LSU Forward Trendon Watford Talks Decision to Return to Baton Rouge, Why 2020 Will be a “Special” Season
Trendon Watford sees the opportunity he has ahead of him by returning to Baton Rouge for his sophomore season. As a freshman with the Tigers, Watford quickly asserted himself as a reliable piece on the offensive end of the floor.
He averaged 13.6 points and 7.2 rebounds and helped lead the Tigers to a 21-10 record and what would've been a second straight appearance in the NCAA Tournament. After declaring for the NBA draft and receiving an offseason’s worth of positive feedback from NBA scouts, the 6-foot-9 Birmingham native knows what he needs to work on.
"It was a lot of positive feedback, just doing a lot of zoom interviews with different teams," Watford said on Off the Bench. "My biggest thing is I want to be a for sure first-round pick next year and come back and lead the team another year. A lot of teams want to see me do it another year and I'm ready for that."
Heading into the 2019 season, Will Wade thought one, maybe two of his star underclassmen would return to Baton Rouge in 2020. He certainly didn't believe the Tigers would be in a position where Watford, Javonte Smart and Darius Days would all run it back for another season.
Now that he is returning, Wade said the goal will be to put Watford in better spots where he can be successful. Because LSU was limited last year with the amount of bigs at its disposal, Watford played "out of position" much of the time according to Wade.
The hope is to play him more towards the middle of the court and a little further away from the basket to unlock his playmaking ability and perimeter shooting.
"He’s a playmaker, he can make plays for other guys and his assist to turnover ratio wasn’t where it needed to be. “We’ll get that corrected and put him in more spots where he can flourish," Wade said Tuesday.
“Coming back I think he will be in the conversation for preseason (SEC) Player of the Year," Wade said of Watford on the College Hoops Today Podcast with Jon Rothstein. "I don’t think there is any doubt he will improve his draft stock and be a first-round draft pick next year.”
Watford called it a relief to finally have the decision out of the way because of all the uncertainty surrounding the NBA draft process. Being able to solely focus on the 2020 team and the "special" season that's in store for the purple and gold is all that’s on Watford’s mind.
"We know that we're going to be a special team," Watford said. "We've got a lot of guys that played last year and have a lot of experience. We've got great freshmen in Cam Thomas, Eric Gaines, Mwani [Wilkinson], Jalen Cook and I'm looking forward to working with those guys."
Despite just being a sophomore, Watford said that he feels like an upperclassman on the team with so much fresh talent on the roster. The younger guys are looking to him Smart, Days and Charles Manning, which is a role he embraces.
Becoming that vocal leader for the team is one goal of his heading into the season after learning behind a guy like Skylar Mays as a freshman. Watford said a combination of he, Smart, Days and Manning will be the nucleus of the team's leadership committee but the biggest challenge will be replacing what Mays brought on the floor.
"It's going to be tough to replace Skylar on the floor because he's such a great talent, such a great leader," Watford said. "I don't have many personal goals, my biggest thing is just coming in and working hard and letting the work show and letting the results show."
