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2024 NBA G League Draft Results

October 26th, 2024 at 1:07pm CST by Luke Adams

The NBA G League held its draft for the 2024/25 season on Saturday afternoon. Players who signed NBAGL contracts and whose rights weren’t already controlled by a team were part of the draft pool.

It was the first time in G League history that each of the 30 NBA teams had an affiliate squad take part in a draft. A 31st team, the unaffiliated Mexico City Capitanes, also participated.

[RELATED: NBA G League Announces Schedule For 2024/25 Season]

The Westchester Knicks, New York’s affiliate, held the top two picks in Saturday’s draft and used them to select a pair of NBA veterans.

The No. 1 overall pick was sharpshooter Matt Ryan, who is reportedly drawing interest from the Knicks and is a candidate to be called up to their NBA roster at some point this season.

Drafting Ryan to Westchester won’t prevent another NBA team from poaching him, since holding a player’s G League rights doesn’t mean you control his NBA rights. But it will give the Knicks a chance to take a first-hand look at him before potentially offering him a standard or two-way contract.

Ryan has knocked down 41.1% of his three-point attempts in 63 career NBA games for the Celtics, Lakers, Timberwolves, and Pelicans.

The second player off the board was swingman Landry Shamet, who is recovering from a dislocated shoulder. Selecting him in the G League draft will allow the Knicks to keep him in the organization and closely monitor his rehabilitation process.

Shamet was expected to make the NBA roster prior to the injury and will be a candidate to rejoin the NBA squad later in the season if he fully recovers from his shoulder injury. He was the most experienced player in the NBAGL draft pool, with 348 career regular season outings at the NBA level.

Another notable name was picked fifth overall, as former NBA first-round pick Chandler Hutchison came out of retirement and was drafted by the Long Island Nets. Hutchison, 28, was the No. 22 pick in the 2018 NBA draft and appeared in 103 total games over the next four seasons for Chicago, Washington, and Phoenix.

Although the Nets’ affiliate technically drafted Hutchison, he was traded to the Cleveland Charge (Cavaliers) in a four-team trade that saw No. 3 pick Sean East II sent to the South Bay Lakers and Colin Castleton‘s returning rights acquired by Long Island. The full details of the deal, which also involved the Santa Cruz Warriors, can be found here.

East reportedly agreed to an Exhibit 10 deal with the Lakers back in June, but that signing never became official. It’s not clear why, but after his rights were acquired by South Bay on draft day, the former Missouri guard will head to Los Angeles’ affiliate after all.

Finally, a pair of familiar names were selected late in the second round, with the 53rd and 54th overall picks. The Rio Grande Valley Vipers, the Rockets‘ affiliate, nabbed former Knicks guard Allonzo Trier, followed by the Maine Celtics (Boston’s affiliate) drafting Kavion Pippen, the cousin of Grizzlies guard Scotty Pippen Jr. and nephew of Hall of Famer Scottie Pippen.

Kavion Pippen wasn’t the only family member of a Hall of Famer who came off the board in the second round. The Capital City Go-Go (Wizards) picked former USC forward DJ Rodman, the son of Dennis Rodman, with the 43rd overall pick.

Here are the full 2024 G League draft results:

Round One:

  1. Westchester Knicks (Knicks): Matt Ryan
  2. Westchester Knicks (Knicks): Landry Shamet
  3. Cleveland Charge (Cavaliers): Sean East II
  4. Rip City Remix (Trail Blazers): Thierry Darlan
  5. Long Island Nets (Nets): Chandler Hutchison
  6. Sioux Falls Skyforce (Heat): Christian Brown
  7. Texas Legends (Mavericks): Tyson Walker
  8. Greensboro Swarm (Hornets): Malik Hall
  9. Maine Celtics (Celtics): Eric Gaines
  10. Salt Lake City Stars (Jazz): Tae Williams
  11. Santa Cruz Warriors (Warriors): Seth Maxwell (Indiana Wesleyan)
  12. Motor City Cruise (Pistons): Cam Martin
  13. Austin Spurs (Spurs): Ibrahima Diallo
  14. Rio Grande Valley Vipers (Rockets): Justin Moore
  15. Raptors 905 (Raptors): Tylor Perry
  16. Indiana Mad Ants (Pacers): Kevin Cross
  17. Sioux Falls Skyforce (Heat): Paul Mulcahy
  18. Sioux Falls Skyforce (Heat): Brandon Childress
  19. Valley Suns (Suns): Nate Roberts
  20. Santa Cruz Warriors (Warriors): Tommy Rutherford
  21. Maine Celtics (Celtics): London Johnson
  22. Cleveland Charge (Cavaliers): Trae Hannibal
  23. South Bay Lakers (Lakers): Marlain Veal
  24. Texas Legends (Mavericks): Bryce Griggs (Overtime Elite)
  25. Salt Lake City Stars (Jazz): Jaylan Gainey
  26. Oklahoma City Blue (Thunder): Justyn Hamilton
  27. San Diego Clippers (Clippers): Garrett Denbow (Anderson University (SC))
  28. Austin Spurs (Spurs): Steven Richardson (Montana State-Billings)
  29. Mexico City Capitanes (N/A): Lewis Duarte (Overtime Elite)
  30. Sioux Falls Skyforce (Heat): No pick
  31. San Diego Clippers (Clippers): Emmanuel Bandoumel

Round Two:

  1. Iowa Wolves (Timberwolves): Sy Chatman
  2. Austin Spurs (Spurs): Xavier Johnson
  3. Delaware Blue Coats (Sixers): Vonterius Woolbright
  4. Texas Legends (Mavericks): Keyon Menifield
  5. College Park Skyhawks (Hawks): Terrell Burden
  6. Memphis Hustle (Grizzlies): Kamani Johnson
  7. Wisconsin Herd (Bucks): Jamal Bieniemy
  8. Austin Spurs (Spurs): Charles Pride
    • Note: Pride is being traded to the Raptors 905, per Blake Murphy of Sportsnet (Twitter link).
  9. Texas Legends (Mavericks): Bobby Planutis
  10. Birmingham Squadron (Pelicans): E.J. Montgomery
  11. Delaware Blue Coats (Sixers): No pick
  12. Capital City Go-Go (Wizards): DJ Rodman
  13. Salt Lake City Stars (Jazz): Dee Barnes
  14. Santa Cruz Warriors (Warriors): Devine Eke
  15. Rip City Remix (Trail Blazers): Sterling Manley
  16. Austin Spurs (Spurs): No pick
  17. Rip City Remix (Trail Blazers): Olisa Akonobi
  18. Salt Lake City Stars (Jazz): Jericole Hellems
  19. Valley Suns (Suns): Olin Carter III
  20. Osceola Magic (Magic): Cameron Parker
  21. Long Island Nets (Nets): No pick
  22. Rio Grande Valley Vipers (Rockets): Allonzo Trier
  23. Maine Celtics (Celtics): Kavion Pippen
  24. Grand Rapids Gold (Nuggets): William Kondrat (D’Youville University)
  25. Capital City Go-Go (Wizards): Jayden Hardaway
  26. Oklahoma City Blue (Thunder): Tray Jackson
  27. Indiana Mad Ants (Pacers): Ishmael Lane
  28. Delaware Blue Coats (Sixers): No pick
  29. Sioux Falls Skyforce (Heat): No pick
  30. Sioux Falls Skyforce (Heat): No pick
  31. San Diego Clippers (Clippers): Mike Scott

Teams will fill out their rosters with affiliate players, returning rights players, tryout players, and players who are assigned to the G League from the NBA roster (including those on two-way contracts).

G League training camps open on Monday, with this year’s NBAGL Tip-Off Tournament getting underway on November 8. The Tip-Off Tournament will be played over about a month-and-a-half and will be followed by the G League regular season, which begins on December 27.

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Draft Notes: J. Williams, Sasser, LaRavia, Houstan, Minott, More

May 27th, 2022 at 2:22pm CST by Luke Adams

Santa Clara wing Jalen Williams was perhaps the standout of last week’s draft combine in Chicago, while Houston guard Marcus Sasser looked like the best player at the G League Elite Camp, John Hollinger and Sam Vecenie of The Athletic write as part of their analysis of the combine.

Hollinger and Vecenie suggest that Williams’ stock has “exploded into the stratosphere” as a result of his performance in Chicago and that he looks like a safe bet to be a first-round pick. As for Sasser, he got “nearly unanimous praise” from scouts, who believe he has a chance to start his rookie season on a standard NBA contract, rather than a two-way deal.

The Athletic’s duo shares several more combine-related tidbits in their full story, including identifying Wake Forest forward Jake LaRavia as a prospect who is drawing legitimate interest from contending teams in the last 10 picks of the first round.

Hollinger and Vecenie also say that chatter about Michigan forward Caleb Houstan having received a promise continues to circulate among league insiders. Those insiders have speculated that Oklahoma City at No. 30 could be the team eyeing Houstan, given the Thunder‘s history of shutting down their targets well ahead of draft night.

Here are a few more draft-related notes:

  • Josh Minott, the No. 48 player on ESPN’s 2022 big board, will be keeping his name in the NBA draft, according to his uncle (Twitter link via Jon Rothstein of CBS Sports). The freshman forward played fewer than 500 total minutes in his first and only college season at Memphis in 2021/22.
  • Wyoming guard Hunter Maldonado tells Rothstein (Twitter link) that he’ll withdraw from the draft and use his final year of NCAA eligibility. Maldonado had a big senior year in 2021/22, averaging 18.5 PPG, 6.3 APG, and 5.7 RPG and making the All-Mountain West Conference first team.
  • George Washington junior guard James Bishop will withdraw from the draft and return to school for at least one more year, tweets Rothstein. Bishop has been the Colonials’ go-to scorer since transferring for his sophomore season, averaging 17.6 PPG in 47 games over the last two years.
  • Senior guard Emmanuel Bandoumel will also withdraw from the draft as he transfers from SMU to Nebraska, tweets Rothstein.
  • Former Louisiana senior center Theo Akwuba has withdrawn from the draft and Oklahoma State junior guard Avery Anderson III and Tennessee junior guard Santiago Vescovi are expected to do the same, according to Jeff Goodman of Stadium (all Twitter links). Goodman notes that Akwuba will be transferring to Ole Miss for his final college season.
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NBA Announces Initial Early Entrant List For 2022 Draft

April 27th, 2022 at 10:05am CST by Luke Adams

The NBA has officially released the initial list of early entrants for the 2022 NBA draft, announcing in a press release that 283 players have filed as early entry candidates. Of those prospects, 247 are from colleges, while 36 are international early entrants.

Those are big numbers, but they fall well short of the 353 early entrants who initially declared for the draft a year ago. Beginning in 2021, the NCAA granted players an extra year of eligibility due to the coronavirus pandemic, resulting in seniors having to decide between staying at college for one more season or declaring for the draft as an “early” entrant.

That tweak to the NCAA’s eligibility rules has increased the number of total early entrants due to the influx of seniors into the pool. However, as Jonathan Givony of ESPN observes (via Twitter), the number of college non-seniors (123) on the initial early entry list this year is actually the lowest since 2016, while the number of international prospects (36) is the lowest since 2014.

This year’s total of 283 early entrants figures to shrink significantly by June 1 and again by June 13, the two deadlines for players to withdraw their names from the draft pool. But it still looks like the pool will remain extremely crowded, with the eventual number of early entrants certain to exceed 58, the number of picks in the draft.

Our tracker of early entrants for the 2022 draft is fully up to date and can be found right here.

Here are the changes we made to our tracker today:

Newly-added players:

College players:

These players either didn’t publicly announce that they were entering the draft or we simply missed it when they did.

International players:

These players weren’t previously mentioned on our list of international early entrants. The country listed here indicates where they last played, not necessarily where they were born.

Other notable draft-eligible early entrants:

The NBA sent its teams a list of 33 “also-eligible” names. That list isn’t public, but Jonathan Givony of ESPN (Twitter link) shared some of the most notable players on it, and we’ve added them to our early entrant tracker. They are as follows:

  1. Dominick Barlow, F, Overtime Elite
  2. MarJon Beauchamp, G/F, G League Ignite
  3. Dyson Daniels, G, G League Ignite
  4. Henri Drell, G/F, Windy City Bulls
  5. Michael Foster, F, G League Ignite
  6. Jaden Hardy, G, G League Ignite
  7. Makur Maker, C, Sydney Kings (formerly Howard Bison)
  8. Jean Montero, G, Overtime Elite
  9. Samson Ruzhentsev, G/F, Mega Basket (formerly Florida Gators)
  10. Kai Sotto, C, Adelaide 36ers (formerly G League Ignite)
  11. Zaire Wade, G, Salt Lake City Stars
  12. Kok Yat, F, Overtime Elite
  13. Fanbo Zeng, F, G League Ignite

Players removed:

Despite reports or announcements that the players below would declare for the draft, they didn’t show up on the NBA’s official list.

That could mean a number of things — they may have decided against entering the draft; they may have entered the draft, then withdrawn; they may have had no NCAA eligibility remaining, making them automatically draft-eligible; they may have incorrectly filed their paperwork; or the NBA may have accidentally omitted some names.

In any case, we’ve removed the following names from our early entrant list, at least for the time being.

Finally, Givony reports (via Twitter) that Canadian forward Leonard Miller, from the Fort Erie International Academy has been asked to fill out additional paperwork to finalize his entrance into the draft pool. According to Givony, there’s an expectation that Miller will be added to the list, so we’ve left him listed in our early entrant tracker among the international players.

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