Lamont Paris proud of GG Jackson after NBA Draft selection

One of the bright spots of South Carolina‘s disappointing basketball season was the individual play of freshman GG Jackson, who performed well enough to be selected in the 2023 NBA Draft last Thursday.

Jackson was selected in the second round with the No. 45 overall pick by the Memphis Grizzlies following just one season with the Gamecocks. And following the draft, South Carolina head coach Lamont Paris reacted to his freshman star’s dream coming true.

“I’m extremely proud of all the things he’s done, and actually probably lowest on the list are his basketball accomplishments,” Paris said. “I expected that all of those would happen, but again as I mentioned before, just at the age he was with some of the obstacles we had.”

Jackson was a highly-rated recruit out of high school, ranked a five-star prospect and one of the top 10 players in the country for the 2022 class according to On3’s Industry Ranking. Originally committed to North Carolina, Jackson reclassified and committed to South Carolina, where he’d lead the Gamecocks in scoring as a freshman with 15.4 points per game.

He earned All-SEC Freshman Team honors following the season and had 11 games with 20-plus points, but Paris is more proud of how he was able to battle through adversity to get to where he is now.

“We had a guy on our team that was 26 years old, maybe 25 last year on our team. Managing all that stuff, preparing every day, the whole rigors of the SEC slate, and doing all that and still coming out on top. So I’m extremely proud of him, but most importantly I’m excited for him,” Paris said.

Jackson turned 18 years old last December and brings tremendous upside with him to Memphis. His 6-foot-9, 215-pound frame gives him valuable versatility on both ends of the floor as a defender and as a scorer, and his young age gives him plenty of time to develop and improve even more on his skills.

He joins Houston’s Marcus Sasser and Turkish prospect Tarik Biberovic as Memphis’ 2023 draft selections, a group of players that have proven they can score in a variety of ways in their respective levels of play.

Grizzlies star Ja Morant will notably be missing the first 25 games of the upcoming season due to a suspension, which could give Memphis’ younger, newer talent like Jackson and others the opportunity to make an impact early in the 2023 season.