Former Ohio State guard Bruce Thornton is officially off to the NBA after four years with the Buckeyes and he has already gotten out to a strong start in the summer league with the Houston Rockets.
In Thornton’s first appearance with the Rockets, he helped lead his team to a 97-86 win over the Denver Nuggets summer league team with a game-high 27 points. He put up that number on 7-of-18-shooting, which included 3 of 8 from three-point range and a perfect 7 of 7 from the free throw line.
“I can compete, I can hoop,” Thornton told ESPN after the game. “Even though I’m undersized, I give it everything I’ve got.”
Thornton followed that performance up with 17 points against the Toronto Raptors on 6-of-17 shooting and 3 of 6 from beyond the arc. In the game, he also had six rebounds, six assists and five steals.
That added onto three steals in his first solid performance against the Nuggets, giving him eight total in just two summer league games.
Before Thornton was selected with the No. 31 overall pick in the NBA draft, he was projected as a late second-round pick, so the Rockets took him earlier than expected.
The Rockets are getting some good early returns from the former all-time leading Buckeye scorer, and hope that he can translate this early success into the regular season with Houston.
