Advertisement
basketball Edit

Nick Smith Jr. returns to practice for Arkansas

NOT A SUBSCRIBER? SIGN UP TODAY FOR ACCESS TO ALL OF HAWGBEAT'S PREMIUM CONTENT AND FEATURES

Advertisement

Arkansas star freshman Nick Smith Jr. has returned to practice and is hopeful to play in the near future, head coach Eric Musselman said Wednesday.

"Nick, he has practiced the last few days with us," Musselman said. "Obviously he did not go on the road trip (to Kentucky) so he could continue to stay back here and work on his conditioning. We're optimistic and hopeful that Nick will be able to play sometime here in the near future."

Right knee management has limited the five-star freshman for a majority of the season, and he's only appeared in five games, four of which came in the month of December.

After exiting in the second half of the Dec. 17 game against Bradley in North Little Rock, Smith hasn't seen the court since. Musselman said on Jan. 5 that the team was anticipating Smith to miss the rest of January and he was seeing a specialist in Los Angeles at that point.

Smith has been bothered by the knee injury ever since the end of the team's European tour over the summer. He missed the first six games of the season to rehab the knee before he made his season debut on Nov. 28 against Troy, who he played just five minutes against.

During the three-game stretch where Smith was not limited, he looked every bit the part of his five-star McDonald's All-American status. The 6-foot-5-inch guard averaged 19.7 points, 2.3 rebounds and three assists per contest. He scored a season-high 22 points and played 39 minutes in a win over UNC Greensboro on Dec. 6.

ESPN's latest NBA mock draft has Smith projected to go No. 6 overall to the Oklahoma City Thunder.

**JOIN THE CONVERSATION WITH ARKANSAS FANS ON THE TROUGH, HAWGBEAT'S PREMIUM MESSAGE BOARD**

Advertisement