Santa Clara’s Bal aims to follow Podziemski to the NBA
The Golden State Warriors were idle in Chicago the night Santa Clara hosted Gonzaga, allowing former Broncos guard Brandin Podziemski to watch on television his successor succeed.
Against a one-point deficit in the closing seconds, Santa Clara guard Adama Bal froze his defender with a hesitation dribble before driving from the left wing and feathering a fallaway floater off the backboard and through the net.
Gonzaga’s 26-game winning streak over Santa Clara ended.
Podziemski’s celebration in the team hotel began.
Bal’s breakout junior season continued — along with his emergence as an NBA prospect. On Thursday, after the wiry, 6-foot-7 Frenchman finished a workout at Chase Center with the Warriors, he said he wants to “show teams that I’m an NBA player. That I belong to that level. … Just kind of like, make a name for myself, and proving to everybody that I belong there.”
Like Podziemski the season before, Bal found his footing on the floor after transferring to Santa Clara, averaging 14.4 points, 3.2 rebounds and 3.1 assists en route to All-WCC honors. Bal declared last month for the NBA draft while maintaining his remaining collegiate eligibility. He’ll attend this weekend the NBA’s G League Elite Camp in Chicago with the chance to earn an invitation to the
NBA combine.
Most mock drafts don't yet include Bal, 20, who is vying to become — after Podziemski and Jalen Williams of the Oklahoma City Thunder — the third Santa Clara guard to reach the NBA in three seasons.
Then again, as Podziemski observed, most mock drafts didn't peg him 19th, or Williams 12th the year before.
“That should give him a little bit of confidence, like, ‘OK, if they can do it, I can do it, too,' ” said Podziemski, who first played sparingly in one season at Illinois. “I know he's done his work since the season's been over. I know this is something he really wants.”
Born into basketball — his parents, Abdu and Marie, played, as did his brother, Mamady — and raised in Le Mans, France, Bal long aspired to play professionally, rising through the French junior national team and proving a standout at the club level in Paris with Centre Fédéral de Basket-ball's academy.
He didn't aspire to play for two American colleges, but he changed his mind during his final year of high school so he could play against similarly aged players.
The first stop for Bal was Arizona, where he enrolled at 17 and played 318 minutes in two seasons, cutting into his confidence and triggering a trip to the transfer portal after the 2022-23 season where the Broncos — and several high-major programs — would eagerly await.
Having remembered watching Bal at the FIBA U-16 World Cup in 2019 during a recruiting trip, Santa Clara assistant coach Jason Ludwig spearheaded his re-recruitment with one specific selling point in mind.
“It started with the fact that we had Jalen and Brandin, both ballhandling guards that had great success,” Ludwig said. “Brandin maybe resonated more” because he hardly played at Illinois. “That was the pitch to Adama: ‘If you come to Santa Clara, you'll be able to be used in the same way.' ”
A week later after a few informal, informative conversations with Podziemski about the emphasis the Broncos place on player development and the responsibility he'd have in a featured role, Bal was visiting Santa Clara, envisioning what he could accomplish with additional opportunity.
Podziemski played 69 minutes total in his season with the Illini, compared with 36 minutes per game for the Broncos, averaging 19.9 points, 8.8 rebounds and 3.7 assists.
On reflection, Bal observed, “As I got older, having a lot of experience, seeing a lot of players have the same kind of path as me, I kind of was like, ‘OK, all right. You're not playing, but you can do something else.' That makes you feel better about yourself. And that can help you going forward.”
Secure in his spot with Santa Clara, Bal spent the summer playing in a featured role with France during FIBA's U-20 European Championship in Heraklion, Greece, averaging 11.7 points, 3.6 rebounds and 1.9 assists while helping Les Bleus win the 16-team tournament.
He arrived on campus at the end of the summer with some “swag and some confidence,” per Santa Clara graduate assistant Alan Guillou, a fellow Frenchman who helped with Bal's transition. “Right from the get-go, he started to work hard, show great attitude and practice after practice, dominate and put his impact on the team.”
As a result, Bal impressed favorably on his teammates — earning equity through his disciplined approach and leading through action more often than with words. He refined his diet and intensified his conditioning, training voluntarily on the weekends under Guillou's supervision.
That the coaches burdened him as the primary ballhandler in Santa Clara's free-flowing offense “gave me confidence. A lot of confidence,” he said. “I realized I was a good basketball player. Now, I just have to do it. I have the opportunity I was waiting for. I worked for it, so I was like, ‘Yeah, let's do it.' ”
By season's start, Bal had
established his place on what was a new-look team that replaced five starters — including Podziemski — from the 2022-23 group that finished third in the WCC. With the ball in his hands and the belief of his coaches, he scored 23 points in a November victory at Stanford and 25 against Oregon three games later.
In those showings, he displayed his strengths as a smooth three-level scorer who doesn't want to dominate the ball.
“That was a moment, at least for me, that I realized this kid's got something special in him,” Ludwig said. “When it all comes together, he's going to have a chance to play at the next level.”
Early draft entrants have through May 29 to withdraw from the draft and maintain their eligibility.
Ludwig would be happy to have him back — and happier to see him in the NBA.
“When we were recruiting him, you could tell that his love for the game, his confidence in himself, was probably at an all-time low in his life,” Ludwig said. “We were able to work together to help him go from the lowest point in his basketball career, to now maybe the highest.”