Sixers G League affiliate Delaware Blue Coats select familiar player with their first draft choice

In Saturday’s draft, the Delaware Blue Coats, the G League affiliate of the 76ers, selected a familiar player with their initial selection.

Terrence Drisdom, who has played for three G League teams, including part of last season with the Blue Coats, was selected with the 18th pick of the second round.

The Blue Coats didn’t own a first-round pick after previously trading it.

The 6-foot-5 Drisdom, 27, averaged 16.5 points and 6.6 rebounds as a redshirt senior in 2014-2015 for Cal Poly Pomona.

Last season, he began the year with the Memphis Hustle of the G League and finished with the Blue Coats, averaging 4.0 points and 12.7 minutes in nine games.

“I had a good time there last year, and I am excited to be back and to get to work,” Drisdom said.

Drisdom played two seasons for the Santa Cruz Warriors in the G League and has also competed abroad. He played one year in Japan, and, after his season with the Blue Coats, played professionally in Mexico for the Hermosillo Rayos.

Returning to the Blue Coats, he has a simple goal.

“My goal is to help the team in any way I can,” he said.

One way is on the defensive end. A swingman, Drisdom says he is comfortable defending shooting guards and small or power forwards.

With their second pick, No. 20 in the third round, the Blue Coats selected Martaveous McKnight, a 6-4 guard who averaged 20.8 points, 5.0 rebounds and shot 38.7 percent from three-point range last season for Arkansas-Pine Bluff.

G League rules mandate that teams make at least two picks in the draft. The Blue Coats had two selections in the fourth and final round but declined to make selections.

According to the G League, each fall more than 100 players are signed by the league and placed in the NBA G League draft pool. That includes players who have previously played in the NBA, the G League, internationally, or undrafted rookies and G League national tryout players.

For instance, center Hasheem Thabeet, who as the NBA’ s No. 2 overall selection in 2009 draft and played parts of five NBA seasons with four teams, was in Saturday’s G-League draft. He was taken in the first round with the 18th overall selection by the Fort Wayne, the G-League affiliate of the Indiana Pacers.

Players must be 18 years old to be eligible for the NBA G League Draft, as opposed to the NBA’s age minimum of 19.

Anthony Lawrence, a 6-foot-7 swingman who averaged 12.5 points last season as a senior at the University of Miami, was the first pick of the draft, selected by Northern Arizona.

Players are eligible to be selected in the 2019 NBA G League Draft if they signed a contract with the league by Oct. 21 (for players who weren’t in NBA training camps) or Oct. 24 (for players who were in NBA training camps), and their rights are not held by an NBA G League team.

Players who participated in NBA training camps and were designated as affiliate players are not draft-eligible. They are allocated directly to the NBA team’s NBA G League affiliate.

Locally, Joe Cremo, a 6-4 guard last year for Villanova who was a graduate transfer from Albany, was the final player selected, No. 27 in the fourth round to Long Island. The team with the final selection, the Rio Grande Valley Vipers, declined to make the selection.

The Blue Coats begin their training camp on Monday. On Friday, the Sixers announced that 2018 first round pick Zhaire Smith (who was acquired in a draft night deal with Phoenix) and two-way player Marial Shayok, a second-round pick this past draft, will report to Blue Coats training camp.