Five reasons for Murray, Kings excitement after Summer League originally appeared on NBC Sports Bayarea
Keegan Murray’s first month with the Kings couldn’t have gone much better.
The No. 4 overall pick of the 2022 NBA Draft showed out in seven exhibition games and was named MVP of the Las Vegas Summer League on Monday.
Murray displayed great poise and potential that has Kings fans champing at the bit to watch the Iowa product join De’Aaron Fox and Domantas Sabonis in Sacramento’s quest to end its record 16-year playoff drought.
Here are five reasons for optimism after Murray’s Summer League dominance:
Already rewriting narratives
In seven total Summer League games — three in the California Classic at Chase Center in San Francisco and another four in Las Vegas — Murray impressed with his scoring ability and averaged 21.7 points and 7.6 rebounds per contest. He also drained 21-of-51 attempts from downtown — a 41.2 percent clip — and shot 50.5 percent from the field.
The biggest talking point following Sacramento’s selection of Murray on draft night was about his lack of superstar potential. Murray was looked upon as the most polished prospect towards the top of the draft but didn’t have the ceiling of the consensus top-three choices or guard Jaden Ivey, who went to the Detroit Pistons one pick later at No. 5.
All it took was a handful of head-turning games for those storylines to quickly change. Last week, it was reported that some anonymous NBA scouts actually had Murray as their No. 2 prospect in the entire draft, putting his ceiling with the likes of Paolo Banchero or Chet Holmgren.
Murray clearly looks polished, but his scoring outburst in Summer League puts his ceiling at an exciting unknown heading into his first NBA season.
Rookie of the Year candidate
With the Summer League MVP already in the bag, we can officially launch the 2022-23 Rookie of the Year campaign for Murray. The three players drafted ahead of Murray — Banchero, Holmgren and Jabari Smith Jr. — will be tough competition for the award as they’ll likely occupy a bigger slice of the pie in their team’s game plan than Murray on the Kings. But, hey, Murray easily outscored all of them in Summer League and dropped 29 points against Holmgren and the Oklahoma City Thunder last week. He’s capable.
Murray is wearing No. 13 with the Kings. The last Sacramento player to win Rookie of the Year? Tyreke Evans, who also wore the No. 13 jersey and was also the fourth pick of the draft…