Having joined the Milwaukee Bucks on a one-year deal worth the veteran minimum, it is time to get familiarized with veteran forward Torrey Craig.
The dust is finally starting to settle on what has been an eventful free agency for the Milwaukee Bucks, to say the least.
Milwaukee made a slew of moves to deliver on their promise to reshape the roster, bringing in several new faces that fill open positions. One of which was Torrey Craig, the veteran forward the team signed at the veteran minimum, which is worth $1.6 million, for just the 2020-21 season.
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Craig comes to Milwaukee after wrapping up a three-year stint with the Denver Nuggets and most recently reached the Western Conference Finals last season.
Now before Craig suits up for the Bucks next season to help fulfill their quest for a title, fans should familiarize themselves with the 29-year-old’s storied journey to this point in his life.
With that being said, let’s dive into Torrey Craig’s basketball journey to this point and how it has all brought him to the Milwaukee Bucks.
Exploring Torrey Craig’s humble beginnings and collegiate career
Craig’s unique journey starts in South Carolina and long before he even made a name for himself in the professional ranks.
It was where in rural Great Falls where Craig experienced his first taste of success with basketball. With a turbulent childhood marked by the absence of his father, his mother struggling with drugs and getting incarcerated in federal prison and his grandmother, who went on to raise Craig, dying suddenly when he was 13 years old, Craig faced no shortage of adversity as a child.
Throughout all of those hardships, the saving grace for Craig was basketball and as he told Gina Mizell of the Denver Post in May of 2018, Craig vowed to take his dream of playing basketball professionally to the fullest extent:
"“There were guys (in my hometown) that were good at basketball, but they never went anywhere,” Craig said. “They always stayed in the same place. I always told myself, ‘I do not want to be like that.’”"
Sure enough, Craig blossomed into a star at Great Falls High School and it was in his senior season where he was named the Class 1A Player of the Year in South Carolina. That eventually led to him to traveling 90 minutes northwest of Great Falls to attend University of South Carolina Upstate in Spartanburg, a school that at the time competed in the Atlantic Sun Conference (now in the Big South Conference).
Craig’s star continued to ascended playing for the Spartans as he would go on to win the Atlantic Sun Player of the Year award in 2012, was named an honorable mention All-American by the Associated Press and earned three all-Atlantic Sun first team selections.
Little did Craig know that his next stop would set him on the path of reaching the NBA.