|
Patrick Sammy "Patty" Mills (born 11 August 1988) is an Australian professional basketball player who currently plays for the San Antonio Spurs of the National Basketball Association (NBA). Mills is the second Indigenous Australian to play in the NBA (after Nathan Jawai) and the first person of Torres Strait Islander descent. Mills was drafted by the Portland Trail Blazers with the 55th overall pick in the 2009 NBA draft after playing college basketball for Saint Mary's College of California. He also played for the Melbourne Tigers of the National Basketball League and the Xinjiang Flying Tigers of the Chinese Basketball Association during the NBA lockout. He signed with the San Antonio Spurs in 2012 and won an NBA championship with them in 2014. He plays the point guard position. Mills led the 2012 Olympics in scoring when he averaged with 21.2 points per game with the Australian national basketball team, the Boomers.〔(Australia's Patty Mills tops Olympic basketball point-scoring averages )〕 ==Early life and career== Mills' father is a Torres Strait Islander from Thursday Island and his mother is an Indigenous Australian from the Ynunga people of South Australia. He was first exposed to basketball as a four-year-old with ''The Shadows'', an Indigenous Australian team that his parents established. Mills attended Marist College Canberra, where he played a variety of sports in addition to basketball, such as Australian football and athletics, and served as ball boy for the Canberra Cannons of the NBL. During that time, his family developed a close relationship with Cannons' player David Patrick, who would eventually play a key role in Mills' career.〔 (free registration required)〕 As well as playing basketball, Mills also played underage Australian rules football at a high level. He represented the Australian Capital Territory at the 2004 Under-16 National Championships, and, after being named the tournament's best and fairest player, was pursued by recruiters from the Sydney Swans, an Australian Football League team.〔(NBA hero could have been AFL star )〕〔(Mills nearly a Swan )〕 At the age of 15, Mills was selected for the ACT's under-18 basketball squad to compete in the Australian National Championships. The following year, Mills accepted a full-time basketball scholarship with the Australian Institute of Sport. He replaced a player who had dropped out of the program, Scott Pendlebury, who had dropped out to (successfully) pursue an AFL career.〔 He also made a strong impression at the 2005 Australian Olympic Youth Festival, an event considered to be a showcase for future elite sporting talents.〔 In January 2006, he received the RE Staunton Medal as top player in the Australia under-20 national championships. In April that year, he received more international attention when he was named to the World team of under-20 players that played a US team of the same age group at the Nike Hoop Summit in Memphis, Tennessee. Mills led the World squad with 6 assists and also added 8 points in a losing effort.〔 〕 He was one of 22 players invited to try out for the Australia squad for the 2006 FIBA World Championship, becoming the youngest player ever to participate in a Boomers training camp. While he was in training with the Boomers in July, he was named by Basketball Australia as the Junior Male Player of the Year.〔 Mills also had an outstanding 2006 season with the AIS men's team in the South East Australian Basketball League (SEABL), earning him a place on the All-SEABL East men's team and the honour of 2006 SEABL U-21 Australian Youth Player of the Year. He went on to be named the 2006 Basketball Australia Player of the Year, and also received two major awards from Indigenous Australian organisations—The Deadlys Award for Most Promising New Talent in Sport and NAIDOC's National Sportsperson of the Year. 抄文引用元・出典: フリー百科事典『 ウィキペディア(Wikipedia)』 ■ウィキペディアで「Patty Mills」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
|