NBA draft marks rise of hoops in Georgia

To David Boyd, a hearty breakfast in west Georgia helps explain why metro Atlanta could land two players among the top 10 of Thursday's NBA draft.

Boyd, the 26-year high school coaching veteran who led Milton High to a state title in March, was with his team in Carrollton for the Class AAAAA state tournament. Boyd and his players wolfed down eggs, bacon and biscuits cooked by Milton football coach and athletics director Scott Walker.

To Boyd, that the football coach was serving the basketball team was a small piece of evidence of how basketball's stature in the state had changed.

"That never happened before, I promise you," Boyd said.

Two Georgia players going in the top 10 -- which Georgia Tech and South Atlanta High product Derrick Favors and Norcross High grad Al-Farouq Aminu should accomplish -- is only slightly less rare. (Chris Morris and Willie Anderson were top-10 picks in 1988, as were Dale Ellis and Jeff Malone in 1983.)

Gani Lawal, a teammate of Aminu's at Norcross and Favors' at Tech, has an outside shot to make it three in the first round.

"I don't think it's going to be an anomaly," said Boyd, who coached Lawal as a freshman and a sophomore at Riverdale High. "I think it's going to be something you're going to see more and more coming from Georgia."

Recruiting expert Bob Gibbons said that Georgia ranks among the top five or six states in the country for producing Division I prospects.

"There's always been good players to come out of Georgia," Gibbons said. "I think it's been in the past 10 years it's really reached the present lofty level that it occupies."

Boyd remembers a time when his sport didn't rate so highly in Georgia.

"It used to be football would get the best athletes and basketball would sort of get the crumbs," said Boyd, the only coach in state history to win titles at four schools.

Boyd need only look at his roster to realize that is not always the case any more. Rising seniors Dai-Jon Parker, Julian Royal and Shannon Scott are among the top five in the state listed by recruiting service Scout.com. Scott is committed to Ohio State, and Parker and Royal are being recruited nationally. Rising junior Evan Nolte already is getting similar attention.

Boyd and other basketball insiders in the state cite a couple of reasons. One is the game's increasing popularity, which has siphoned off talent from football. Lawal played a variety of sports as a youth, including football with former Georgia Tech safety Morgan Burnett, but chose basketball as a high school freshman despite the entreaties of Riverdale's football coaches.

"I just knew that's what I wanted to do," Lawal said. "I just fell in love with it."

AAU programs such as the Atlanta Celtics -- where Favors, along with NBA stars Dwight Howard and Josh Smith, played-- and the Georgia Stars -- Lawal and Aminu's team -- have risen to national prominence, giving young players more opportunities to play, more exposure and better competition.

Said Boyd, "That's a big part of it."

Georgia Stars coach Norman Parker, who started the team in 1988, said the level of talent is cyclical. He said his mid-'90s teams led by eventual first-round pick William Avery would rival the best teams today.