Kentucky forward Jacob Toppin declares for 2023 NBA Draft

Kentucky forward Jacob Toppin has made a decision regarding his future with the Wildcats. The senior posted on Twitter on Friday that he will declare for the NBA Draft.

Toppin’s decision comes after a bizarre 2022 Kentucky season. Toppin himself sort of performed as the team did. Early in the year, he was flat-out bad for periods of play and almost looked like he’d regressed since coming on strong as a reserve in 2021-22. But during the early portion of conference play, he completely flipped the script.

By March, Toppin was Kentucky’s most consistent all-around contributor. He was a terrific secondary rebounder next to Oscar Tshiebwe, and helped Kentucky become the best rebounding unit in the nation. Toppin also surged to become one of the team’s three leading scorers, and averaged over 14 points a game from Mid-January through the end of the season.

Jacob Toppin simply played excellent basketball for the last two months of the season…until the Kansas-State game. He still defended really well and played well in other areas, but he and Antonio Reeves just went cold as the ‘Cats ultimately lost. Oh well. For Toppin on his own, 2022-23 was a real season of growth. The guys he was by March is so much different than the guy he was back in November. Best of lucky to JT next year!

More on the 2023 NBA Draft

The 2023 NBA Draft is set to take place on Thursday, June 22, 2023, in Brooklyn at Barclays Center. Round 1 of the draft will be announced by NBA Commissioner Adam Silver, while Deputy Commissioner Mark Tatum is expected to handle the second round of picks.

To be eligible for the NBA Draft, players must be at least 19 years in age during the calendar year that the draft is held and at least one NBA season from their high school graduation date, or the date that would have been if they are not graduated. It is not required that player spend that one year playing college basketball, though. Players can play in either college, abroad, or the G League Ignite if they choose so.

While this is a significant change from what the rules once were, players are eligible to enter their names into the NBA Draft pool and explore their options by hiring an agent to go through the process, while still keeping their college eligibility. The deadline to make that move is on April 23 beginning at 11:59 p.m. ET. Players have until June 12 at 5 p.m. ET to withdraw their name from the pool and return to college.

The NBA Draft Lottery will be held on May 16, which is also the start of the NBA Conference Finals.