Three euros in the first round of the draft, seven in the second

2017-06-23T07:22:45+00:00 2017-06-23T13:40:12+00:00.

Aris Barkas

23/Jun/17 07:22

Eurohoops.net

The trio of Lauri Markkanen, Frank Ntilikina and Anzejs Pasecniks saved the euro pride in the NBA draft.

By Eurohoops team/ info@eurohoops.net

Those three players were drafted in the first round with Markkanen not considered international, because he had played in the NBA, and being picked up at number 7 by Minessota, followed by Ntilikina at no.8 by New York and Pasecniks at no.25 by the Sixers.

No other player from Europe was part of the first round unless you add T.J.Leaf, son of former Maccabi Tel Aviv Brad Leaf who was born in Israel and was the no.18 pick by the Pacers. Leaf has also the Israeli citizenship, he had played in the U18 second division Eurobasket with Israel in 2015 after being cut from the U.S. U19 team , but at this point he doesn’t seem to have any other connection with Israel.

The players from the old continent who were picked in the second round were German center Isaiah Hartenstein of Zalgiris Kaunas at no.43 (Houston), Slovenian small forward Vlatko Cancar at no.49 (Denver) Serb point guard Ognjen Jaramaz at no.58 (New York)  and French forward Alpha Kaba at no.60 (Atlanta), all  three of them from Mega Bemax, while French power forward Mathias Lessort of Nanterre 92 was the 50th pick (Philadelpia), Greek-Bulgarian Aleksandar Vezenkov of Barcelona the 57th pick (Brooklyn).

Australian Jonah Bolden who has a contract with Crvena Zvezda for next season was the 36th pick of the draft by the Sixers and Greek-American Tyler Dorsey was the no.41 pick by Atlanta. While the rest of the second round picks from Europe seem to be draft-and-stash players, Bolden and Dorsey may have chances to play next season in the NBA.

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