Last weekend, Phenom Hoops hosted a variety of intriguing teams and prospects at our highly entertaining Tourney Town Showcase. Although the event featured several men’s games, one could argue that Janiya Milligan stood out as much as anyone on display. Her TW Andrews team ultimately suffered a narrow defeat in overtime, but there were plenty of takeaways worth noting from the freshman post.
There are a few indicators of surefire talent when identifying these young ladies on the basketball court with size and athleticism usually being the easiest to point out. Well, that’s a massive reason why Milligan already has so much appeal. She possesses excellent size (with coordination) for her age, but also displays great feel, mobility, and understanding of how to affect the action on both ends of the floor without requiring a ton of touches. Milligan is great at controlling the glass, altering shots, and applying scoring pressure as needed. She finishes well around the basket, draws a lot of fouls, and converts at a solid rate from the free-throw line. Milligan also runs the floor well in transition. She has the ability to be a nightly double-double threat in addition to someone who can accumulate blocks with relative ease.
Milligan was far from the only noteworthy prospect on the TW Andrews roster, but her status as a freshman makes it difficult to be anything other than impressed. The blend of poise, maturity, mentality, and willingness to play hard/do the little things is what separates her from other young, high-upside prospects. It’ll be interesting to see how her development irons out over the coming years, as her foundation clearly has some special attributes in place.