Cameron Thomas dreamed about walking across the NBA draft stage. Tonight, it becomes a reality.
Cameron Thomas and his mother, Leslie, watched previous NBA drafts from their living room.
On Thursday night, both will be at Barclays Center in Brooklyn for the 2021 NBA draft.
Thomas is considered a likely first-round draft pick.
“It feels good. Just to have your dreams come true is surreal,” said Thomas, who starred for one season at Oscar Smith High in Chesapeake before transferring to basketball power Oak Hill Academy. “I’m not really feeling anything yet. I might feel it (Thursday) for sure, when the day actually is here.”
Thomas received an invitation to the draft’s green room last week. With that, he joins special company: a multitude of projected NBA lottery picks, proving his draft stock is rising.
He found out about the invitation from his mother.
Leslie heard about other players being invited and wondered where was her son’s invitation.
Her emotions were put at ease when she received a phone call from Cameron’s agents, Michael Tellem and Erika Ruiz from CAA.
“He called me and said, ‘We got the invite,’” she said.
She responded with a loud scream.
“I was so wound up,” she said. “Him being invited was a big moment. We celebrated that.”
Cameron didn’t find out until later in the day because he was on a flight for a workout.
“His agent texted him, and then I texted him and he was so happy because he responded with a smiley face,” she said. “It was just such a relief. It was the best feeling next to hearing his name called on draft night.”
She knows how much Cameron worked and sacrificed to get to this moment.
“This is his dream,” she said. “And when your dream comes true, you can’t put it into words.”
On Thursday, Thomas, just 19, is expected to walk across the stage and shake hands with NBA commissioner Adam Silver, who will then hand him the jersey of his new NBA team.
“You watch it so much on TV, and you want to be there and walk across the stage, so for me to actually have that moment is very cool,” he said. “It just shows that my hard work is paying off, and just for me to be one of the 20 people in the room is a huge sign of success, honestly. I’m just happy to have this opportunity. And I’m definitely going to run with it.”
Thomas has worked hard for this opportunity.
As an LSU freshman, the 6-foot-4, 210-pound guard was the fourth-leading scorer in the nation, averaging 23 points per game last season.
Thomas led the SEC in scoring, free-throw percentage and field goals made, and his 194 free-throw makes led the country. He made an LSU-record 42 consecutive free throws.
Thomas led all NCAA Division I freshmen in scoring, while also posting the fourth-highest scoring average for a first-year LSU player, behind only Pete Maravich as a sophomore in 1972-73 (43.8), Mahmoud Abdul-Rauf as a freshman in 1988-89 (30.2) and Bob Pettit as a sophomore in 1951-52 (25.5).
He was first-team All-Southeastern Conference, All-SEC Freshman, the USA Today SEC Newcomer of the Year and a USA Today second-team All-American as well as Associated Press All-America honorable mention and a Collegeinsider.com Kyle Macy Freshman All-American.
After his amazing freshman season, he turned pro and signed with CAA agents Tellem and Ruiz.
Since then, he’s had private workouts with multiple NBA teams, including the Golden State Warriors, Atlanta Hawks and New York Knicks.
Thomas is being called a “scoring machine” who is “fearless.”
Longtime AAU coach Boo Williams, who Thomas played for, said he’s “the best scorer I’ve coached since (Allen) Iverson” because of his ability to shoot the 3-pointer, mid-range jumper and drive to the rim.
“He’s a scorer,” Williams said previously, “and he has that killer instinct.”
ESPN held its mock draft on Tuesday night, and along with NBAdraft.net, they project Thomas will go 20th overall to the Atlanta Hawks, while NBAdraftroom.com predicts he’ll be selected 26th overall by the Denver Nuggets.
Thomas and his mother just want to hear his name called.
“We’re enjoying this, but we don’t know what to expect,” she said. “It’s out of our comfort zone because we don’t have control of it. So I’m just going to enjoy it for my son.”
Thomas was asked what he will do when his name is eventually called?
“I haven’t thought about it yet,” he said. “I think I’m not really going to know until it actually happens. We’ll see. I don’t know how I’m going to react.”
Larry Rubama, 757-575-6449, larry.rubama@pilotonline.com
