North Carolina’s Dexter Strickland won’t be at the NBA Draft on Thursday in body but will be in spirit.
It’s all about that ol’ Jersey bond and his Duke buddy Kyrie Irving.
“We’re good friends, so sure, I’m going to be watching and hoping he’s the No. 1 pick,” Strickland said Tuesday during UNC’s summer media interviews.
Strickland, a junior guard from Rahway, N.J., and Irving, from West Orange, N.J., spent much of the spring working out with each other.
Underclassmen have until 5 p.m. Saturday to withdraw from the NBA Draft, N.C. State's Tracy Smith doesn't need any more time. Smith announced today that he's returning for his senior season.
Smith, an undersized power forward, led the Wolfpack in scoring (16.5 points per game) and rebounding (7.3 per game) in 2009-10. The junior from Detroit submitted his name on the early entry list on April 25 but did not work out for any NBA teams, according to the school's web site.
Tracy Smith will play basketball for N.C. State next season, his mother said Thursday.
The Wolfpack junior is among the 103 underclassmen on the NBA's list of
early entrants but he's not going anywhere, LaShawn Lester said.
"There's nothing to worry about," Lester said Thursday.
Virginia Tech junior guard Malcolm Delaney opted to submit his name into the NBA draft, but he has not hired an agent.
He hopes to get the feedback he needs from pro scouts and NBA teams before deciding
whether his NBA stock is high enough or if he should return to Blacksburg, Va. for a final season of college basketball. But with a new, shortened period to withdraw his name and return to school, the question now is, does he really have enough time to get that feedback?
North Carolina sophomore forward Ed Davis, who declared for the NBA Draft on Monday, wasn’t born when the pros began tapping the ACC for promising underclass players.
The process actually started in 1972 when the Tar Heels' lost first-year star and ACC Tournament MVP Robert McAdoo to the Buffalo Braves.
Following are my lists of the ACC's best first- and second-year players to leave early for the NBA draft.
It was a friendly debate for Duke and North Carolina fans of late: Who would be chosen first during Thursday night’s NBA draft – The Forearm or The Nose?
In the end (or near the beginning, actually), it was Duke wing Gerald Henderson — whose flagrant forearm bloodied Tar Heel forward Tyler Hansbrough nose back in March, 2007, adding to the Tobacco Road rivalry lore — who became the first player taken. He was selected 12th overall by the Charlotte Bobcats.
Hansbrough, who graduated in May, was then taken 13th, by the Indiana Pacers.
North Carolina forward Tyler Hansbrough, who could be taken as early as 11th in the NBA draft Thursday night, said he debated whether to accept the invitation to sit in the Green Room at Madison Square Garden.
"But it's always been a dream of mine to be there and shake Mr. Stern's hand,” Hansbrough said during a phone interview Tuesday.
UNC Juniors Ty Lawson and Wayne Ellignton declare their intentions to make themselves eligible for the NBA draft. (Staff video by Travis Long)
Wall tells USA Today that he will go to college.
Could John Wall enter this year's NBA draft?
