“Get the team to rally together and try to win the game”
Gonzaga’s Andrew Nembhard has a plan for the NBA
BY HENRY ABBOTT
When Andrew Nembhard was three years old, hooping in the driveway in Ontario, he would pretend to be Allen Iverson. His brother, Ryan, preferred Nuggets-era Carmelo Anthony. “Always, always,” Andrew says, his plan was to play in the NBA.
“I was delusional at that point,” he laughs, sitting almost literally in the lobby of the NBA. He’s smearing butter on a bagel from the same Chicago hotel counter where Pacers coach Rick Carlisle is, as Nembhard speaks, purchasing a salad, a water, and a Mountain Dew. There are agents and players and front-office people and league personnel at almost every table. “That delusion,” he says, “got me to this point.”
Some rookies have to adjust to living away from home for the first time. Nembhard moved away from his parents in Vaughan, Ontario, to chase his NBA delusion five whole years ago. First, he moved to Montverde Academy in Florida, then the University of Florida, then Gonzaga, where he was the lead guard of one of the nation’s best teams.
Two hours after we talk, Nembhard is due to take the court—if his quadriceps is recovered from a strain sustained in one of the combine’s sprint tests.
These audition scrimmages are notorious for players selfishly trying to distinguish themselves by making highlights. “That’s my job today, a little bit,” says Nembhard. “Get the team to rally together and try to win the game. I’m going to try to preach that, to do the right thing, and it’ll be good for all of us. I’m going to tell them that. We have a meeting at 12.”
Part of the reason Nembhard and I are meeting here and now is because of David Thorpe, who met Nembhard in Los Angeles last week. Thorpe has a certain set of convictions about what makes a good teammate. He rates Nembhard very highly as a prospect, and roughly at a 450 out of 10 as a teammate. He almost struggles for words to explain how he feels about him; his fast talk includes a suggestion that it would be fantastic if Nembhard married into the Thorpe family.
“For me, it’s more about building that connection,” Nembhard says of his leadership style, “building that relationship with a guy first, and then understanding what time of approach I should take when I talk with him. Should it be more like a get-on-his-ass-harder type of thing? Or a bring-him-to-the-side-and-give-him-a-couple-tidbits type of thing? Varies for everybody.”
The approach for his star teammate at Gonzaga, Chet Holmgren, was to get him involved.
“He likes to be involved in the game, whether it’s making plays for others, or making shots,” says Nembhard. “He’s a guy you gotta get going early. Whether it’s the pick-and-pop game, letting him feel comfortable behind the 3-point line. When that 3-ball’s there, and guys have to really press him on the perimeter, it makes his life a lot easier. Get him going early, perimeter shots, rhythm shots, any shots.” (Is Holmgren too skinny? “He wasn’t too skinny for college; that’s for sure.”)
Nembhard smiles at the mention of Thorpe (“that’s my guy”) and many other things. I tell him a story about a photo shoot I witnessed 20 years ago, where Allen Iverson yelled at his teammates not to smile. Nembhard gets it: the “intimidation factor.” He nods along with the concept, then smiles even more. Iverson’s mood-setting is simply not the Canadian way.
What is?
“We just try to get it done in any way possible,” he says. “I don’t think we need to put on any gimmick or any front. That’s how I get misconstrued sometimes. Maybe I come off like a laid back guy, but I think I’m very focused at all times. I’m always looking to win a game. I’m always looking to see what we can do to get better.”
Steve Nash, he agrees, is “100 percent” like that.
Nembhard says he loves watching Kevin Durant, and steals from all the greats: “Trae Young drawing fouls. Luka Doncic coming off the ball screen probing, probing, probing. CP comes off, snakes, gets to mid-range shots. I look at all that, and see how I can implement my game in similar but different ways.”
Does it strike him as almost … arrogant … the time Luka takes with the ball, solving the puzzle of the defense? “Yeah. For real. I think I’m similar to him in that sense. I’ve played with a lot of pace in my career, but I’ve done a lot of probing. I think I read the game well. So, I think it works to my advantage with my size, too.” Nembhard is listed at 6-5.
As a member of the Canadian national team, Nembhard has played against Kemba Walker, Donovan Mitchell, Jayson Tatum, and Jaylen Brown—and with Andrew Wiggins and Jamal Murray. As he watches the NBA playoffs, he’s seeing familiar faces succeeding deep in the playoffs.
“That’s why I feel comfortable making the step,” Nembhard says. “I’m a lot more mature than I was when I was trying to come out freshman year. I understand the game more; my body’s more fit. I think I’m just ready. I think I can compete with all these guys I’ve been playing with.”
He feels he’s been training his whole life to be a good teammate to incredible players. “As a young kid playing with older kids, my dad always taught me: pass. If you’re playing with older kids, you’ve got to get them looks and stuff. I don’t know; I’ve just always been that guy. Try to connect guys, win games. I’ve always been part of winning cultures. It just came natural to me.”
Nembhard says there are players on every NBA team that he would love to play with. He can play fast or slow, as a point guard or shooting guard. He has played off the bench and as a starter. He does have one request, though: “I want to go to a team that’s trying to win games. It doesn’t have to be a team that’s maybe in contention right now, but a team that’s working towards that. That’s where I excel—in those types of environments.”
He says he is not obsessively checking draft projections because “a lot of that stuff is kind of thrown out the window on draft day.” His goal is to fall between picks 20 and 40, and to know how that’s going, he’s listening closely when he meets with teams. “I’m looking more for the team feedback, and try to work out where I might fit that way. I’ve worked out for the Lakers, Atlanta, and the Bucks. It went well. I showed leadership; I showed defensive versatility. Stuff that I think can get on the court early on—command the floor, make plays.”
As his showcase game begins, on Thursday afternoon, I’m surprised to see that Nembhard’s not starting. Teammates like Marcus Sasser, Terquavion Smith, and Ryan Rollins handle the ball as Nembhard watches from the bench. It’s not his turn today. After the game, his agent says the quad strain is still an issue. There’s a chance he’ll play Friday.
Nembhard came off the bench for 16 games at Gonzaga, and he developed a certain approach. “It’s definitely hard to be patient,” he says, “but I came with the mindset that I just want to put the team first. For myself, guys will respect me more if I just work on trying to win games rather than trying to worry about myself.”
On Friday, Nembhard got some treatment in the morning, felt good, stepped on the court, and took over the ball-handling duties of a roster absolutely depleted by players dropping out due to injury concerns. With just seven players on the roster (including two who had a bad head-to-head collision on Thursday), Nembhard moved the ball around effectively, snake-dribbled like CP3, and finished with 26 points, 11 assists, just two turnovers, and wide adulation from the assembled media. It has been years since any player had 11 assists in a combine game. Playing like this is exactly why a player on the draft bubble comes to an event like this.
Afterward Nembhard told ESPN he saw teams that weren’t used to playing together, and that were using new terminology. “I knew guys were going to be sloppy with their coverages. I kill in that ball screen. I knew I was going to have a good day today.” Nembhard was the only player on his team with a positive plus/minus.
Why did he play when so many big names were sitting out? He said he wanted to prove that he belonged: “I’m here to stay for a while.”
It was an impeccable performance, and who would care that his team lost by six?
Well, one person: Nembhard himself. One could argue that alone gives him a great chance to be in the NBA for a long while.
Thank you for reading TrueHoop!
He's definitely one to keep an eye out on for the future. I'm sure than many will have him pegged as "over the hill" at 22 but was no doubt also said of Max Strus or Gabe Vincent. They seem to be doing alright!