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Clippers

Veteran NBA forward Semi Ojeleye has reached a two-year deal to play for Virtus Bologna in Italy, the <a href="https://www.virtus.it/news/semi-ojeleye-e-un-nuovo-giocatore-di-virtus-segafredo-bologna/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">team announced in a press release</a>.
Ojeleye was the 37th pick in the 2017 draft, playing his first four seasons in the NBA with the Boston Celtics. In 2021, he signed with the Milwaukee Bucks and was traded midseason to the Los Angeles Clippers before being waived.
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The 27-year-old has averaged 3.4 points and 2.2 rebounds in his five NBA seasons. He now joins the Virtus Bologna club that plays in Italy's LBA and the EuroLeague, a team that also includes former NBA players Marco Belinelli, Milos Teodosic, Nico Mannion, and Jordan Mickey.
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Veteran NBA forward Semi Ojeleye has reached a two-year deal to play for Virtus Bologna in Italy

Semi Ojeleye signs with Virtus Bologna on two-year deal

Phil Jackson sat atop his perch and preached the gospel of Tex Winter.
The triangle offense, Jackson steadfastly declared, was not obsolete.
Truth it may be, in his final act as the chief of the New York Knicks, Jackson ultimately made the decision to cut against the grain from within his own scouting department and opted to select Frank Ntilikina with the eighth overall pick in the 2017 NBA Draft.
Malik Monk &mdash; the prospect favored by more than one of the team&rsquo;s front-office members &mdash; believed he was bound for New York, but Phil obviously had other ideas.
Today, it&rsquo;s easy to look back at the draft and lament the fact that the Knicks didn&rsquo;t end up with Donovan Mitchell, Bam Adebayo, Kyle Kuzma or even OG Anunoby.
But it&rsquo;s easier to look back at Ntilikina&rsquo;s tenure with the organization and realize that the Knicks, not even under Leon Rose, are yet fully worthy of the benefit of the doubt.
Slowly but surely, over the past 30 years, the only constant in New York has been the lack of the type of developmental culture that the league&rsquo;s more successful organizations seem to have. That didn&rsquo;t begin with Ntilikina; his struggles just further highlighted this weakness.
As his time with the organization has come to an end, the French guard was nowhere near an impact player, and it would be unfair to not lay at least a bit of blame for that fact on the Knicks themselves.
&ldquo;There was a fair amount of reluctance in making him the pick,&rdquo; one source who was familiar with the Knicks&rsquo; plans heading into the 2017 NBA Draft told Basketball News.
&ldquo;[Ntilikina] obviously had the physical gifts to be an impact player in the league, but there were two or three other guys that got support because they seemed much safer.&rdquo;
The operative word there being safe.
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At the NBA level, in the majority of instances, impact players are not born, they&rsquo;re developed. Except in the rare and obvious cases &mdash; LeBron James, Kyrie Irving and Zion Williamson, for example &mdash; players arrive to the league as lumps of clay. Player development personnel, analytics staffers, assistant coaches and members of team scouting departments come together to analyze, critique, tear down and build up the neophyte chasing stardom. Their job isn&rsquo;t only to find the player, their job is to chisel and sculp them.
Lumps of clay. Blobs of potential. Frank Ntilikina came into the league as cake batter. It was the organization&rsquo;s job to whisk him and bake him thoroughly.
But like way too many before him in New York, it didn&rsquo;t happen. So now, the question becomes whether Ntilikina isn&rsquo;t an NBA player simply because the Knicks said he isn&rsquo;t.
Like every other rookie who showed flashes of potential in New York, he built a strong following among Knicks fans, many of whom are disappointed that the team decided it would be better off without him.
&ldquo;I was honestly surprised,&rdquo; one of Ntilikina&rsquo;s former teammates with the Knicks told Basketball News. &ldquo;He struggled a bit with his confidence, but most of us thought he would figure it out. But he never really had the chance to make mistakes, and every player needs that.&rdquo;
Said a bit differently, in four years, the young guard had four different coaches. The expectations placed upon him and his place in the rotation varied quite a bit, so it&rsquo;s not a complete surprise that he never found consistency while playing in New York. At the same time, he didn&rsquo;t exactly take advantage of the opportunities he was given, either by David Fizdale or Tom Thibodeau.
There&rsquo;s more than enough blame to go around.
Still, as recently as the beginning of last season, teams were registering interest in the defensive specialist. According to one league source, the Detroit Pistons made more than one attempt to trade for Ntilikina, while the Orlando Magic were believed to have been enamored with his potential.
One former front-office staffer in New York told Basketball News that Ntilikina&rsquo;s name would come up in trade discussions multiple times per season, but that the team never received an offer for him that included a future first-round pick. That was believed to be the asking price from the team&rsquo;s current front office. It obviously never materialized, and somewhere along the way, the Knicks believed that its roster spot and/or the cost of re-signing Ntilikina outweighed the benefit he could provide a roster that suddenly has other talented players competing at his position.
Based on what we&rsquo;ve seen and heard, the now-23-year-old seems to have been perceived as having too much potential for him not to find a new home in the NBA.
The question is whether he wants it.
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Once upon a time, Danny Green wasn&rsquo;t thought to be an NBA player, neither was P.J. Tucker. Both became lynchpins on championship teams. Teams like San Antonio, Oklahoma City and Miami have had success with reclamation projects and in developing young players, and Ntilikina has at least shown the potential to give a team some meaningful minutes.
As an on-ball defender, his timing and instincts are world-class, and while he received drastically reduced playing time last season, he at least showed the ability to be a respectable shooter from deep (he only took 48 attempts in 33 appearances, but connected on 23 of them &mdash; 47.9%).
But he wouldn&rsquo;t be the first player to decide that they&rsquo;d rather return home to play in Europe rather than continue to pursue their career in the NBA.
Two well-regarded Spanish guards &mdash; Sergio Rodriguez and Rudy Fernandez &mdash; once made that choice, while the Serbian-born Milos Teodosic and Lithuania legend Sarunas Jasikevicius did as well.
Nobody would have confused any of the four for a perennial NBA All-Star, however, fact is that not every player is happy having to constantly fight to earn his keep in the NBA. Especially when richer paydays, more notoriety and comfort await back home.
While the 2019-20 season was objective evidence of the Leon Rose-Tom Thibodeau marriage being a step in the right direction for the Knicks, the organization will only truly turn the corner and earn the respect of the league at large when it finds a way to develop its players. R.J. Barrett, Immanuel Quickley, Obi Toppin and even Mitchell Robinson will figure into that equation, as will the trio of young players with whom New York walked away from the 2021 NBA Draft.
Like every possession in a basketball game, young prospects have a shot clock. If the buzzer goes off before their perceived potential yields real-life impact, they may end up being squeezed between the margins and on the outside looking in when it&rsquo;s all said and done.
Conveniently, Phil Jackson can be blamed for the Knicks selecting Ntilikina in 2017 in the first place, but not finding a way to at least get a return on his perceived potential falls directly at the feet of those currently at the helm for the Knicks.
Time will tell whether Ntilikina was never fit to be an NBA player in the first place, but even in a sea of otherwise good moves, his departure from the organization &mdash; and nothing in return to show for it &mdash; is unfortunately reminiscent of the way business has been done in New York for far too long.
Hopefully, for the sake of those who wish to see the Knicks succeed, this kind of outcome becomes ancient history, much in the way that Malik Monk&rsquo;s hopes of hearing his name called eighth by Commissioner Adam Silver have.

How much of Frank Ntilikina's failure should the Knicks organization take responsibility for? Quite a bit, writes Moke Hamilton.

There’s plenty of blame to go around for Frank Ntilikina’s failure

NBA players from countries outside the United States are in the process of trying to qualify for the Olympics, and none had a better game in the first few FIBA qualifiers than Boban Marjanovic. And that includes Luka Doncic.
The Dallas Mavericks&rsquo; center had 25 points (on 12-for-18 shooting) and 10 rebounds in an 83-76 victory over the Philippines in front of a COVID-capacity crowd of 1,250 mostly home fans in Belgrade, Serbia. Coach Igor Kokoskov rested Miami Heat forward Nemanja Bjelica as Serbia had a 46-28 advantage on points in the paint.
"The Philippines played as a team, and I want to congratulate them on that. They fought,&rdquo; Kokoskov said. &ldquo;We will know more after the review. We have a lot of new names, and some guys were missing. We didn't react, we overthought. We defended instead of being in an attacking rhythm. It wasn't nice, again, but we won.&rdquo;
"At some point, we were relaxed. We played irresponsibly. That resulted in us playing an uncertain ending. We must not allow that,"&nbsp;said Milos Teodosic, Serbia&rsquo;s captain.
After trailing 74-73, Serbia closed with a 10-2 run and pulled out the victory, advancing to the semifinals where they will play either Puerto Rico or Italy.
Doncic had 18 points, 10 rebounds and six assists in just 22 minutes of playing time as Slovenia defeated Poland, 112-77. Slovenia, Lithuania, Venezuela and Poland have already qualified for the semifinals.
Doncic was playing in a competitive international for the first time since helping Slovenia claim a historic win at FIBA EuroBasket 2017 as an emerging 18-year-old. Goran Dragic of the Miami Heat is not playing, but he made the trip and was in the crowd at Zalgirio Arena.
"For me, it's also a pleasure to play for the national team," Doncic said. "It's something I desire. I can't wait to play, so I&rsquo;m really happy to be here. Everyone is enjoying playing and everyone is having fun, and that is what we have to do out there."
Doncic also addressed Dragic's absence.
"Obviously, I wish he was playing with us... He was the guy at EuroBasket 2017. It's great that he came all the way here to support us. It means a lot, not just for me, but the whole federation."
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In Victoria, British Columbia, Canada started five NBA players &ndash; Andrew Wiggins of the Golden State Warriors, RJ Barrett of the New York Knicks, Cory Joseph of the Detroit Pistons, Dwight Powell of the Dallas Mavericks and Trey Lyles of the San Antonio Spurs &ndash; and, after defeating Greece, rolled to a 109-79 victory over China.
Wiggins had 20 points on 5-for-9 shooting while Barrett shot 3-for-7 from three-point territory. He scored 16 points, but missed half of his six free throws. Among those coming off Canada&rsquo;s bench for Nick Nurse were Luguentz Dort of the Oklahoma City Thunder and Nickeil Alexander-Walker of the New Orleans Pelicans. Nicholson, who played last season in China, added 14 points off the bench.
"When you play together, the game comes easy. When you're in a good rhythm, everyone's going to get after it offensively, defensively. We have a lot of unselfish guys. We all want to see each other win, do good, and out there, we're just trying to play aggressive, play to win, play the right way. I feel like if we keep playing that way, keep playing together, then the sky is the limit for us,&rdquo; Wiggins said.
Canada advanced to the semifinals, as has Turkey. Greece, playing without Giannis Antetokounmpo, is 0-1 heading into a Thursday night game against China.
In Croatia, the biggest upset of the qualifying process happened when the home team, led by Utah&rsquo;s Bojan Bogdanovic, was crushed by Brazil, 94-67. Brazil was led by 20 points from 35-year-old center Rafael Nettscheimeir. Bruno Caboclo, who was waived by the Houston Rockets in January, added 16 points, and NBA veteran Anderson Varejao scored 11. Brazil is coached, ironically, by a Croatian, Aleksandar Petrovic.
Despite that loss, Croatia, Germany, Brazil and Mexico have qualified for the semifinals at the tournament in Split, while Russia and Tunisia have been eliminated.
In Lithuania, the home team is 2-0 after defeating Venezuela and South Korea. Jonas Valanciunas and Domantas Sabonis are representing their homeland, which will play Poland in the semifinals and either Slovenia or Venezuela in the qualifying finale. Valanciunas is averaging 17.5 points and 12 rebounds in a little under 19 minutes per game.
"It would be amazing to go to Tokyo," Valanciunas said. "Another Olympics for Lithuania, as a country, would mean a lot to us.&nbsp;
"Our preparation has been a challenge, but I think that's the same for everybody. We are just getting together and trying to find that chemistry as soon as possible."
Lithuania won bronze medals at the 1992, 1996 and 2000 Olympics along with the 2010 World Championship in Turkey. If they qualify for the Olympics, they will be grouped with Spain, Argentina and Japan.
The winner of the tournament in Canada will be grouped with the United States and Iran, and the winners from the tournaments in Croatia and Serbia will be grouped with Australia and Nigeria. The Olympic men&rsquo;s basketball tournament begins July 25.

With the Olympics set to begin on July 25, NBA players from around the world are engaging in battle with their national teams.

Boban Marjanovic posts one of the bigger lines of Olympic qualifier

Ethan Fuller evaluates the NBA landscape at the quarter mark of the season.