Dreams come true. Former Indiana Hoosier Romeo Langford has been selected with the 14th overall pick by the Boston Celtics in the 2019 NBA Draft hosted in Brooklyn, New York. He becomes the 26th Hoosier to be selected in the first-round of the NBA draft. They remain in 7th place among all NCAA teams with Michigan’s Jordan Poole being selected in the first-round. The Wolverines currently lead the Big Ten with first-round picks at 27.
As the 14th overall pick, Romeo Langford is the last of the 2019 NBA lottery picks. The Celtics received the 14th pick from the Sacramento Kings when they sent the 2017 first overall pick to the 76ers (which was ultimately used to draft Markelle Fultz) for the third overall pick in that draft.
Romeo Langford becomes the 77th Hoosier to be drafted, and he will be joining eight other Hoosiers that are currently active in the league. He is the highest picked Hoosier since Noah Vonleh was drafted in the first-round of the 2014 draft.
As the 14th pick, Romeo Langford is expected to sign a contract in the neighborhood of $2.878 million and $3.022 million dollars in his first two years. These are estimated numbers by RealGM based on between 80% to 120% of the NBA rookie pay scale.
As a top-5 recruit in the 2018 recruiting class, Romeo Langford had high expectations when he committed to play for the Indiana Hoosiers. At the time, numerous early draft predictions had Romeo Langford in the top-10 range of the 2019 NBA draft.
For the Hoosiers, Romeo Langford was one of the most utilized freshman in the country and one of the most effective scorers in the Big Ten. He finished with averages of 16.5 points and 5.4 rebounds per game throughout an Indiana season where he played in every game except the final post-season NIT trio of games.
The play of Romeo Langford at Indiana has been polarizing for a number of reasons – many stemming from the high expectations of him when he committed to play for Archie Miller.
After the season was over the Indiana, it was revealed that Romeo Langford had a season-long wrist injury that he played through in order to appear in games for the Hoosiers. He has since had surgery to repair his wrist. Romeo Langford was not able to participate in the 2019 NBA Combine due to the recovery process.
The New Boston-Indiana Connection
On the East coast, there is certainly an Indiana pipeline that is starting to be built. The Celtics are coached by Brad Stevens who is most famous for his back-to-back national title runs with Butler University in 2010 and 2011. He is a graduate of Zionsville High School and a native of Zionsville as well.
The Celtics also have the star player of those first Butler Bulldogs NCAA run in 2010 . Gordan Hayward, a Brownsburg, Ind. native played two years under Brad Stevens at Butler and he was a major reason for the Bullsdogs’ success in 2010.
The third Indiana connection on the roster is RJ Hunter who played at Pike High School in Indianapolis and eventually played for Georgia State in college. He was a first round pick in 2015 and spent a number of years in the G-League before now being back on the Celtics.
Boston added two more Hoosier pieces in the 2019 NBA Draft, of course first starting with Romeo Langford. In the second round, the Celtics used the 33rd overall pick to pick up Carsen Edwards out of Purdue – yet another Hoosier that will be transplanted to the east.
He’s basically a wing, that has the ability to the point if you want him to. He reminds me of me a better, more athletic version of Evan Turner. We all know how much Brad Stevens loved Evan Turner when he was here for the Celtics. Romeo – that’s a good pick. That’s a really solid pick at 14.
