CLEVELAND — Cleveland Cavaliers draft pick Maleek Thomas honed his skills in Midland, Pa.

Thomas, a 6-foot-3 freshman guard from Arkansas, was the 34th pick in the NBA draft on Wednesday night.

He played his first three seasons of high school basketball at Lincoln Park Performing Arts Charter School, leading the Leopards to PIAA Class 4A state championships in 2023 and 2024.

He scored 1,750 points in three seasons at Lincoln Park, leaving before his senior season for Overtime Elite, a league for 16-20 years based in Atlanta.

As a Lincoln Park freshman, Thomas scored 16 points during a 96-74 win over East Liverpool in the Midland-Geneva College Tournament in Midland, Pa.

“Their freshman is unreal,” East Liverpool coach Nate Conley said after the game.

Thomas was the second-leading scorer as a freshman at Arkansas, averting 15.6 points, 3.8 rebounds, 2.5 assists and 1.5 steals in 30.5 minutes per game. He also shot 42% from three-point range and 84% from the foul line.

BUCKEYE JOINS KNICKS

NEW YORK (AP) — Some of New York’s biggest basketball heroes were second-round draft picks.

Like Jalen Brunson, the guy marching through Manhattan with the Larry O’Brien Trophy in his arms last week during a joyous championship parade celebration. And Willis Reed, the guy who limped onto the floor before and during the early minutes of Game 7 of the 1970 NBA Finals to lift the Knicks to their first championship.

So when the NBA draft resumed on Wednesday night in Brooklyn with the Knicks on the clock with the No. 31 pick, every team had hope of finding someone who can be a key piece of a title team.

They drafted Ohio State guard Bruce Thornton, but had already agreed to trade the rights to the pick to Houston by the time NBA deputy commissioner Mark Tatum announced the selection.

Thornton was given a Knicks hat when his name was announced. He was wearing a Rockets one by the time he arrived for his interviews and said he was just happy to get to the NBA, even if it was in Texas and not with the new champions.

“Somebody said I got the wrong hat. I’m like, ‘What do you mean?'” Thornton said. “Then I heard it’s the Houston Rockets. I’m like, no state tax, so that’s even better.”

The first round, which began with Washington selecting AJ Dybantsa, finished late Tuesday night.

The end of it and the second round has become a process of wheeling and dealing, with teams like the Knicks, who traded back from the No. 24 spot and eventually out of the first round entirely, sometimes moving multiple times. That was part of the reason teams wanted to stop doing the entire draft in one night and break it into two, given them more time for evaluation.

That makes things hard for players like Duke’s Isaiah Evans, who was in the green room at Barclays Center on Tuesday but wasn’t selected. He didn’t return Wednesday to hear his name called with the No. 33 pick that is owned by Minnesota after a trade with Brooklyn.

It’s not as bad for players who weren’t expecting to be selected on the first night or understood patience, something Meleek Thomas said he learned playing for John Calipari at Arkansas.

“The most important lesson I learned from Coach Cal this year was: Your time is coming. Don’t worry about when. Don’t worry about how,” said Thomas, who was selected by Sacramento and dealt to Cleveland.

In a much different NBA with a different draft format, Reed was the No. 8 pick in the 1964 draft, which made him the first pick of the second round. The Hall of Famer went on to lead the Knicks to championships in 1970 and 1973 and was the NBA Finals MVP both times.

Brunson was the No. 33 pick in the 2018 draft, taken early in the second round by the Dallas Mavericks. The Knicks signed him as a free agent in 2022 and the franchise has been on the rise ever since, culminating with their five-game victory over the San Antonio Spurs earlier this month when Brunson was MVP of the series.

Among the other well-known names taken early in the second round Wednesday were Richie Saunders, Dybantsa’s BYU teammate who was taken at No. 32 by Memphis; and Purdue’s Braden Smith, the NCAA’s career assists leader, who was taken at No. 38 with a pick belonging to Indiana.