{"id":633123,"date":"2026-03-01T21:56:23","date_gmt":"2026-03-01T21:56:23","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/633123\/"},"modified":"2026-03-01T21:56:23","modified_gmt":"2026-03-01T21:56:23","slug":"cbs-sports-writer-says-hed-be-a-bit-surprised-if-jayden-quaintance-didnt-return-to-college","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/633123\/","title":{"rendered":"CBS Sports writer says he’d be ‘a bit surprised’ if Jayden Quaintance didn’t return to college"},"content":{"rendered":"

Jayden Quaintance<\/a> is widely viewed as a guaranteed lock to enter his name into the 2026 NBA Draft, but one notable college basketball writer isn\u2019t fully convinced. <\/p>\n

Kyle Boone of CBS Sports<\/a> projected the entire first round in an updated version of the mock draft he released on Friday. Not only did Boone have Quaintance outside of the lottery, but he also believes the 6-foot-10 sophomore is likely to return for another college season. Boone projects him as the 29th overall pick to the Minnesota Timberwolves if JQ does ultimately declare. <\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s turned into a lost season at Kentucky for Quaintance, who has appeared in only four games,\u201d Boone wrote. \u201cI\u2019d be a bit surprised if he didn\u2019t come back to school. But if he stays in the draft he\u2019d be a tremendous late-first value for a team like Minnesota, giving them a young defensive monster in the frontcourt to build around.\u201d<\/p>\n

Quaintance\u2019s father, Haminn, reposted the article on his social media, saying, \u201cHe (Boone) will definitely be surprised.\u201d<\/p>\n

Following surgery to repair a torn ACL in March 2025, Quaintance made his Kentucky debut on December 20 against St. John\u2019s, posting 10 points, eight rebounds, and two blocks in 17 minutes. After appearing in three more games for the Wildcats, the 18-year-old has not seen the floor since January 7 as he deals with knee soreness\/swelling. It doesn\u2019t sound like he\u2019ll be back any time soon, either.<\/p>\n

\u201cHe continues to make progress. He is not ready right now. He\u2019s not ready, and we\u2019re not going to roll him out there till he\u2019s 100 percent \u2014 and he\u2019s a ways from that,\u201d Head coach Mark Pope<\/a> said last week<\/a>. \u201cWe haven\u2019t incorporated him back into practice, so that\u2019s complicated. I don\u2019t know how optimistic I am about that.\u201d<\/p>\n

Looking at other NBA mocks released this month, ESPN<\/a> and Bleacher Report<\/a> have both moved Quaintance down their boards. ESPN has JQ as the 18th-best prospect, while Bleacher Report has him going 10th overall to the Milwaukee Bucks. But this is the first time we\u2019ve heard a national writer suggest a return to college in 2026-27 \u2014 whether that be at Kentucky or somewhere else \u2014 was on the table for the talented big man. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Jayden Quaintance is widely viewed as a guaranteed lock to enter his name into the 2026 NBA Draft,…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":556188,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3724],"tags":[7,5403],"class_list":{"0":"post-633123","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-basketball","8":"tag-basketball","9":"tag-jayden-quaintance-24-word-of-god-christian-academy"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@nba\/116156157149211954","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/633123","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=633123"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/633123\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/556188"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=633123"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=633123"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=633123"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}