Introduction

Since college basketball started having a national championship in 1939, it has been dominated by a group of schools called the “blue-bloods”, winning 50 out of the 86 potential national championships. Historically the blue-bloods consist of Duke, North Carolina, Connecticut, Indiana, Kansas, Kentucky, and University of California Los Angeles. Villanova and Florida are now also in the blue-blood conversation after consistent success during the 21st century. Add in schools like Michigan State, Michigan, and Louisville, very strong programs that do not have quite the same level of consistent success, but get many of the top recruits each year and you have the powerhouses of men’s college basketball. With this level of domination these programs have, it raises the question what college programs are the best at producing NBA talent?

Player Database

Data comes from a combination of the NBA’s historical draft tracking since the inception of the draft and the NBA’s advanced stats website. For analysis purposes I only took draft data since 1989, when the NBA draft changed to two rounds. The NBA started tracking advanced stats in the 1996-97 season, so for most of the analysis it is since 1996.

Draft Picks by College

Duke and Kentucky lead all college basketball programs with the most draft picks since 1989, both with 66 followed by most of the traditional blue bloods.

Offensive Stars

Offensive rating measures how efficient a player is on offense by how many points they generate per 100 possessions, accounting for made field goals, free throws, assists, and offensive rebounding.

Gonzaga leads all colleges in highest average offensive rating since the NBA started their advanced stats in 1996 at 108, followed by Arkansas and Texas both at 106 points per possession. Villanova, Duke, and Kentucky follow as the only blue bloods adn 106, 105, and 104 respectively. This may not seem like a big gap. However, a normal NBA roster is between 12 and 15 players, so if we take 4 players each from Gonzaga, Texas, and Arkansas and 4 from Villanova, Duke, and Kentucky, you get a difference of 20 points, which is a substantial gap.

Defensive Specialists

Overall, Georgia Tech leads all colleges in average defensive rating per player drafted at 103. This means that on average players drafted from Georgia Tech give up 103 points per 100 possessions. The NBA average defensive rating for the 2024-25 season was 110.68, which is significantly higher. However, this should be put into some context. 20 years ago the league average defensive rating was 102.82, almost even with Georgia Tech. This is also why some programs like Stanford, who had 5 players drafted between 1999-2002 with a career defensive rating below 99.5 points per 100 possessions, make the top 10.

Defensive Specialists Since 2016

After filtering to only include affiliations with at least 5 draft picks since the 2016 season, where the league average jumped to 107 and continued to increase to where the league is at now, Maryland leads all with an average rating of 104. North Carolina tops the blue-bloods at 108. The vertical line shows the NBA average for the 2024-25 season, and we can see just over half the teams that meet the conditions are at or below league average. Again the difference on a player basis may not be that large, but a team of the top three non blue-bloods would have a rating about 12 points lower than the top three blue-bloods.

Overall Stars

Arkansas is the overall strongest program per average net rating. It is surprising that there was not a single program with a positive average net rating, meaning that all programs on average produce players that give up more points than they create. Similar to defensive rating, the changing of the style of the NBA may have some influence over these rankings, with Stanford being in the top 10 again.

Overall Stars Since 2016

Since 2016, Arkansas and Oregon are the only affiliates to have a positive average net rating. Overall 13 teams are above the league average net rating for the 2024-25 season, with programs that usually have good offense and defense like Duke, Michigan, UConn, and Michigan State are below the league average.

Shooters

True shooting percentage is an interesting stat to analyze because it shows a player’s scoring efficiency by combining both field goals and free throws. One issue is bigger players like centers and power forwards are more likely to have a high true shooting percentage because the probability of making a shot is greater if you are next to the basket.

Potential Stories

With positional data available, which schools are better at producing 3 point shooting guards versus efficient bigs?

How has the introduction of NIL changed these numbers, and what can it tell us for the future of college basketball and NBA draft prospects?

How does international development influence these metrics compared to college development?