Hawks No. 1 Pick Zaccharie Risacher Reveals What His "Welcome To The NBA" Moment Was

Atlanta selected Risacher with the No. 1 pick in the 2024 NBA Draft

Jun 28, 2024; Atlanta, Georgia, USA; Atlanta Hawks first overall draft pick Zaccharie Risacher (10) poses for a photo at the Emory Sports Medicine Complex. Mandatory Credit: Brett Davis-USA TODAY Sports / Brett Davis-USA TODAY Sports

This year's No. 1 pick Zaccharie Risacher is going to make his Atlanta Hawks debut this week.

After being drafted a couple of weeks ago by the Atlanta Hawks, Risacher is going to take the court this Friday night when the Hawks face the Wizards in this year's NBA Summer League. Before taking off for Summer League, the Hawks held a media availability and Risacher got to speak to the media for the first time since his introductory press conference. One of the questions that Risacher was asked was about if he had a "welcome to the NBA" moment where he realized he had made it to the league and he had this to say:

"I don't really know. I think it would be when I got my jersey with my number and the Hawks on it. Maybe when I put my jersey on and that was a proud moment for me. It is a dream come true for me to be able to walk into the facilities and put on this jersey and have those great people around me, it was amazing."

Risacher went on to say that while it was a good moment, the real work is just starting.

There were a lot of other topics covered at today's media availability, including the recent trade of Dejounte Murray.

Despite paying a hefty price tag and getting little to no results after the Murray trade, Hawks general manager Landry Fields did not see the trade as a failure:

"Not at all. Absolutely not. I look at it as at the time, we had an opportunity to go get a good player and where we are at we wanted to take a chance and take a chance to get to the next level of what we were trying to do. I think that at this point its kinda what I said earlier, we were faced with another challenging decision in moving him but no I don't see it as a failure at all especially when you look at, ok, what are some things that we learned from that, what are some things that worked well, what are some things that did not work out well? But I think going back, we would definitely take that risk again."

Giving up as much as they did and only having one (very short) playoff appearance, it is hard to categorize this as anything but a failure. The Hawks are in worse position because of this trade and are going to have to hope for their young players like Zaccharie Risacher, Jalen Johnson, Kobe Bufkin, and Dyson Daniels to step up alongside Trae Young.

When asked about Daniels and what made him a great fit for the Hawks, here is what Fields had to say:

"His defensive versatility is something that really stands out. His shooting has gotten better, it is something that we think can get an uptick in him as time goes on with his development. So, we are able to help him stay the course defensively and then give him some offensive adjustments there."

When asked about what went into the decision to trade Murray, this is what Fields had to say:

"Just evaluating where we are at. It was a hard decision, it was challenging, we knew that where we ultimately wanted to be, was going to require some challenging decisions, just not being at that point currently where we felt like we could continue on with what we have so we wanted to reshape some things and this is an unfortunate part of the business. Dejounte is a fantastic player and we are excited for him and his journey onto New Orleans and we are also very excited about the guys that we got back. We got some assets back too that are going to be helpful to us. We wish him nothing but the best, he and his family have been nothing but great for us."