On Thursday, the hard work, long hours of practice and four years of steady growth and improvement that Oklahoma All-American Buddy Hield put into his four-year college career at OU will pay off with a first-round selection in the 2016 NBA Draft.
A total of 60 players will be selected in the draft, which this year will take place from the Barclays Center in Brooklyn, N.Y. OU’s Hield is expected to be a lottery pick in this draft and could go as early as No. 3 to the Boston Celtics, according to some NBA mock drafts, but more likely somewhere between the No. 6 and No. 8 overall selections.
A two-time Big 12 Player of the Year and winner of the 2016 Wooden Award and Naismith Trophy as college basketball’s best player this past season, Hield is rated by ESPN’s Chad Ford as the eighth best player overall available in the 2016 draft and the No. 1 shooting guard.
Most draft experts have Hield going No. 6 to the New Orleans Pelicans, No. 7 to the Denver Nuggets or No. 8 to the Sacramento Kings. The Big 12’s leading scorer the past two seasons is expected to be able to play immediately in the NBA, and by remaining in school for four seasons he has been able to greatly improve his shooting ability and efficiency, which is in direct correlation to his high NBA draft stock.
Hield worked out over the weekend with the Los Angeles Lakers, who have the No. 2 pick in this year’s draft, and reportedly made 85 of some 100 three-point shot attempts.
He also has held individual workouts with Boston, New Orleans and Phoenix, and believes, with the Lakers losing future NBA Hall of Famer Kobe Bryant, who retired at the end of this past season, he would be a great fit on the Lakers’ roster.
Hield told Mark Medina of the Los Angeles Daily News that his scoring ability “is what the (Laker) franchise needs. The Lakers are losing Kobe and they need a scorer. So why not call on me to fill in their spot?”
The Lakers are widely expected, however, to select former Duke star Brandon Ingram with the No. 2 pick in the draft.
While Hield is a sure first-round pick in the draft, his former Sooner teammate Isaiah Cousins is a potential second round draft selection. DraftExpress.com has the 6-foot-4 Cousins listed as a shooting guard prospect, like Hield, and projects him No. 53 among the best prospects available, which would place him at the back end of the 60 overall draft selections.
Whether or not Cousins is selected in the draft, he is sure to get a tryout with one or more NBA teams as a free agent. Free agency is also the path likely to be taken by 6-foot-8-inch Ryan Spangler, who played alongside both Hield and Cousins at Oklahoma the past three seasons.
The last Oklahoma Sooner to be selected in the NBA Draft was Romero Osby, who was taken in the second round in 2013 by the Orlando Magic with the 51st overall pick. Osby is currently playing professional ball in Israel.