Missouri Valley players who have played in the NBA

[Da Coach]

The Bulls made a trade today. They traded 2 players from their active roster, Bobby Portis and Jabari Parker, to the Washington Wizards for Otto Porter, Jr.
https://www.chicagotribune.com/sport...206-story.html

That opens a roster spot for the Bulls. It seems more likely they would fill the spot with another forward, since they just traded 2 of their forwards who get substantial minutes.
But maybe they might call up someone from their G-League team? In his first 16 games since being traded by the Boston Celtics G-League team to the Windy City Bulls, Walt Lemon, Jr. is averaging a team-leading 18.7 ppg, 7.9 assists per game, 4.4 rebounds per game, and he is shooting 33.3% from three. Let's hope Walt gets a chance, since the Bulls have little to play for. They lost tonight to fall to 12-41.

[tornado]

Former Wichita State player Ron Baker was cut by the NY Knicks today.
Baker appeared in 92 games, had 14 starts over three seasons with the team and averaged 14.7 minutes, 3.3 points, 1.8 assists and 1.5 rebounds per game.
https://www.kwch.com/content/news/Ne...502694852.html

Ron Baker has had an interesting couple months...
He was cut by the Knicks back in December - then just when he shipped all his stuff back to his home in Kansas - his agent got him signed on with the Wizards..
....but he only played a few seconds and was cut again within two weeks.
Then he decided he wasn't going to be able to get another contract when it was revealed he had a torn right shoulder labrum - so he went to Los Angeles and had a major
shoulder operation to repair his torn labrum and will be out 6 months or so... He remains a free agent as his contract with the Knicks is bought out


Other MVC guys in the NBA...

Cleanthony Early quit the G-League and went to play pro ball in Japan...
His team hit the skids and lost 20 games in a row, but he helped them break that streak
https://www.japantimes.co.jp/sports/.../#.XHm5K4hKjIU

Creighton's Anthony Tolliver (T-Wolves) recently got a little good press for a really impressive block he made on Giannis Antetokounmpo
https://www.nba.com/timberwolves/new...olutely-insane

Fred Van Vleet is also out with injury like his old college teammate Ron Baker.
Fred had surgery to repair torn ligaments in his left thumb - could be out a month...
http://www.espn.com/nba/story/_/id/2...ear-left-thumb

Alize Johnson has also been battling injuries and has been back & forth between the Pacers & G-League
https://www.cbssports.com/fantasy/ba...-for-thursday/

Landry Shamet was traded to the Clippers and has been playing well
https://news.medill.northwestern.edu...ging-clippers/

Kyle Korver was traded to the Utah Jazz and has been playing very well
https://www.ksl.com/article/46501868...-the-utah-jazz

Doug McDermott plays reserve minutes for the Pacers

..and I believe all the other guys mentioned here - Lemon, Lynch, Murry, Akoon-Purcell, Doyle, Lofton, Rhodes, McIntosh, Hawkins, Ingram...
are all out of the NBA and playing either in the G-League or overseas...

[tornado]

Congrats to Fred VanVleet - who joins an exclusive club of MVC players who have won NBA titles

I can think of a few others....Chet Walker, Wes Unseld, Oscar Robertson, Butch Beard, Larry Bird, David Thirdkill, Steve Kuberski, Kyle Korver, Cliff Levingston, Kevin McKenna, McCoy McLemore, Dave Stallworth, Nate Bowman, Tom Thacker, Ron Bonham & Harold Olsen as a coach

[Da Coach]

And although only one of these guys played in the MVC (Van Vleet) the state of Illinois was well represented in the 2019 NBA Finals-
Fred Van Vleet- Rockford Auburn HS
Shaun Livingston- Peoria Central HS
Andre Iguodala- Springfield Lanphier HS
Alfonzo McKinnie- Chicago Marshall HS

And one more near-MVC connection- the head coach of the Toronto Raptors is Nick Nurse, who won a championship in his first season as head coach of the Raptors this season. He is an Iowa native from Carroll Iowa. He played college basketball at the University of Northern Iowa from 1985 to 1989, and his first coaching job was as a graduate assistant to Eldon Miller at UNI in the 1989-90 season. Northern Iowa did not enter the MVC until a year later (in 1991), so Nurse played and was assistant coach under former UNI head coach Eldon Miller when UNI was a member of Mid-Continent Conference (which in 2007 became the Summit League), just before UNI joined the MVC in 1991.

Unlike Golden State Warriors Head Coach Steve Kerr, whose first and only coaching job of any kind was head coach of the Warriors (from 2014-present), Nick Nurse has been an assistant coach or head coach at no less than 15 different teams in Europe, the D-League, various colleges, and now with the Toronto Raptors.
This bio has the list of all the places he has coached in the right side column, and most of them were low-level jobs at meager pay. But his persistence, and his frequent successes in the past, finally paid off for him.-

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nick_Nurse