Cardinals great James signs with Suns
Published 9:51 pm Monday, July 3, 2017
Former Lamar all-conference performer and NCAA tournament participant Mike James signed a contract with the Phoenix Suns on Monday, the team announced.
James (6-foot-1, 190 pounds) spent the past five seasons in the Greek Basketball League with Panathinaikos. He averaged 13.1 points, 3 assists and 0.9 steal in 25 Euroleague games this past season, according to the Suns, and helped Panathinaikos win the Greek league and Greek Cup.
He’s spent the early part of this summer with Phoenix in the NBA Summer League, as he did in 2015, when Phoenix finished as runner-up. He had clips of 12.6 points, 4.3 rebounds and 3.9 assists per game then, including a 32-point outing in the championship game against San Antonio. That was the highest-scoring game by any player that summer.
James, a Portland, Ore., native who transferred to Lamar from Eastern Arizona College, was a first-team All-Southland Conference performer who led the Cardinals to their most recent NCAA appearance in the 2011-12 season under coach Pat Knight via the Southland tournament title. The season before, he scored 52 points against Louisiana College to set a still-standing LU record.
— I.C. Murrell
About I.C. Murrell
I.C. Murrell was promoted to editor of The News, effective Oct. 14, 2019. He previously served as sports editor since August 2015 and has won or shared eight first-place awards from state newspaper associations and corporations. He was born in Memphis, Tennessee, grew up mostly in Pine Bluff, Arkansas, and graduated from the University of Arkansas at Monticello.
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