The Oklahoma City Thunder decided to trade up in the 2023 NBA Draft, keeping a five-year streak of shuffling up the NBA Draft board alive for the Bricktown boys. While the OKC Thunder got their guy with this transaction, selecting Kentucky guard Cason Wallace, the NBA’s awkward transactional process held Wallace out from competition throughout the week in Salt Lake City.
Despite the trade between the Dallas Mavericks and Oklahoma City Thunder being stamped official hours before the third and final game in the Salt Lake City Summer circuit, Cason Wallace still could not make his Thunder debut. On top of being unable to ink his rookie scale contract due to this trade delay, he was not eligible to be placed on the team’s Salt Lake City roster as it was announced a week ago. Now, all of that is behind us.
The OKC Thunder finally have the debut for rookie guard Cason Wallace set as the team heads to Vegas to continue Summer League.
The Oklahoma City Thunder wrapped up a three-game Salt Lake City Summer League stretch where they turned in a 3-1 record, including a tournament MVP performance from third-year guard Tre Mann. Now, the OKC Thunder head to Vegas to participate in the grand spectacle of Summer League with the rest of the NBA Franchises. As the Cason Wallace trade became official on July 6th, with him inking his rookie-scale contract on July 7th, the Thunder have issued a fresh Summer League roster ahead of their Vegas opener.
Updated Thunder Summer League roster: pic.twitter.com/oSEekTWLEG
— Rylan Stiles (@Rylan_Stiles) July 7, 2023
The Oklahoma City Thunder have added Cason Wallace to the Summer League roster and tweaked the Summer League coaching staff. OKC Blue head coach Kameron Woods will take over as the bench boss for the Summer squad from David Akinyooye. This was part of the plan laid out by Mark Daigneault to me last weekend. Daniel Dixon and Darnell Foreman will join the staff in Vegas, who accompany Woods on the bench with the OKC Blue.
Cason Wallace will make his OKC Thunder debut on Saturday at 2 p.m. CT on ESPN2 against his hometown Dallas Mavericks. The same Mavericks who shipped him out of town in favor of salary-dumping Davis Bertans and grabbing Dereck Lively II. Lively II, Olivier-Maxence Prosper, and Jaden Hardy highlight the Mavs Summer League team. Rivaling them will be the likes of Chet Holmgren, Jalen Williams, a red-hot Tre Mann, Ousmane Dieng, and Jaylin Williams.
As another point of note, Jeremiah Robinson-Earl (ankle) and Keyontae Johnson (hamstring) were listed as out for Salt Lake City; we should get an update on their status for Vegas at some point this morning.