MILWAUKEE — Doc Rivers says he saw star potential in Shai Gilgeous-Alexander whereas teaching him as a rookie earlier than the Los Angeles Clippers traded him to Oklahoma Metropolis.
However the veteran coach concedes that Gilgeous-Alexander has drastically outperformed these expectations.
“I don’t assume anyone in the world saw this in him,” mentioned Rivers, who coached the Clippers from 2013-20. “We did assume he was going to be actually, actually good. I assumed he was going to be a star. I mentioned it after we traded him. However to see this, I don’t assume anybody can actually say they knew he was going to be this particular.”
Rivers was talking earlier than his Milwaukee Bucks misplaced 121-105 to Gilgeous-Alexander’s Western Convention-leading Thunder on Sunday evening.
The Clippers included Gilgeous-Alexander as a part of the bundle to carry nine-time All-Star Paul George to Los Angeles in the summer season of 2019. The acquisition of George helped the Clippers additionally land Kawhi Leonard in free company after he had simply led the Toronto Raptors to an NBA title.
On the time of the commerce, Gilgeous-Alexander was coming off a rookie season in which he had averaged 10.3 factors, 3.3 assists and a pair of.8 rebounds whereas beginning 73 video games. The three-time All-Star took his sport to a different stage with Oklahoma Metropolis and now’s thought-about one of many high candidates for this season’s MVP award together with Denver’s Nikola Jokic.
Gilgeous-Alexander, 26, is averaging an NBA-leading 33 factors and has scored at the least 20 factors in 62 consecutive video games.
“I had him his rookie yr, the one factor I liked about him, the sport has by no means gone quick for him,” Rivers mentioned. “He’s all the time been in a position to play at a reasonably good tempo, and now he’s simply getting higher at it.”
He continued strengthening his MVP case this weekend by serving to the Thunder win at Detroit and Milwaukee on back-to-back nights.
Gilgeous-Alexander scored 48 factors in a 113-107 victory at Detroit. He confirmed the diversification of his offensive sport Sunday by scoring 31 factors regardless of going 0 for five from 3-point vary, the primary time since Nov. 20 that he had gone a whole sport and not using a 3-pointer.
“He simply has nice mix and located stuff in the movement of the sport,” Thunder coach Mark Daigneault mentioned. “He didn’t, I feel, play his greatest offensive sport tonight, however nonetheless had a really regular hand.”
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