The naturalized players perform well, is he an important puzzle piece for the Croatian men's basketball team?
In today's warm-up match of the men's basketball European Championship, Slovenia narrowly defeated Croatia 94-88 after a hard battle. Although he lost the game, American guard Jaleen Smith, who had just received a Croatian passport not long ago, did well, scoring 13 points and five assists in the whole game.
Born in November 1994, Smith is 193cm tall and weighs 93kg, and is a two-legged defender with a certain ability to score independently and organize tandem. He was the loser in the 2017 NBA Draft, and he didn't play in an NBA game. He played for the Phoenix Suns in the NBA Summer League last summer, but his performance in the summer league wasn't particularly ideal, and he didn't get the attention of NBA teams. However, in europe, he has a fairly good performance. He was honoured MVP of the German League in 2020-21 and last season he helped Alba Berlin win the German League title and is the core of the team's backcourt.
The Croatian Basketball Association has just announced the 12-man roster for the European Championships, and Smith is also on the list, and he will play in the European Championships with several well-known stars in the NBA, such as Bojan Bogdanovic, Dario Saric, Ivica Zubac and former NBA lotto show Mario Hezonja. The Croatian men's basketball team has strong players in other positions, relatively speaking, the team's strength in the first position is relatively average, and it is not known whether Smith can become the last piece of the team's puzzle.
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