Marleen Peek (C/PF 6’4”, 2000) from The Netherlands
Marleen is a strong inside player, without a great length but wide shoulders and complete frame. She has a regular leap ability and is not the speediest player on the court, but she is able to run the floor in the correct way for a player of her size. Peek is really strong player, and plays hard inside the paint.
In the O end, the Dutch displays a quite good mobility without the ball, and possesses good hands both catch the ball and grab rebounds. She has the fundamentals, frame and aggressiveness to seal its defender inside the paint (rolling or not) and usually offers a good target to the passer. Her shooting skills are really good, and its touch close to the rim is remarkable with the right hand (promising with lefty shots). Although it’s a bit robotic, her footwork is interesting back to the basket, and is able to create her own shots inside the paint. Her face-to-face game is a bit reduced because, although she can put the ball on the floor, her dribbling skills have not an outstanding level and her explosiveness is still growing. I guess that she could play easily as a pure PF playing inside the paint, pick-and-roll situations or taking some open shots with efficiency (least of the options). Marleen has the ability to put interesting ball-screens and is able to roll in the correct way as well (or playing with two ball-screens up and cutting the paint from the top of the key). Peek should add (again) the routine of going to the O rebound to its game.
In the D end, Marleen shows as a hard player who displays an interesting mobility/activity (especially helping from the weak side) and she doesn’t refuse play through the contact. Although she can chase the ball both through the paint and in flash-and-recover situations, she lacks a great lateral explosiveness (1st step a bit slow), which makes her struggle either guarding more explosive players or boxing-out the paint. Despite of that, Marleen gives to her team a solid help-defense close to the rim and could become an interesting rebounder.
Marleen couldn’t play last summer with the Dutch U18 NT due an injury, but next summer will play with the U20’s NT (+2 years older than her) at Matosinhos. She has showed last season with her local team (Royal Eagles from The Netherlands) that she is completely recovered.
Video of Marleen Peek from Netherlands after U16 FIBA Europe 2015 (images via @FIBA)
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