Oklahoma City’s No. 26 overall pick in the 2024 NBA Draft, Dillon Jones, joins the team with a well-deserved all-around reputation.

The 6-foot-1, 240-pounder averaged 20.8 points per game, 9.8 rebounds per game and 5.2 assists per game during his 31 senior year games at Weber State University. He was the only Division I player since 2008 to record at least a 30% defensive rebounding rate and a 30% assist rate in a season, posting a 3.1% steal rate and a 58.6 true shooting rate last year %.

Jones has maintained a great rebound in the three Thunder preseason games this week. He had five rebounds in 26 minutes against the Spurs, three rebounds in 17 minutes against the Rockets and 13 rebounds in 35 minutes in last night’s Tulsa game with the New Zealand Breakers. This output equates to 9.74 rebounds per 36 minutes – more than any player in last year’s rotation, including Chet Holmgren.

The 2023-24 Thunder had the fourth-highest opponent offensive rebounding percentage (30.2%) in the league, mainly because they lacked positional size. Jones, who is at the peak of a guard position and plays a wing role, should help lower that percentage on a nightly basis. He recorded at least five defensive rebounds in 29 of 31 games last season and at least 10 defensive rebounds in 15 games.

“Rebounding is like a passion statistic, I like to call it,” Jones said in a February 2023 internal interview at Weber State. “If you play hard, all you’re going to get are rebounds. … You just have to find something that makes you more attractive than the next person because everyone wants to score.”

Jones credits his brother Eric, who plays professional basketball in Germany, with helping him become a better rebounder.

“He just had me in the gym rebounding,” Jones said, “and I remember him telling me in the gym, ‘work on your stuff, work on chasing rebounds, don’t let it get that far or this far .’ And I didn’t want to run around the gym chasing balls either. So I just worked on the timing, like knowing it came from here, knowing it came from here. So while he got better on the field. I got better and better at my rebounding, without even realizing it.”

No matter how many minutes Jones plays for the Thunder this season, he will be an impactful rebounder when he steps on the floor.

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