page_title: 2009 NBA draft
section_title: Draft
hierarchical_section_title: 2009 NBA draft / Draft
caption_attribution_description: English: Tyreke Evans of the Sacramento Kings
context_page_description: The 2009 NBA draft was held on June 25, 2009, at the WaMu Theatre at Madison Square Garden in New York City. In this draft, the National Basketball Association teams took turns selecting amateur U.S. college basketball players and other eligible players, including international players.
  The Los Angeles Clippers, who won the draft lottery on May 19, 2009, used their first overall draft pick to draft Blake Griffin from University of Oklahoma. However, he missed the entire 2009–10 season due to surgery on his broken left kneecap, which he injured during the pre-season. Tanzanian-born Hasheem Thabeet from University of Connecticut was drafted second by the Memphis Grizzlies. Thabeet became the first player born in Tanzania to be drafted by an NBA team. James Harden was drafted 3rd by the Oklahoma City Thunder. This made him the first player to be drafted by the franchise as the Oklahoma City Thunder; the franchise moved from Seattle to OKC in 2008.
context_section_description: Nationality indicates the player's national team or representative nationality. If a player has not competed at the international level, then the nationality indicates the national team which the player is eligible to represent according to FIBA rules.
   a: Nick Calathes was born in the United States, and has dual U.S. and Greek citizenship by birth. He has represented Greece internationally.
   b: Goran Suton, who was born in Bosnia and Herzegovina, is also a naturalized citizen of the United States since 2006.
   c: Emir Preldžič, who was born in Bosnia and Herzegovina, also has Slovenian and Turkish citizenship. He had represented Slovenia internationally in 2008, before switching to Turkey.
   d: Chinemelu Elonu was born in Nigeria, is also a naturalized citizen of the United States.
caption: Tyreke Evans was selected fourth by the Sacramento Kings.
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