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Guards Poole, Mannion and Lin Among Players Going to G League Bubble

When G League play in Orlando tips off on February 10 at 8 AM PT, the Warriors’ affiliate will have recent draft selections and a 2019 NBA Champion with them in the Bubble.

The Santa Cruz Warriors are one of 18 teams going to the G League Bubble – which runs from February 10 to March 6 at the ESPN Wide World of Sports Complex – with a roster featuring 2019 draft picks Jordan Poole and Alen Smailagić, 2020 second-rounder Nico Mannion and former Warrior and member of the 2019 Toronto Raptors Jeremy Lin.

While Poole has seen an uptick in his playing time with Golden State, scoring 16 points in Saturday’s win against the Detroit Pistons and prompting chants of “cancel the flight (to Orlando)” from his Warrior teammates, the former Michigan guard is still joining Santa Cruz in Florida.

Smailagić is also accompanying the team, with the 20-year old Serbian big finishing up his rehabbing sessions with Klay Thompson after the former recently had knee surgery. While Poole struggled on the NBA’s worst team last season, shooting just 33% from the field, Smailagić played in just 14 games before the season was brought to a halt by COVID-19. “Smiley” has yet to return to the court since his short stint at the end of that campaign.

Rounding out the recent draftees is the rookie Mannion, who got playing time in five consecutive games before being inactive in Saturday’s blowout win over Detroit. Coach Steve Kerr has leaned on the Arizona product when in need of a ball handler and a distributor, but the guard has only converted a field goal in one of his six professional games.

A former Warrior, Palo Alto High School graduate and the player behind “Linsanity”, Lin traded in stardom in the Chinese Basketball Association for another crack at making an NBA roster. The guard has endured multiple knee injuries in his professional career, but said to the San Francisco Chronicle’s Connor Letourneau he believes he is better now than when he set the league on fire in 2012 with the Knicks, and still has what it takes to play again in the NBA.

Joining the squad in Orlando is another Bay Area product from Castro Valley High School in Juan Toscano-Anderson, whose most notable recent activity was his scuffle with Pistons guard Rodney McGruder. On the court, however, the two-way player has only played once in the last 14 games after playing in each of the first six contests of the season and starting twice.

Each team in the Bubble will play 15 games with an eight-team playoff beginning on March 8, and Santa Cruz starts off all the action against the Ignite – a developmental team with prospects like Jalen Green and Jonathan Kuminga based in Walnut Creek, California.

For Lin, it will be his first time playing in the NBA’s minor league since 2012, when it was still known as the D-League. For others on the squad, the trip between the Bay Area and Santa Cruz has become part of their routines, and once again can show their ability to play at the next level.

And while it is uncertain how the Santa Cruz Warriors’ players’ prospects of making an NBA roster will pan out, it seems like a safe bet the G League and the “Sea Dubs” will soon be able to showcase their talents in their first basketball since March of 2020.