Craig Bradshaw

This article is about a New Zealand professional basketball player. For the former professional American football player, see Craig Bradshaw (American football).

Craig Bradshaw (born 28 July 1983 in Lower Hutt) is a New Zealand professional basketball player who last played with the NZL NBL team Otago Nuggets.

Craig grew up in Stokes Valley and was a promising Rugby union player, he was noticed for his basketball talent at St. Bernard's College in Lower Hutt and spent his last two years of high school at Wellington High School,^[1] where he focused solely on Basketball.

NCAA

Bradshaw completed a mediocre college career at Winthrop University in South Carolina, where he helped the Eagles to their third consecutive Big South Conference championship and a second round appearance at the NCAA national championships.

Bradshaw averaged 12.8 ppg, 6.0 rpg and .02 bpg.

Play

Bradshaw has been noted for his shooting range for a big man. He is a natural Power Forward but is capable of playing Center as he has done for New Zealand in recent times. Standing 6'9.5", he may have the physical potential to become an average post player. However, Bradshaw has failed to develop his skills beyond the mid major college basketball level. Sub par coordination and fear of contact has marred his style of play. At 27 years of age, skill development has most likely halted.

Tall Blacks

Bradshaw debuted for the Tall Blacks during their 2004 Olympics campaign and has stepped his game up a level since the retirements of veteran “bigs” Sean Marks and Ed Book.

He was named MVP of last year’s^[when?] series win over Australia after scoring 25 points in the Tall Blacks’ first ever road win over the Boomers in Melbourne.

Craig Bradshaw has become a secondary role player for the New Zealand Tall Blacks national team. He played in the 2004 Olympics as well as the 2006 FIBA World Championships.

Bradshaw also played in the 2010 FIBA World Championship in Turkey.

NBA Draft

Bradshaw went undrafted in the 2007 NBA Draft. Bradshaw then played the NBA summer league with the Atlanta Hawks, but unfortunately didn't make any NBA roster.

Career

Bradshaw joined the NBL for the 2007/08 season playing for the Brisbane Bullets. He was averaging 12.4 ppg. He then negotiated a deal with Basketball New Zealand and the Brisbane Bullets for his off season release so that he could play in the Turkish Basketball League for the European season but return to Australia to play the NBL. He has since become a centrepiece in the Efes Pilsen S.K. offense. In 2009, he became a starting player for the Korean Basketball League (KBL) side LG Sakers out of Changwon, South Korea. On 23 December 2010 Bradshaw officially signed to play with the Otago Nuggets of the New Zealand NBL in the 2011 season. After a stand-out season, he later confirmed that he would be transfering to the Southland Sharks for 2012.

References

1. ^ "Prospect profile - Craig Bradshaw". NBA. http://www.nba.com/draft2007/profiles/CraigBradshaw.html. Retrieved 7 January 2010. 

Persondata
Name	Bradshaw, Craig
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Date of birth	28 July 1983
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