“With the seventh pick in the 2010 NBA Draft, the Detroit Pistons select Greg Monroe from Georgetown University.”
When former Hoya center Greg Monroe heard those words and walked onstage at The Theater at Madison Square Garden to shake NBA Commissioner David Stern’s hand Thursday night, a childhood dream came true. After two years playing under Head Coach John Thompson III, the Louisianan big man will begin his professional career in the Motor City.
Playing for a franchise that reigned as an Eastern Conference power for most of the 2000s, Monroe will join former teammate DaJuan Summers – taken by the Pistons in the second round of the 2009 NBA Draft – in Detroit. Along with Oklahoma City’s Jeff Green (No. 5 overall to Boston in 2007) and Indiana’s Roy Hibbert (No. 17 overall to Toronto in 2008), Monroe is one of three Hoyas in the last four years to be drafted in the top 20.
Leading up to the draft, pundits projected Monroe to go anywhere from No. 5 to No. 10, and once Golden State passed on him in favor of Baylor’s Ekpe Udoh with the sixth pick, the frontcourt-challenged Pistons were happy to scoop up a player who should start from Day One.
Monroe, who will play the four in Detroit, enters the NBA as a Georgetown big man, but he is cut from a different cloth than former All-Stars Patrick Ewing, Dikembe Mutombo and Alonzo Mourning. In a draft headlined by Kentucky freshman point guard John Wall, many believe that Monroe is the best passer in the 2010 crop. Unlike his predecessors, he is not a big-time shot blocker and has the ability to put the ball on the floor from the high post and get to the rim.
As a senior at Helen Cox in New Orleans, Monroe made his official visit to the Hilltop in October 2007 at Midnight Madness. Thompson was able to gain a commitment from the prized center, who was tabbed as the best in the Class of 2008 at various points throughout the recruiting process. While some questioned his desire to take over a game and his physical strength, Monroe played his way to Big East Rookie of the Year honors with averages of 12.7 points, 6.5 rebounds, 1.5 blocks and 2.5 assists.
Had he decided to bolt for the NBA after just one year at Georgetown, he might have been a top 5 pick. Instead, Monroe decided he needed to get better – a goal he accomplished. Watching him play and looking at his numbers, the 6-foot-10 Monroe showed marked improvement. He turned in averages of 16.1 points, 9.8 rebounds and 3.8 assists, although his field goal percentage was down from just over 57 percent to 52.5 percent (he took 135 more shots in 2009-2010, including 21 more threes).
In the heat of the moment after the third-seeded Hoyas were embarrassed by No. 14 Ohio in the first round of the NCAA Tournament, Monroe expressed his intention to return to Georgetown – a sentiment Thompson prophetically downplayed at the time. Three months after that defeat, with his former head coach watching from the audience at MSG, the 20-year-old Monroe became a Detroit Piston.