Admin July 26, 2024
Where would the Olympic men’s basketball competition be without college hoops?
That’s not a rhetorical question.
Really, without college basketball, the Olympics would be half-empty.
Of the 144 players on 12 team rosters that will contest Paris 2024 over the next two weeks, half competed at U.S. colleges, all but four of those at the Division I level. (And South Sudan center Khaman Maluach will effectively tip that past more than 50 percent when he takes the court this autumn for the Duke Blue Devils).
The list of college products includes the whole of the Canada roster, all but one player for each of Puerto Rico, South Sudan and the United States, and at least half the members of the Australia, Japan and Germany squads. Only two teams involved, France and Brazil, are taking no U.S. college products to the Games.
In some cases, players come from overseas to compete in the NCAA to advance their educations and develop athletically. In others, American collegians are recruited by countries of their origin – or just countries that want them to ball – to enhance their national teams. In the case of Canada, their development program essentially is mixed with U.S. basketball, especially at the elite AAU level, to the point college is a natural step in the process toward the pros.
In advance of the Games, the NCAA has been promoting the value of its competitions as the backbone of the U.S. Olympic movement. Their message: If you enjoy Paris 2024, it’s because most of the American athletes in the majority of sports came through their members and competitions.
They could do that with basketball, as well, as this list of the top 15 collegians on non-U.S. men’s basketball teams at the Games will demonstrate.
MORE: Full schedule, TV times for men’s Olympic tournament
Best non-U.S. Olympic basketball players from NCAA teams
1. Shai Gilgeous-Alexander
Nation: Canada
College: Kentucky
Position: Point guard
Overview: Gilgeous-Alexander was the consensus No. 30 player in the recruiting class of 2017, ranked behind a dozen players who never appeared in the NBA. He made a wise choice in Kentucky, which had a nice habit of producing exceptional point guards during John Calipari’s tenure. He averaged 14.4 points and 5.1 assists in his one season, which ended in the NCAA Sweet 16. SGA has exploded since, being selected with the 11th pick in the 2018 NBA Draft, and his 30.1 points and 6.2 assists in 2023-24 with the Thunder led to his second All-NBA selection. His presence gives Canada a chance in any game it enters in these Olympics.
2. Jamal Murray
Nation: Canada
College: Kentucky
Position: Shooting guard
Overview: During the 2015 Pan-American Games, Murray played for Canada, although he was fresh out of high school. And against a team comprising U.S. collegians and some fringe pros, Murray scored 22 points in the fourth quarter and overtime to secure a Canada victory. It was obvious then Murray was special, and he verified that by averaging 20 points and 5.2 rebounds for Kentucky’s SEC champions. That led to him being chosen No. 7 overall in the 2017 NBA Draft, and he averaged the same scoring number as part of the Denver Nuggets’ 2023 NBA champions. A little secret about these Olympics: One can make the case the SGA-Murray backcourt is the best of any entrant.
MORE: How to watch every Canada basketball game in Olympics
3. Franz Wagner
Nation: Germany
College: Michigan
Position: Small forward
Overview: Wagner left Michigan after two seasons still oozing potential. He averaged 12.5 points and 6.5 rebounds in his second season with the Wolverines, who won the Big Ten regular season title and advanced to the NCAA Elite Eight. It was obvious he’d be a star in another year at UM, but it was equally apparent he’d be a lottery pick if he turned professional. So stardom with the Orlando Magic has taken a bit, but he has advanced from 15.2 points per game as a rookie, to 18.6 and then 19.7 in his third year. He’s also grown to 6-10, up two inches from where he was listed upon arrival in Ann Arbor. In Germany’s championship run at the FIBA World Cup last year, he ranked only fifth on the team in scoring. But he was more aggressive offensively in the narrow exhibition loss to the U.S. in advance of Paris 2024 and led Germany with 18. He could be the most important player to his team’s medal aspirations.
4. Jose Alvarado
Nation: Puerto Rico
College: Georgia Tech
Position: Point guard
Overview: In the final of the Olympic qualifying event that earned Puerto Rico its position in the tournament, Alvarado tore through a veteran Lithuania squad for 23 points on 9-of-14 shooting, including four 3-pointers. And he did his customary defensive-demon thing, picking up a couple steals and six rebounds. That’s what Alvarado delivered in his senior season at Georgia Tech, when he led the Yellow Jackets to the ACC Championship and a berth in the NCAA Tournament. He was undrafted after completing his fourth season but fought his way onto the New Orleans Pelicans roster and this year ranked sixth in Sixth Man of the Year voting.
5. RJ Barrett
Nation: Canada
College: Duke
Position: Small forward
Overview: In his relatively short international career, Barrett has caused all kinds of problems for USA Basketball. It began with his one-man-show performance in the 2017 FIBA U19 World Cup, when he crushed every defender American coach Calipari threw at him and rang up 38 points in a semifinal victory. Canada then beat Italy and claimed the gold, the nation’s first-ever FIBA title in any age group. Barrett was good for 23 in the bronze medal game at last year’s FIBA World Cup, a performance that helped assure the USA men would fail to medal a second straight time.
6. Patty Mills
Nation: Australia
College: Saint Mary’s
Position: Point guard
Overview: It seems like Mills was in college forever ago, and that he ought to be slowing down at the international level as he has in the NBA. But when he puts on a green and gold jersey, he looks like he still could be the guy who plundered the West Coast Conference for two seasons with the Gaels from 2007-09. Mills was fourth in scoring at the 2019 FIBA World Cup, when Australia finished fourth, then averaged 23.3 points as Australia earned bronze at the Tokyo Olympics in 2021, and last year he was good for 18.6 points at the World Cup. He played in his first Olympics for Australia at Beijing 2008 while still a college student and has been one of the most dynamic guards in the international game since. What does he have left as his 36th birthday approaches?
7. Santi Aldama
Nation: Spain
College: Loyola (Md.)
Position: Power forward
Overview: It’s still hard to explain how Aldama was able to excel relatively unnoticed for two years at Loyola, until the Greyhounds advanced to the final of the Patriot League tournament thanks to Aldama’s 33-point semifinal performance against Army. He averaged 21.2 points and 10.1 rebounds that year, and the pros saw enough to make him the last pick of the 2021 first round. His NBA career has moved mostly forward since, but his importance to Spain has increased exponentially. The Gasol brothers left a ton of minutes and shots behind with their retirements. Aldama is a different sort of big man, but he needs to be huge in Paris for Spain to reach their standards.
8. Rui Hachimura
Nation: Japan
College: Gonzaga
Position: Forward
Overview: Hachimura was outstanding at Gonzaga, a consensus first-team All-America choice who averaged 22.3 points for an Elite Eight team with the Zags. As a freshman, he was a member of the first Gonzaga team to reach the NCAA Final Four. He became a top-10 NBA pick and has been a double-figure scorer in each of his five NBA seasons. What he’s not been able to do is get Japan out of group play in international competition. In appearances at the 2019 FIBA World Cup (13.3 ppg) and 2020 Olympics (22.3 ppg), Hachimura has produced on offense. But they did not win a game at either tournament.
9. Nick Calathes
Nation: Greece
College: Florida
Position: Point guard
Overview: After two terrific seasons with the Gators, with career averages of 16.3 points and 6.3 assists, Calathes departed Florida in 2009 to accept a lucrative professional offer from Greece’s Panathinaikos club in Athens. He was drafted in the NBA’s second round, anyway, and did return to the U.S. for two seasons with the Memphis Grizzlies. The majority of his career has been spent in Europe, including Russia, Spain, Turkey and now France (technically Monaco, but it’s the French league). He has played more than 100 times for Greece’s senior men’s team, winning a bronze medal at EuroBasket in 2009. He was 10th in assists at the 2019 FIBA World Cup.
10. Moritz Wagner
Nation: Germany
College: Michigan
Position: Center
Overview: Wagner was the primary force behind Michigan’s run to the 2018 NCAA Championship game (unless you count coach John Beilein). Wagner found a path to excellence that March that included an MVP performance at the Big Ten Tournament and then five consecutive double-figure scoring games in March Madness, including 24 points and 15 rebounds in the national semifinal against Loyola (Ill.). He has found a home with the Magic in Orlando, where he averaged double-figure scoring this past season, and was the No. 2 scorer for Germany’s gold medalists at the 2023 FIBA World Cup.
11. Jock Landale
Nation: Australia
College: Saint Mary’s
Position: Center
Overview: Landale was a consensus All-America for a Gaels team that won 30 games and reached the NCAA Sweet 16, and he has carried that rugged, skilled play into a successful pro career – and into the international game. He averaged 12.8 points and 4.7 rebounds as Australia won five of their six games at the 2020 Olympics and earned a bronze medal. He missed the 2023 World Cup with an ankle injury, and it showed: The Boomers went 3-2 and Australia finished 10th in the competition. That was good enough for an automatic berth to these games, but it’s not what this team expects to deliver. Landale scored 20 points, grabbed 7 rebounds and passed for 6 assists in Australia’s narrow exhibition loss to the United States this month.
12. Luguentz Dort
Nation: Canada
College: Arizona State
Position: Small forward
Overview: Dort doesn’t typically start for Canada, and he’s not their best shooter and far from their leading scorer. He ranked sixth on the team in scoring average and fifth in rebounding as Canada claimed the bronze at the 2023 World Cup. He ranks first, subjectively, among guys you’d rather not having guarding you if searching for an opening to beat the shot clock. He has been a double-figure scorer regularly for Oklahoma City, who signed him to a two-way contract after he went undrafted in 2019. Dort tried to short-cut the development process and left ASU after a single season. That has cost him money, but he did eventually sign a 5-year deal for $87.5 million in 2022.
13. Lorenzo Brown
Nation: Spain
College: NC State
Position: Shooting guard
Overview: Brown’s story is one of the most remarkable in international basketball. He grew up in Georgia, played prep school ball in Virginia and college hoops in North Carolina and has been a member of professional teams in the United States, Canada, China, Serbia, Turkey, Russia, Israel and, now Greece. He never played in Spain, never lived there. But he’s a citizen now, and an important member of the team that looks to continue the country’s great international history. He averaged 15.2 points and 7.6 assists as Spain won EuroBasket 2022 but was injured and missed last summer’s World Cup.
14. Yuta Watanabe
Nation: Japan
College: George Washington
Position: Forward
Overview: At GW, Watanabe gradually grew into from a contributing freshman into a first-option senior – the way it used to happen all the time in NCAA basketball. He was the Atlantic 10’s defensive player of the year in 2017-18 and averaged 16.3 points. He since has carved out steady work in the NBA, albeit with five different teams. But with Japan he has been a star, producing in each of the past three major worldwide tournaments: 15.6 ppg at the 2019 World Cup, 17.7 ppg in the Olympics played at home in 2021, 16 ppg at last summer’s World Cup.
15. Marial Shayok
Nation: South Sudan
College: Iowa State
Position: Forward
Overview: Shayok was born in Canada, attended high school in New Jersey, played college basketball in Virginia and Iowa and has played professionally in the U.S., Turkey and China. This is somebody whose game has been around the world. Shayok began as a reserve for the Virginia Cavaliers and played three seasons there, never getting more than the 20 minutes a game he played as a junior. After a redshirt year at Iowa State, though, he found his voice with 18.7 points per game and 38.6 percent 3-point shooting in 2018-19, when the Cyclones won 23 games and reached the NCAA Tournament. He was the No. 3 scorer for South Sudan at the 2023 FIBA World Cup, and in a narrow exhibition loss to the USA this month, Shayok led his team with 24 points and hit 6-of-12 on 3-pointers.
