Washington Wizards small forward Bilal Coulibaly is considered one of the franchise's building blocks, an essential ingredient to the long-struggling organization's rebuild. However, the 20-year-old's nondescript 2024 Paris Olympics campaign with Team France doesn't add inspiration to his profile.
Outside of Coulibaly's 11-point outing in France's exhibition loss to Germany on July 8, he's made minimal impact across limited minutes. The 2023 seventh-overall NBA draft pick has scored just 1.5 points with 1.5 rebounds and 0.5 assists across 8.9 minutes per game since the group stage began. While the French are semi-finalists, it's still a mild surprise that Coulibaly hasn't made more of an impact.
Established players like Victor Wembanyama, Evan Fournier, Rudy Gobert, and Nicolas Batum were always going to get more playing time. However, non-NBA players like Frank Ntilikina, Guerschon Yabusele, and Isaia Cordinier have each shined more than Coulibaly, which is a curious development on paper since the NBA is the best league in the world. What gives?
Bilal Coulibaly's Olympic run isn't indicative of his Wizards potential
Before Coulibaly averaged 8.4 points and 4.1 boards per game as a rookie in the NBA last season, he played with Wembanyama on the French club Boulogne-Levallois Metropolitans 92. “Wemby,” who has top-15 all-time potential, had nothing but nice things to say about his fellow countryman back then, via Olympics.com's Michael Charles.
“He is our X factor,” Wembanyama said. “An all-terrain weapon, he can posterise a player and on the very next play block him. Players keep on underestimating him because he is young…They go for a layup thinking they are safe and they get annihilated. Every game he does something crazy. I think he is the player I’m looking for the most on the court.”
After averaging 5.2 points, 3.1 rebounds and 0.8 steals in just over 18 minutes per game an 18-year-old, new Washington GM Will Dawkins drafted Coulibaly.
“He’s got a rare mix of youth, elite athleticism, speed with a skill set to continue to handle the ball, pass and defend at a high level. He’s a two-way player that we have a lot of confidence in and were able to target for those reasons,” Dawkins said.
Coulibaly may not be in Wembanyama's stratosphere, but he still showed he belonged in his first year with the Wizards.
“I'm proud of myself because I've proved that I belong in the NBA,” Coulibaly said. “I proved that I can guard the best players on each team. Just proving that I can be a good player offensively, too. So yeah, I'm proud of what I did.”
Veteran guard and locker-room leader Jordan Poole agreed, via Monumental Sports Network's Chase Hughes.
“Fantastic [season]. He made the Rising Stars Challenge. Going to All-Star weekend in your first year is huge,” Poole said. “He got a lot of playing time, a lot of experience, which is huge, especially for a rookie… he had a really good season and I'm excited for his future.”
Coulibaly played much more on Washington than he's been playing with France, averaging 27.1 minutes per game last season. While he may be buried on the depth chart this summer, it's more likely due to his youth than a large skill gap, as he's the roster's youngest player.
Once NBA training camp starts in September, Coulibaly will be back to being a big fish, as the Wizards look to mix him with their new additions, including Alex Sarr, Bub Carrington, and Jonas Valunciunas. By the time the 2028 Olympics roll around, expect him to be a bigger piece to France's puzzle, as he'll be an experienced veteran at 24 years old.
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