Yanic Konan Niederhauser 2025 NBA Draft Profile

Yanic Konan Niederhauser 2025 NBA Draft Profile

The 2025 NBA Draft has officially arrived! Today, we will be previewing Penn State’s Yanic Konan Niederhauser, a late riser throughout the pre-draft process! Let’s jump right into it!

Height (no shoes): 6’11.25 (7’3.25 wingspan, 9’3 standing reach)

Weight: 243 lbs.

Draft Age: 22.3

Position: Big

Konan Niederhauser began his professional career internationally in Germany before heading over to the United States for college. He only played six games in the German Pro A League, scoring 12 total points with 10 rebounds.

Konan Niederhauser began his collegiate career at Northern Illinois. He barely saw any run before becoming a full-time starter as a sophomore, averaging 7.3 points, 4.4 rebounds and 2.1 blocks in just 19.6 minutes per game. He parlayed that growth by transferring to Penn State, tallying 12.9 points, 6.3 rebounds and 2.3 blocks across 29 starts on 63.1 percent true shooting.

Let’s dive into his profile!

Profile:

Konan Niederhauser has climbed through the G-League Elite Camp and the NBA Combine into a draftable prospect, which is pretty impressive. To start, he’s the most athletic big in this class. You’d be hard-pressed to find many near-7-footers who are as springy as him, as he posted a 33.5-inch standing vertical and a 37-inch max vert at the combine, by far the best amongst true bigs.

His offensive profile is super simple: He’s going to rim run. He’s going to vertically space. He’s a good-not-great screener and does a good job sealing off defenders when he needs to. But if you throw to any corner of the backboard, there aren’t very many bigs who can go up and corral the rock the way that Konan Niederhauser can. His biggest impact offensively will come as a lob threat.

When he’s not trying to posterize other bigs, Konan Niederhauser’s got decent touch around the rim and has become more comfortable with putting the ball on the deck. He’s not going to be tasked with doing that often, nor should he (at the start of his career), but there was some comfort level there.

Konan Niederhauser also uses his freakish length and lively athleticism on the defensive end as a shot-blocker, where he’s one of the best in this class. Konan Niederhauser led the MAC in blocks in 2023-24 and the Big Ten in blocks in 2024-25; of the 248 players 6-foot-10 or taller who played at least 750 combined minutes each of the last two seasons, Konan Niederhauser’s 10.6 block percentage was the 11th-highest, according to Stathead.

However, his reliance on blocking shots comes with two fatal flaws: It compromises the rest of his team’s defense, and he’s not a very disciplined defender. He’ll jump for joy when he doesn’t need to. Pump fake him once, and he’s likely going to try and send your shot into the fourth row. Players are smart enough to seek that out if it’s on the scouting report.

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He’s not spry nor is he coordinated enough to be a switch big. For as athletic as he is, he’s not a particularly fluid north-south mover. He’ll be a drop big, but he has to learn how to become more disciplined around the rim if he’s going to do his best Hassan Whiteside impression and try to get triple-doubles with blocks.

I think Konan Niederhauser is a slightly better rebounder than his numbers suggest, but it feels more underwhelming when it should, at times, given his physical measurables. He’s not super strong in the paint and I have no idea if he’ll be strong enough to withstand the physicality of NBA bigs–something I talk about a lot.

Projection: Mid Second Round

In practically every other draft, Konan Niederhauser has an undrafted grade for me. He’s a 22-year-old big who I give a ton of credit to throughout the pre-draft process. He took advantage of every opportunity that came his way, but I also don’t think he’s a player that I’d bank on becoming a rotation-level big right away at the NBA level. He still needs extra seasoning. I don’t see it yet.

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