For many years now, Kentucky Wildcats basketball players have made a huge impact in the NBA. While that sentiment was true of many former Wildcats in the league, thus far Lexington’s rookie class has yet to show as much promise.
No Kentucky rookies were selected to the NBA’s All-Rookie teams, per results posted by the league.
Each of Rob Dillingham, Justin Edwards, and Reed Sheppard received a single vote, putting them in a tie for last place with Washington’s Kyshawn George and Orlando’s Tristan Da Silva.
Dillingham is having the best (and longest) season out of the three Wildcats. The combo guard was drafted eighth overall by the Minnesota Timberwolves last summer. He’s still playing in the playoffs with Minnesota and has featured in 49 games. His 4.5 points aren’t much, but it’s still promising given that it’s his rookie year and he’s playing on a deep playoff team.
Sheppard’s campaign has been disappointing given that he was drafted third overall by the Houston Rockets. His 4.4 points per game were disappointing in his 52 games played.
Edwards had the best campaign despite going undrafted. With the 76ers underperforming this year, Edwards was given the space to excel. In his rookie campaign he averaged 10.1 points in 44 games played.
Stephon Castle (San Antonio, UConn), Zaccharie Risacher (Atlanta, France’s JL Bourg), Jaylen Wells (Memphis, Washington State), Zach Edey (Memphis, Purdue) and Alexandre Sarr (Washington, Australia’s Perth Wildcats) made the All-Rookie first team. Kel’el Ware (Miami, Indiana), Matas Buzelis (Chicago, G-League Ignite), Yves Missi (New Orleans, Baylor), Donovan Clingan (Portland, UConn), and Bub Carrington (Washington, Pitt) made the second team.
