September 20, 2024

Lakers Summer League guard signs with an international team.

The Los Angeles Lakers are losing a key player from their Summer League team to an international club. Former NBA shooting guard Trent Forrest, who recently played with the Lakers’ Summer League squad in Las Vegas, has signed a two-season deal with Spanish team Saski Baskonia, as reported by Sportando.

Forrest, a 6-foot-4 swingman from Florida State University, went undrafted after a successful NCAA career where he was named to the All-SEC Second Team in 2020. He has played for the Utah Jazz and Atlanta Hawks over his four-season NBA career, averaging 2.8 points, 1.9 assists, and 1.5 rebounds in 151 games (nine starts) with shooting splits of .444/.185/.828.

In the 2022-23 season, Forrest joined the Hawks as a two-way player, appearing in 23 games and averaging 2.3 points per game. He re-signed with the Hawks in the summer of 2023 on another two-way deal, which was later converted to a standard contract in late February. During the 2023-24 season, he averaged 2.2 points, 2.4 assists, and 10.9 minutes per game across 38 contests as a reserve.

In two appearances at the Las Vegas Summer League with the Lakers, Forrest averaged 1.0 points on 16.7 percent shooting, 4.0 assists, 1.5 steals, and 1.5 rebounds per game. His G League performance with the College Park Skyhawks, the Hawks’ affiliate, included averages of 7.5 points on .607/.800/.800 shooting splits, 4.2 assists, 2.5 rebounds, and 1.2 steals per game over nine regular season games.

Meanwhile, the Lakers had a standout performer at Forrest’s position in rookie shooting guard Dalton Knecht. The former Tennessee Volunteers star, selected 17th overall, averaged 18.0 points, 4.8 rebounds, 2.2 assists, and 1.5 steals per game across six games at the California Classic and Las Vegas Summer League. The Lakers are hopeful that Knecht can contribute significantly as a rookie this season, having not made many offseason moves outside of drafting him.

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