South Carolina basketball star GG Jackson declares for 2023 NBA Draft after one season

COLUMBIA — After one season with South Carolina men's basketball, star freshman GG Jackson is headed to the NBA.

The 6-foot-9, 215-pound freshman is a projected first-round draft pick with most mock drafts placing him outside of the lottery picks in the middle to end of the first round. Jackson would be the first South Carolina player drafted since Sindarius Thornwell in 2017 and the first first-round selection since Renaldo Balkman in 2006. The draft is on June 22.

Jackson, a Columbia native, was a five-star recruit and the No. 1 prospect in the state coming out of high school. He landed at South Carolina after originally committing to North Carolina in the Class of 2023. He flipped his commitment to the Gamecocks after reclassifying into the Class of 2022.

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In his lone season at South Carolina, Jackson led the team in scoring, averaging 15.4 points and 5.9 rebounds per game. He was named to the SEC All-Freshman team and earned freshman of the week honors after recording a double-double in his Gamecocks debut with 18 points and 10 rebounds against South Carolina State on Nov. 8. Jackson's best game of the season came against then-No. 16 Auburn, where he scored 30 points and had eight rebounds.

The Gamecocks finished with an 11-21 record, including going 4-14 in the SEC. Their season ended on an 67-61 loss to Ole Miss in the conference tournament on March 8.

Jackson started in 29 of 32 games, coming off of the bench in three straight games from Feb. 7-14. The freshman was benched after he went on Instagram Live to air frustrations with the program following South Carolina's two-point loss at Arkansas on Feb. 4.

This article originally appeared on Greenville News: GG Jackson: South Carolina basketball star enters NBA Draft 2023