Like the first digit of his jersey number, Kentucky freshman point guard John Wall is the top player entering the NBA Draft.

Can five players from one school all wind up being lottery picks in the same year?

John Wall, DeMarcus Cousins, Patrick Patterson, Daniel Orton and Eric Bledsoe sure think so.

They each left the University of Kentucky this year for the NBA Draft, which is next month.

All five are NBA talents and many experts say all five will go in the first round.

The question I have is will Wall, Cousins, Patterson, Orton and Bledsoe be lottery picks. A lottery pick is someone taken in the first 14 picks of the draft.

We all know the 6-foot-4 Wall, who is blessed with tremendous talent, will be the first overall pick. Unless he gets hurt or the Washington Wizards know something the rest of us don’t, they will take Wall with the first overall pick.

Unless you got Kobe Bryant, point guard play is paramount in the NBA. Just see how Rajon Rondo has made Boston a legit title contender.

Didn’t Rondo go to UK too?

So let’s assume the Wizards draft Wall, where would the other four guys fit in the remaining 13 picks in the draft. Let’s take a look.

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A few years ago, Mike Gansey led West Virginia to the Eilte Eight of the 2005 NCAA Tournament.

“Marshall? Oh man.”

That’s what Mike Gansey said after spotting the Marshall University skull cap I was wearing Tuesday. It was all good.

See, Gansey, who just joined the Erie BayHawks last week, was a star player at West Virginia and years before that, I was a sports editor at Marshall University.

Marshall and WVU are state rivals.

We both laughed about it and although I was planning to talk with new BayHawk about his first season in the D-League, I decided to interview him about WVU and what’s going on with his former coach at WVU, Michigan head coach John Beilein.

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Newly acquired guard Mike Gansey made his Erie debut in today’s game against Reno in the D-League Showcase. Last week, the BayHawks traded their 1st-round pick – Donell Taylor – to get the former WVU star.

Gansey started the game and finished with 15 points on a shaky 5-of-17 shooting from the field in the 92-88 overtime win for the BayHawks.

Now let’s look a little further into his performance. I watched the game on NBA TV and this is what I noticed.

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Paul Harris, who shared the backcourt with NBA first-round pick Jonny Flynn at Syracuse last season, is in the D-League draft pool.

The D-League announced Wednesday the list of available players for Thursday’s D-League Draft, which can be seen live on NBA TV beginning at 7 p.m.

With eight rounds and 16 teams, a total of 128 players will get drafted. There are 200 players in the draft pool.

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