The 1995-96 NCAA men's basketball season was one for the ages. It had the memorable showdown in the Big East Tournament Championship game between Georgetown's Allen Iverson and Ray Allen from the University of Connecticut. It saw Marcus Camby, the lanky, shot-blocking machine from the University of Massachusetts, carry his team to the Final Four. And it culminated with Antoine Walker leading the University of Kentucky over John Wallace and Syracuse in a thrilling NCAA National Championship final. With all that talent to go around, it's no wonder the 1996 NBA Draft was memorable as well.
The top college basketball programs sent multiple players to the NBA, including some of the best at their positions. Four players were drafted from Kentucky, while Georgetown and the University of Arizona each had three players selected. When it was all said and done, the 1996 NBA Draft produced one of the greatest players ever (Kobe Bryant), one of the NBA's best best pure scorers (Iverson), a legendary three-point shooter (Allen) and an all-time great point guard (Steve Nash). While these statements can be debated, these next five facts about the 1996 NBA Draft can't be argued.
5. Marcus Camby was the No. 2 overall pick - Some forget or may not know that Camby was a beast in college. A scoring and shot-blocking monster - he has the second-most blocks in his UMass history - the lanky All-American was named the Associated Press Player of the Year and won both the Wooden Award and Naismith Award in 1996 as he led the Minutemen to the NCAA Final Four. Camby was drafted second overall that year in the NBA Draft by the Toronto Raptors, but he never turned into a superstar in the pros. Camby, however, has been productive during his 14 years in the league. Camby, who now plays for the Portland Trailblazers (his fifth career team), has led the league five times in blocks per game and has been named to the NBA All-Defensive Team four times.
4. Three Georgetown Hoyas were selected - Allen Iverson was drafted first overall by the Philadelphia 76ers, but can you name the other two former Georgetown players taken in the 1996 NBA Draft? You may have to think about it for a minute ... OK, time's up. Jerome Williams went 26th overall to the Detroit Pistons and Othella Harrington was selected with the first pick of the second round (30th overall) by the Houston Rockets. Williams played mostly for Detroit and Toronto during his 9-year career, while Harrington, who played for five different teams, stretched his NBA career a couple of years longer. The six-foot Iverson went on to become perhaps the best pound-for-pound player in the history of the NBA. In his 13 years in the NBA, the 11-time All-Star led the league in points per game four times, won the league MVP in 2001 and scored a career 24,368 points.
3. The Phoenix Suns selected Steve Nash with 16th overall pick - Here are a few players selected before Steve Nash: Kerry Kittles (selected by the New Jersey Nets with the eighth overall pick), Samaki Walker (taken with the ninth pick by the Dallas Mavericks) and Vitaly Potapenko (chosen one pick before Nash by the Sacramento Kings). It's easy to second guess those selections now. Try finding someone - even in the Suns' front office - who at the time knew Nash, out of little-known Santa Clara University, would be this good. He averaged 14.9 points per game and only 4.5 dimes per game in his four years at Santa Clara. Nash would be traded by the Suns to Dallas in 1998, but returned to Phoenix as a free agent in 2004. He led the league in assists the next three seasons and won back-to-back NBA Most Valuable Player awards in 2005 and 2006. A seven-time All-Star, Nash is well on his way to 10,000 career assist (he entered this season with 8,397).
2. Three players from Kentucky were selected in the first round - It shouldn't be a shock that three players from UK were taken in this draft, but they all went in the first round. The Wildcats defeated Syracuse for the NCAA National Championship in 2006 behind Antoine Walker, Tony Delk and Walter McCarty. Walker was drafted sixth overall by the Boston Celtics, Delk, the NCAA title game's Most Outstanding Player, was taken 16th by the Charlotte Hornets and the New York Knicks took a chance on McCarty with the 19th pick. Walker easily had the best pro career of the three. He scored 15,647 points in his NBA career, which is second-most by a former Kentucky Wildcat (Hall of Famer Dan Issel scored 27,482). Delk lasted nine years in the NBA, but averaged just 9.1 points and 1.9 assists per game for his career. McCarty also played nine years in the NBA, mostly for the Celtics, and averaged 5.2 points per game during that time. Mark Pope, by the way, was selected 52nd overall by Indiana, to give Kentucky the most players selected in the draft that year.
1. Twelve teams passed on Kobe Bryant - You really can't blame the twelve teams that passed on the future Hall of Famer, including the Golden State Warriors, who selected N.C. State's Todd Fuller with the 11th overall pick (doh!). Bryant, who was drafted 13th overall by the Charlotte Hornets, was an out-of-this-world talent, but he still was nothing more than a high school sensation. Plus, he wasn't the physical specimen LeBron James or Dwight Howard was as a prep athlete. As a matter of fact, so unproven was Bryant, the Hornets traded him less than a month later to the Los Angeles Lakers for Vlade Divac (double doh!). The rest, as they say, is history. Bryant, who entered the 2010-11 season averaging 25 points per game for his career, has won five NBA championships with the Lakers (being named Finals MVP twice) and been selected to the NBA All-Star game 12 times. And here's far from done.
Sources
Basketball-Reference.com / 1996 NBA Draft. Accessed Jan. 10, 2011.
Adam Martini - Adam Martini is a freelance sports writer based in Winnipeg, Manitoba. He has more than 15 years of writing experience, most recently as ...
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