The NBA may have to rethink the timing of its annual draft. Not the month or the new two-day format, but a tweak to the hour the picks start coming off the board. Paris is six hours ahead of New York, so French basketball fans eager to see history had to stay up into the wee hours of Thursday morning to see France join the United States as the only countries with three players drafted in the top 10 picks of an NBA draft.
The first round ended with four Frenchmen drafted: Zaccharie Risacher. Alex Sarr. Tidjane Salaun.
Pacome Dadiet. By the end of the draft Thursday evening, Melvin Ajinca made it five as the 51st pick overall by the New York Knicks. The question going into the draft was whether Risacher or Sarr would be the No.
1 pick overall pick and become the second straight player from France to be the top selection following in the footsteps of last season's eventual Rookie of the Year Victor Wembanyama . Atlanta made Risacher that player. “If I had to give him one advice to him, it would be to ‘just be yourself, don’t change for anything, don’t let the pressure change you, don’t let fame, money whatever.
’" Wembanyama said during a French national team news conference in Paris Thursday ahead of the Olympics. "But I know Zach, he’s got it.” Washington took 7-footer Sarr at No.
2 and not long after Charlotte made the history-making decision to select Salaun at No. 6 overall. It became a French quartet when the New York Knicks drafted Dadiet as the 25th pick o.
