The NBA’s opening night is underway, and every basketball fan is wondering: What are my favorite NIT players up to now?
Here’s everyone we’ve got, team by team (as you would hope, I did this in a rush, and I have no idea how to find out which players are active on a given night, so if I forgot anyone please alert me immediately so I can publicly shame myself):
The Lakers Lack Stars, But They’ve Got Rings
Taurean Prince? NIT champion. Jaxson Hayes? NIT champion. While the Lakers have, at least for tonight, shelved those with better NIT performances (Colin Castleton, D’Moi Hodge), they do have two champions on the court, and while Prince didn’t do a lot on that Baylor team and Hayes was hurt when Texas won it all, it takes a whole team to win a title. Here’s hoping the Lakers figure that out and get Hodge in there before it’s too late. Who can forget Cleveland State hanging with Xavier in 2022? It was almost over before it started for the Musketeers.
Is Reggie Jackson Enough to Lead the Nuggets?
I don’t think Hunter Tyson is active, and he was part of an embarrassing effort this March anyway, as Clemson no-showed against Morehead State. That leaves Reggie Jackson and Braxton Key to carry the Nuggets, and judging by Key’s performance against Richmond in 2017, Denver’s going to have to hope Jackson does it all. He only went 1–1 in his NIT career, but not a lot of people can say they scored 22 points against McNeese State in the first round in 2011. In fact, Jackson might be the only person in the world who can say that.
The Dark Side of the Sun(s)
The Suns have a number of NIT legends. Josh Okogie scored 19.8 ppg in the tournament for THE Josh Pastner team back in 2017. Yuta Watanabe was part of the George Washington team that won it all in 2016 and made the second round the year prior. Damion Lee was a role player for Drexel in 2012 when they won two games. Add in Jordan Goodwin, who caused problems for Mississippi State’s guards in a 2021 first-round loss, and Keita Bates-Diop, who was only kept from NIT glory by an ill-timed sore throat in 2011, and it’s quite the collection of NIT alumni.
Then, there’s Chimezie Metu.
The guy Andy Enfield convinced to sit out in 2018.
He was only a kid, you know?
NIT Warriors
Steph Curry. Klay Thompson. Jerome Robinson. Brandin Podziemski. Lester Quiñones.
The dream is that at some point this year, the Warriors put an all-NIT alumni lineup on the floor. Would it go well? No. It would go terribly. That is such a small lineup. But it’d be a lot of fun for me and you.
People forget that Steph Curry finished his college basketball career at its pinnacle, scoring an average of 29 points in two 2009 NIT games, a stretch which ended with a second-round loss to Saint Mary’s. Similarly, people forget Lester Quiñones scoring eight and grabbing 16 boards in the 2021 championship (that is the best kind of single-double). Those are just about the exact same thing, and people forget both of them.
