Italian Wing Achille Lonati Makes Statement with St. Bonaventure Commitment

Kasparas Jakucionis and Egor Demin were just the beginning. Their decision to depart highly-regarded EuroLeague development programs last summer - Barcelona and Real Madrid, respectively - and see their draft stock improve. At the same time, the inverse happened to most prospects who remained in Europe, setting the table for what we are seeing now: a mass exodus of top European prospects to the United States for NCAA opportunities.

David Mirkovic, Aleksa Dimitrijevic, and Andrija Jelavic are three players who, in the past few weeks, have formally announced their commitments to NCAA universities after spending the previous season in Europe. Now, they will be joined by Achille Lonati. A 6-foot-5 Italian wing who has spent the past few seasons in the Emporio Armani Milan youth setup. Lonati did make his EuroLeague debut this season, logging just over two minutes in Milan’s last game of the EuroLeague regular season against Baskonia.

In 11 EuroLeague registered Next Generation U18 appearances since 2023, Lonati has averaged 11.8 points, 3.1 rebounds, and 2.4 assists per game on 39/28/83 shooting splits. He has primarily impressed as a transition scorer due to his ability to finish with both hands and his soft touch when using the glass. He’s also shown himself to be a reliable spot-up shooter in the halfcourt and in transition.

Lonati is also a decent passer for his size and is comfortable utilizing ball screens to create for himself and others. He is far from an elite pick-and-roll youngster, but certainly has upside in that regard. His size and length will potentially allow him the ability to offer a lot of defensive versatility at the collegiate level. He will likely guard wings for the most part, but should be capable of switching onto smaller guards and secondary bigs.

Lonati is also young, having turned 18 in January of 2025. While other European prospects have made the jump in their early twenties, Lonati is making the jump to NCAA right away, likely following the recent boom in European recruitment we’ve seen at the college level. St. Bonaventure’s General Manager is a renowned former NBA reporter and insider, Adrian Wojnarowski. It is likely that Wojnarowski, who covered the NBA during its international explosion, is trying to bring the same to St. Bonaventure. With the increased interest from European prospects overall, it could be easy to execute with the right connections.

There’s a good chance Lonati is not the only Italian wing to make the jump to NCAA basketball next season, with ex-Barcelona prospect Dame Sarr being heavily linked to the University of Illinois for the better part of the past month. The two of them will hope to follow in the footsteps of Simone Fontecchio, who made it to the NBA after going undrafted. In front of them are also stashed Italian wings, Matteo Spagnolo and Gabriele Procida, whose rights are retained by the Minnesota Timberwolves and Utah Jazz, respectively.

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