Will Magnay and Jack McVeigh earn Olympic selection for Paris
The fate of two Tasmania JackJumpers stars has been decided ahead of the Paris Olympics with some shock selection decisions made.
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Tasmanian JackJumpers duo Jack McVeigh and Will Magnay are on their way to the Paris Olympics.
The NBL championship winning duo’s positions were confirmed with the Boomers set to produce some major selection shocks, with Olympic bronze medallists Chris Goulding, Matisse Thybulle and defensive beast Xavier Cooks all cut.
NBA wing Thybulle and NBL stars Goulding, Cooks, Jack White and Dejan Vasiljevic have been left out of the Boomers team for Paris.
Portland Trailblazer Thybulle, 27, is a surprise omission, given the athletic defensive guard-forward has elite tools and was a member of the Boomers’ bronze-medal winning Tokyo Olympic team.
The move to leave Cooks out of the squad is intriguing, given the versatile big man just signed the biggest contract in NBL history to play under Goorjian at the Sydney Kings for the next three years — a marker of the brutal reality of Olympic selection.
One of Australia’s greatest marksmen, Goulding, 35, appeared to book his ticket to Paris with eight treys in the two games against China. But selectors opted to look elsewhere.
White, who will play for Melbourne United this season after two years in the US, and sharpshooting Adelaide 36ers guard Dejan Vasiljevic were told before Thursday night’s game they would not get any game time but did not find out they wouldn’t be on the plane until later that evening.
The squad will be officially announced on Sunday, but multiple sources confirmed to this masthead legends Patty Mills and Joe Ingles will join Andrew Gaze as the only Aussie hoopers to compete at five Olympiads, while Tasmania JackJumpers Will Magnay and Jack White franked their NBL championship with maiden Olympic berths.
BOOMERS 12-MAN SQUAD
Josh Giddey
Matthew Dellavedova
Patty Mills
Dyson Daniels
Josh Green
Dante Exum
Jack McVeigh
Nick Kay
Joe Ingles
Jock Landale
Duop Reath
Will Magnay
MISSED: Matisse Thybulle, Chris Goulding, Xavier Cooks, Jack White, Dejan Vasiljevic
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