
Songaila (Photo
courtesy of Wake Forest) |
The Celtics roster in the 2002 Shaw's Pro
Summer League took on an international flavor on Wednesday
night when Celtics General Manager Chris Wallace announced
from the Celtics draft headquarters in Waltham that the
Celtics 2002 draft choice, Darius
Songaila, will be joined by four European-based
players on the club's summer league roster.
Demos Dikoudis, a 6-9 Greek forward who
plays for AEK Athens, Jaka Lakovic, a 6-foot shooting guard
from Slovenia, Milan Gurovic, a 6-9 small forward Yugoslavian
native who now plays for Pallacanestro Trieste in Italy, and
Martin Muursepp, a 6-9 European star who has had a cup of
coffee with several NBA clubs, are all expected to play for
Boston at the summer league ?which runs from July 15 through
the 22 at Umass-Boston.
Whether other teams follow the Celtics lead
in bringing in foreign talent for a look is yet to be seen.
But with the amount of 2002 draftees expected to participate,
the addition of this foreign contingent gives the league an
even greater talent upgrade.
As many as 22 players selected on Wednesday
night could appear for their teams at the Shaw's Pro Summer
League, eight of which are first round picks including
Indiana's Jared Jeffries (Washington), Tennessee's Marcus
Haislip (Milwaukee), Maryland's Juan Dixon (Washington), Notre
Dame's Ryan Humphrey (Orlando), Illinois's Frank Williams (New
York) and Gonzaga's Dan Dickau (Atlanta).
Local prep product Dan Gadzuric, who was
selected out of UCLA by the Bucks in the second round, also
could appear.