Completed Event: Men's Basketball versus No. 9-Seed Cincinnati (1st Round) on March 10, 2026 , Loss , 66, to, 73
Final Score
Men's Basketball
66
vs No. 9-Seed Cincinnati (1st Round)
73
The University of Utah Athletics
Poeltl Declares for NBA Draft
4/13/2016 12:00 AM | Men's Basketball
April 13, 2016
SALT LAKE CITY - Utah sophomore forward Jakob Poeltl will enter the 2016 NBA Draft, Poeltl and Utah head coach Larry Krystkowiak announced in a press conference on Wednesday. Poeltl plans to sign with an agent, concluding his career at Utah.
"I have thought about this day and this decision for a long time," Poeltl said. "I have thought about it really hard and I have talked to a lot of people about it. Coaches were involved with it. Obviously I talked to my family about it and with my friends. All of us together, came to the decision and I have decided to enter the NBA Draft. I think this is the next step I wanted to take in my basketball career."
Krystkowiak, who joined Poeltl during Wednesday morning's press conference, agrees that the sophomore is more than ready for the workload that the NBA has to offer and supports his decision to enter the draft.
"We are thankful for Jakob and what he has done here at Utah," Krystkowiak said. "It was a heck of a run. It is a super proud day, I think, for Utah basketball. Jakob is a young man over the past two years that he was here, has been a big catalyst for our program. Our record is 53-18 over the past two seasons and he has been a big part of it. I think he is an example of what college basketball is all about."
A Second-Team Consensus All-American, Poeltl led the Utes averaging 17.2 points and 9.1 rebounds per game. He shot .646 (228-353) from the field, which ranked first in the Pac-12 and seventh in the nation. He collected 16 double-doubles, while also registering a total of 56 blocks and 70 assists on the year.
The Vienna, Austria, native ranked third in the conference and 57th in the nation with 620 points on the year, becoming the first Utah player to eclipse the 600-point mark in a season since Andrew Bogut tallied 715 points in 2004-05.
Poeltl posted double-digit scoring efforts in 31 of his 36 games this past season, which included 12 20-point games. He had seven games where he notched at least 20 points and pulled down 10 boards. He notched his career-high of 32 points against Temple, back on Nov. 22, 2015.
A first-team All-Pac-12 selection and the Pac-12 Player of the Year, Poeltl was named the Kareem Abdul-Jabbar Center of the Year and the NABC's Pete Newell Big Man of the Year, while being named a finalist for the Oscar Robertson, Naismith and Wooden Awards. He was also named to the USBWA All-District VIII and NABC All-District 20 teams, prior to earning All-American nods by the Associated Press (2nd Team), NABC (2nd Team), USBWA (2nd Team) and Sporting News (1st Team).
In two seasons with the Utes, Poeltl averaged 13.3 points and 8.0 rebounds per game. He rounds out his career with a .658 field goal shooting percentage, which ranks first all-time in the Utah career records and his 13.3 career scoring average ranks 24th all-time. He tallied 194 career offensive rebounds, which ranks No. 8 all-time and his 119 career blocks is ranked seventh most in school history.
"I have had the most amazing two years here in Utah," Poeltl said. "I don't regret anything about coming here and I do not regret staying for a second year. I think it was an unbelievable journey. I have really enjoyed it and that is why this decision was so hard on me, because I really wanted to stay for two more years. I think it is a necessary step for me in my basketball career and that is why I wanted to [enter] the draft."
Utah has produced five first-round NBA Draft picks since 1997 (Keith Van Horn, 1997; Michael Doleac, 1998; Andre Miller, 1999; Bogut, 2005; and Delon Wright, 2015) and 10 overall. The 2016 NBA Draft will be held on June 23 at Barclays Center in Brooklyn.
Players Mentioned
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