LOUISVILLE, Ky. (WDRB) -- University of Louisville basketball fans watched Chucky Hepburn silence the most creative offensive players in the Atlantic Coast Conference.
Hepburn has the ACC Defensive Player of the Year award to prove it. He controlled games on both ends of the court and grew into an immense crowd favorite.
Terrence Edwards Jr. overtook Hepburn to finish the season as the Cards' leading scorer at 16.7 points per game, 0.3 more than his teammate. He finished the season by scoring at least 21 points in six of Louisville's final seven games, including a 35-point night against California when he made seven of 11 shots from distance.
Edwards looked like a guy that even Hepburn would struggle to defend, especially with his 4-inch height advantage and ability to back smaller defenders into the lane.
So who would win a Hepburn vs. Edwards battle? There is a chance we will find out Thursday night.
Hepburn and Edwards are listed among the 64 participants at the 71st annual Portsmouth (Virginia) Invitational, an invitation-only event for players determined to prove they should be taken with one of the late picks in the NBA Draft or at least earn a free agent contract.
Hepburn is one of eight players for the Portsmouth Sports Club. One teammate is former Kentucky forward Andrew Carr.
Edwards has one of the eight spots for Roger Brown's Restaurant. His teammates include Vanderbilt point guard A.J. Hoggard and Julian Reese of Maryland.
Maybe there will be some possessions when Edwards and Hepburn go sneaker-to-sneaker, even with Hepburn at point guard and Edwards on the wing.
The game is booked for 7 p.m. at Churchland High School in Portsmouth. The event website has a streaming link here. The four-day event concludes Sunday with the championship game booked for 7 p.m.
The tournament opened with two games Wednesday. Former Indiana center Omar Ballo had 16 points and nine rebounds in his debut.
Ballo, Carr, Hepburn and Edwards are the only four players with local ties. There are plenty of prominent former college players participating, including Sean Padulla of Ole Miss, J'Wan Roberts of national runner-up Houston, Johnell Davis of Arkansas, Ace Baldwin of Penn State, Tamar Bates of Missouri (who transferred from IU), Samson Johnson of UConn, Wade Taylor IV of Texas A&M and Nolan Hickman of Gonzaga.
Going to Portsmouth is the long and grinding route to the NBA. Most of these players are not listed among the top 100 candidates for the 2025 NBA Draft by Sam Vecenie at The Athletic. Hepburn, Edwards, Carr and Ballo were not on Vecenie's latest top 100 he shared Feb. 27.
They have a dreaded word attached to their names: senior. But teams are limited to eight players, so everybody gets ample playing time in front of the flock of NBA and foreign basketball scouts who attend.
The NBA likes its prospects young, after one or no more than two seasons of college basketball. Most of the players competing in Portsmouth will land in the G-League or overseas. Some will draw invitations to the NBA Summer League and training camps.
There are exceptions. Current NBA standouts Jimmy Butler of the Warriors, Dorian Finney-Smith of the Lakers and Pat Connaughton of the Bucks made a detour into Portsmouth.
Most of the tournament's biggest success stories are considerably older and retired: John Stockton of the Utah Jazz, Dennis Rodman of Pistons' and Bulls' fame, and Tim Hardaway of the Warriors and Heat.
If you really want to jump into the time machine, former NBA all-stars John Lucas (1976) and Hall of Famer Rick Barry (1965) played in Portsmouth. But those guys played in an era when competing on college basketball for four seasons was not a flashing red light.
This weekend, Hepburn and Edwards will begin the journey of proving they can take the Portsmouth Route to the NBA — and maybe go head-to-head on the basketball court.
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