McEachern grad Cooper taken by hometown Hawks

Jul. 30—As Thursday approached, many organizations and mock drafts had Sharife Cooper as the biggest sleeper in the NBA draft.

The Atlanta Hawks are banking on that being the case.

After being projected by many outlets to be taken somewhere between the 19th and 25th pick of the first round, the former McEachern High School and Auburn standout dropped into the latter half of the second round. That allowed Atlanta to grab Cooper with the 48th overall pick to be a playmaking backup for All-Star point guard Trae Young.

Young quickly posted his enthusiasm for the selection on Twitter.

"STAYING HOME !! Welcome To The Gang!! @SharifeCooper Let's get it," Young tweeted.

Hawks general manager Travis Schlenk said the team did not expect Cooper to be available at No. 48.

"We had (Sharife) ranked much higher than 48. We got pretty excited when we saw him there late," Schlenk said in a release Thursday night. "A really, really good playmaker. He's good with the ball in his hands, a very good passer. He pushes tempo and has the ability to get to the foul line. We're excited to add him to our program as well."

Cooper played only 12 games in his freshman season at Auburn as the NCAA reviewed his eligibility, but averaging 20.2 points and 8.1 assists per game in the short collegiate stint helped him to build a pedigree for the future.

At 6-foot-1, 180 pounds, he may have been undersized, but ESPN analyst Jay Bilas said he was surprised Cooper lasted to the second round. Two days earlier, Bilas said Cooper could be one of the steals of the draft.

"Sharife Cooper, as you saw, is sort of a self-made player — really a talented handler, passer, scorer," Bilas said in a pre-draft release. "He's small, though, and he's not a great shooter, but he's a scorer, not a shooter. I think as he refines his shot, he's got a good floater and all that, he can get into the lane and find people. He just has the ball on a string, a total wizard with the basketball."

Cooper became the fourth Cobb County product since 2016 to be selected in the NBA draft. Former Wheeler star Jaylen Brown was the third overall pick of the Boston Celtics in the 2016 draft, and former Pebblebrook star Collin Sexton was taken by the Cleveland Cavaliers with the No. 8 pick of the 2018 draft. Cooper's former McEachern teammate, Isaac Okoro, who also went to Auburn, was the fifth overall pick by Cleveland last year.

"Happy for my guy. Atlanta gotta dog for sure," tweeted Okoro, who will face off against his teammate as many as four times next season as Eastern Conference rivals.

Cooper is the second player with McEachern ties to be selected by the Hawks. Josh Smith, who played his junior season with the Indians before transferring to Oak Hill Academy in Virginia, was selected with the 17th pick of the 2004 draft and went on to play nine of his 13 NBA seasons in Atlanta.

Cooper is also the second draft selection in his family after his older sister, Te'a, was a second-round pick of the Phoenix Mercury in the 2020 WNBA draft. She currently plays with the Los Angeles Sparks.

In his time at McEachern, Sharife Cooper led the team to the state championship as a junior with a 32-0 record, and then was named to the McDonald's All-American team after his senior season.

The success led Cooper to a five-star rating and a ranking as the fifth-best point guard in the 2020 recruiting class.