It’s wild enough that the undefeated national champion 2023-24 Montverde Academy basketball team is sending four players into the 2025 NBA Draft after just one year of college basketball. To make it even wilder, two of them, Derik Queen and Asa Newell, got an immediate introduction into the life of professional basketball as they were traded for each other in an undoubtedly consequential draft night move.
12 picks after their most famous Montverde teammate, Cooper Flagg, came off the board at No. 1 overall to the Dallas Mavericks, the New Orleans Pelicans aggressively moved up to grab Queen with the 13th overall selection, giving up No. 23 and next year’s unprotected first-round pick in the process. The Hawks happily slid back to 23 and 10 picks later grabbed Asa Newell, ending the Georgia Bulldog’s unexpected draft-night slide.
Asa Newell finds soft NBA landing in Atlanta
The cherry on top of this unique deal for Georgia fans, is that many also pledge an allegiance to the Atlanta Hawks, who should benefit greatly from this deal, not just from Newell, but from the 2026 first round pick from a team that is relying on Zion Williamson to stay healthy in the loaded Western Conference.
Though they ostensibly play the same position, Queen and Newell could not be more different players, which is why they worked together so effectively on the same floor for Montverde, aside from simply being more talented than every other high school team and plenty of college programs in the country.
Queen is an on-ball creator, operating from the high post and the short-roll as a passer and adding value as a grab-and-go big man in transition. Newell is a high-energy big who leverages his athleticism to impact the game on the boards as a rim-runner. While he’s a capable above-the-break three-point shooter as a trailer, Newell took 72 percent of his field goal attempts either at the rim or in the paint.
Aside from being part of a quirky trade on a historic draft night for Montverde, which is still waiting for Liam McNeely to come off the board on night one, Newell found a nice landing spot in Atlanta with Trae Young, one of the best lob throwers in the NBA, who will find him plenty of easy buckets early in his career.
Newell is the ninth first-round draft pick out of Georgia in program history and the first since Anthony Edwards went No. 1 overall in 2020.