Spurs snare Wembanyama in NBA draft with high hopes
|
Victor Wembanyama has become the latest No.1 NBA draft pick and is heading to San Antonio with enormous expectations to become basketball’s newest sensation.
The selection of the French 19-year-old had been a foregone conclusion for months and was announced by NBA commissioner Adam Silver on Thursday night at Barclays Centre in Brooklyn.
His selection was followed by chants of “Wemby! Wemby” from a group of Spurs fans waving signs from the first row of seats.
Wembanyama arrives with far more height and hype than most No.1 picks. Listed at 7-foot-4, he dominated his French league in his final season there, leading all players in scoring, rebounding and blocked shots.
Now he makes the move to the NBA, perhaps as the best prospect since LeBron James came out of high school in 2003.
Two former NBL players, meanwhile, were chosen in the second round.
Following a strong season with the New Zealand Breakers, Rayan Rupert was picked 43rd by the Portland Trail Blazers, making him the 13th player to be directly drafted from the NBL and putting him alongside stars like Josh Giddey, LaMelo Ball, and RJ Hampton.
The 19-year-old was soon joined by Mojave King, a former teen prodigy who debuted with the Cairns Taipans before signing with the NBA G League Ignite.
He was drafted 47th by the Los Angeles Lakers with reports he could be traded to the Indiana Pacers.
Wembanyama brings a package of skills that seem perfect for the modern NBA and too vast for one player, with the size of a centre and the shooting and ball handling ability of a guard.
Wembanyama said hearing his name being called out brought him to tears as he had waited for this moment.
“Hearing that sentence from Adam Silver, I’ve dreamed of it so much, I’ve got to cry,” Wembanyama said, hugging his siblings.
“On lottery night, when the Spurs got the No.1 pick, I was just thinking, I was feeling lucky that they got the pick.
“As a franchise that has that culture and that experience in winning and making, creating good players. So, I really can’t wait.”
It marks the third time in San Antonio’s 51-year history the Spurs have held the top pick.
They are hoping Wembanyama fulfills predictions he is a generational big man and follows in the championship footsteps of the franchise’s previous top picks of David Robinson (1987) and Tim Duncan (1997), as they look to end a four-year playoff drought.
The Charlotte Hornets selected Alabama’s Brandon Miller with the No.2 pick, giving them an athletic 6-foot-9 wing with a smooth shooting stroke who can knock down shots from the perimeter.
The Hornets chose Miller, the Southeastern Conference’s player of the year as a freshman, over NBA G League Ignite star Scoot Henderson, who now heads to Portland.
AP
