NBA Mock Draft: Thunder Select Modern Forward

As the college basketball season continues to unfold, the 2022 class of NBA rookies looks impressive.

Early in this NBA season, the Oklahoma City Thunder have struggled as expected. The youngest team in the entire league, they're still learning how to play together and win games.

At the end of the season, it's likely that OKC will have one of the top picks in the 2022 NBA Draft. With that in mind, there's a good chance the Thunder will add another franchise cornerstone before entering the 2022-23 season.

The Athletic's Sam Vecenie recently released a 2022 NBA Mock Draft, which sets the stage for where some of the best prospects in this class could land.

While the draft order won't be known until after the 2021-22 NBA season, the Thunder are currently projected to take a modern forward that's been extremely impressive as a freshman.

Let’s see how Vecenie thinks the lottery could unfold in the 2022 NBA Draft.

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Team	Player	School
1. HOU	Paolo Banchero	Duke
2. NOP	Chet Holmgren	Gonzaga
3. ORL	Jabari Smith	Auburn
4. DET	Jalen Duren	Memphis
5. SAS	Jaden Ivey	Purdue
6. SAC	Jaden Hardy	G League Ignite
7. OKC	Kendall Brown	Baylor
8. IND	Patrick Baldwin	Wisconsin-Milwaukee
9. TOR	TyTy Washington	Kentucky
10. MIN	Dyson Daniels	G League Ignite
11. MEM	Bennedict Mathurin	Arizona
12. CLE	A.J. Griffin	Duke
13. ATL	Keegan Murray	Iowa
14. PHI	Nikola Jovic	International

The 2022 NBA Draft will be yet another pivotal event for the rebuild of the Oklahoma City Thunder.

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