Charlotte Hornets: Greensboro Swarm go young in 2019 G-League Draft
The Charlotte Hornets’ G-League affiliate, the Greensboro Swarm, walked away with two young prospects after yesterday’s 2019 G-League Draft.
While the Charlotte Hornets continue the early stages of their 2019-20 season, their G-League affiliate, the Greensboro Swarm, are loading up for a season of their own. In Saturday’s G-League Draft, Greensboro added two young players that may be worth developing.
With the 14th pick in the first round, the Swarm selected Demajeo Wiggins, a 22 year old forward who played his college basketball at Bowling Green. He went undrafted in the 2019 NBA Draft after averaging 12.5 points and 10.6 rebounds during his senior year.
Wiggins is a bouncy 6’10” forward that does most of his work inside the paint. He has good athleticism and size to make a difference as a power forward/center. He doesn’t have great range on his shot yet (didn’t make a three in four years in college), but that’s something he can slowly add to his game.
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He wasn’t the most talked about prospect during his time in college, but he obviously intrigued teams enough to warrant a top-15 selection in the G-League draft. He’ll likely have an immediate role for the Swarm during the 2019-20 season.
Later on, in the third round, the Swarm were back on the clock. This time, they decided to go with Max Montana, a forward that played college basketball at Indiana and San Diego State and most recently played in Germany.
Montana went undrafted during the 2018 NBA Draft, which wasn’t surprising. He didn’t get the chance to show out in college, averaging 6.8 points and 3.0 rebounds during his final season with the Aztecs.
Like I said, he ended up playing in Germany, which was good for his development. Despite having a similar role to what he had in college, Montana was at an advantage due to the simple fact that he was playing against grown men every night.
During the 2018-19 season, Montana averaged 7.3 points and 3.0 rebounds, while shooting 44 percent from the floor and 34 percent from downtown.
After the G-League Draft, the Swarm weren’t done making moves. They acquired 30 year old Durrell Summers from the undrafted player pool. Summers is much more seasoned compared to Wiggins and Montana, having eight years of experience under his belt already.
Summers played four years at Michigan State and went undrafted in 2011. Since then, he’s bounced around from the G-League and Internationally. His last G-League stint was with Westchester in 2015.
Fun fact — Summers actually signed a contract with the Charlotte Bobcats back in 2011. He was waived shortly after, but he now finds himself back in Charlotte, this time in the G-League.
So, after a successful draft and some key trades, the Greensboro Swarm are nearly ready for the 2019-20 season. I’ll be excited to watch both Wiggins and Montana in particular during the season.
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You can also expect to see numerous Charlotte Hornets players find themselves with the Swarm throughout the season. Robert Franks and Kobi Simmons are on Two-Way contracts, but you could also see guys like Jalen McDaniels and Cody Martin spend time in Greensboro.