NBA star turned-coach lands Shaq's son in portal
Shaqir O'Neal, son of Shaq, has found a new home playing for a new head coach and former NBA star after leaving an HBCU and hitting the transfer portal.O'Neal has reportedly committed to play for Sacramento State, which just hired Mike Bibby as its head basketball coach. The former NBA veteran was announced as the school's head coach on March 25. O'Neal hit the transfer portal on March 29.
O'Neal is coming off the best season of his college career at Florida A&M, where he averaged 6.2 points and 3.7 rebounds per game. That included seven double-figure scoring outputs after having just one in his first two seasons. He scored a career-high 26 points against Trinity Baptist and scored 20 against Trinity, as well as a couple of double-figure games against SWAC competition. Shaq showed up in Atlanta to watch his son play in the SWAC Tournament earlier this month.
Listed as 6'7, 201 pounds out of high school, Shaqir O'Neal was a three-star prospect in the Class of 2021 out of Union Grove Senior High School in Georgia and signed with another HBCU, Texas Southern. He redshirted the 2021-2022 season and made his college debut against San Francisco in Nov 2022. He played in 20 games during the 2022-2023 season, averaging 1.4 points per game in just over seven minutes of action per contest. The best game of his Texas Southern career came against North American when he scored 12 points with 7 rebounds and 4 assists in 28 minutes.Shaqir averaged 1.8 points and 1.8 rebounds per game in 20 appearances during the 2023-2024 season at Texas Southern. He played a season-high 23 minutes against Creighton and had his best game against Biblical Studies when he scored nine points and hit two three-pointers for the HBCU squad.Now he will step out of the SWAC/HBCU landscape for the first time under a first time head coach looking to show that he's more than just an NBA name.
The post NBA star turned-coach lands Shaq's son in portal appeared first on HBCU Gameday.
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