blessed with the otherworldly athleticism that many of those prospects possess.
But Boswell is a good athlete and is physically much stronger than most players his age. He’s also a master of the cerebral part of the game.
Boswell clearly enjoys the grind that it takes to become a high-level basketball player, as evidenced by his yearly improvement and the pride he takes in playing defense.
It wouldn’t surprise at all if Boswell turns out to be a three-year player who leaves college as one of the better lead guards in the country and one of its most dogged defensive players.
With so many positive attributes surrounding Boswell and the likelihood that he will be a cornerstone for the early Tommy Lloyd era, it’s easy to see why Lloyd prioritized Boswell so early in the process and held an open roster spot with the hope that the physically mature Boswell would opt to move to Tucson a year early.
Arizona fans will like what they see from Boswell this coming season, but the move to reclassify should pay even bigger dividends in 2023-24.
Follow Mike Luke on twitter @ironmikeluke
