{"id":757181,"date":"2026-06-24T02:40:15","date_gmt":"2026-06-24T02:40:15","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/757181\/"},"modified":"2026-06-24T02:40:15","modified_gmt":"2026-06-24T02:40:15","slug":"grizzlies-select-forward-cameron-boozer-with-no-3-pick-in-nba-draft","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/757181\/","title":{"rendered":"Grizzlies select forward Cameron Boozer with No. 3 pick in NBA Draft"},"content":{"rendered":"

The\u00a0Memphis Grizzlies<\/a>\u00a0selected Duke forward Cameron Boozer with the third pick in the NBA draft Tuesday night, adding another high pick in their latest rebuilding project.<\/p>\n

Boozer joins seven-foot-three centre Zach Edey, the ninth overall pick in 2024, and Cedric Coward, the 11th selection a year ago and a member of the\u00a0All-NBA rookie team.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s crazy,\u201d Boozer said of hearing his name called by NBA Commissioner Adam Silver. \u201cIt\u2019s a happiness. It\u2019s a joy.\u201d<\/p>\n

The six-foot-eight, 253-pound Boozer is the son of former Duke and NBA player Carlos Boozer. He was the fifth freshman voted\u00a0AP men\u2019s national player of the year. Now Cameron Boozer joins Edey, a\u00a0two-time AP men’s\u00a0national player of the year, in Memphis.<\/p>\n

Carlos Boozer said his son shows up every single day, and he had some advice for him now.<\/p>\n

\u201cTake this moment, enjoy this moment,\u201d Carlos Boozer said. \u201cObviously be where your feet are. Go enjoy it, man, go enjoy it.\u201d<\/p>\n

Boozer\u00a0averaged 22.5 points and 10.2 rebounds while helping Duke win 35 games and reach No. 1 in the\u00a0AP Top 25 poll. The Blue Devils claimed the top overall seed for\u00a0March Madness\u00a0and reached the NCAA Tournament\u2019s Elite Eight.<\/p>\n

He showed the kind of toughness the Grizzlies can use after so many injuries over the past couple of seasons. Boozer finished a loss to UConn with 27 points despite suffering multiple\u00a0facial fractures\u00a0in the first half.<\/p>\n

That helped Boozer prove he can finish through contact, shooting 55.6 per cent from the floor and also shot 39.1 per cent from three-point range. Boozer is also a strong passer (4.1 assists), notably\u00a0assisting on Isaiah Evans\u2019 late three-pointer\u00a0to beat reigning national champion Florida.<\/p>\n

The Grizzlies came into this draft as the NBA\u2019s only team with three selections in the top 35. They also hold the No. 16 spot in the first round and No. 32 early in the second round, giving general manager Zach Kleiman plenty of flexibility to continue revamping the roster.<\/p>\n

Memphis kicked this rebuild into gear last summer, trading away\u00a0Desmond Bane\u00a0and followed up by trading\u00a0Jaren Jackson Jr.\u00a0in February.<\/p>\n

The only reason\u00a0two-time All-Star Ja Morant\u00a0hasn\u2019t joined that exodus was that Memphis could not find a good enough deal for the point guard to close out the three core Grizzlies who were supposed to lead the franchise into the future.<\/p>\n

Memphis still is expected to move on from Morant, with the guard playing only 79 games combined over the last three seasons. Morant could be packaged as part of a move up in this draft by the Grizzlies with two years left on his current contract.<\/p>\n

The Grizzlies\u00a0moved up\u00a0from sixth to third in the lottery after finishing 25-57 and missing the playoffs for the second time in three years. That record makes it difficult to get a read on coach\u00a0Tuomas Iisalo and whether his time in European basketball will translate to NBA success.<\/p>\n

Memphis also has shooting guard Jaylen Wells, who has started 143 of 148 games in his first two seasons. He joined Edey on the\u00a0NBA\u2019s All-Rookie team, and veteran Ty Jerome was added a year ago as another guard option.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The\u00a0Memphis Grizzlies\u00a0selected Duke forward Cameron Boozer with the third pick in the NBA draft Tuesday night, adding another…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":757182,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[434],"tags":[49,48,459,82],"class_list":["post-757181","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-nba","tag-ca","tag-canada","tag-nba","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/757181","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=757181"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/757181\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/757182"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=757181"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=757181"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=757181"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}