Justin Edwards kicks off the Summer League with a solid outing

Dust hasn’t yet collected on Shai Gilgeous-Alexander and Cason Wallace’s NBA Championship trophy, but American professional basketball is back in action. The NBA Summer League kicked off on Saturday, and former Wildcat Justin Edwards picked up right where he left off at the end of the regular season.

To help clarify the NBA’s unnecessarily confusing July schedule, Edwards and the Philadelphia 76ers are participating in the Salt Lake City Summer League, not to be mixed up with the California Classic going on at the same time. Only a handful of teams play in these appetizer games before the main course Summer League in Las Vegas, where every team plays, which begins July 10.

The Sixers fell to the Utah Jazz on the University of Utah’s court Saturday, 93-89. But final scores are always the least interesting part of a Summer League box score. Justin Edwards finished with 13 points on the night, including a deep 3 to get into the scoring column. He also had three rebounds, an assist, and a steal.

J3dwards gets on the board. 👌 pic.twitter.com/Scq4BZMFtQ

— Philadelphia 76ers (@sixers) July 6, 2025

Edwards just signed a three-year deal with Philly after averaging 10.1 points in 26 minutes per game. Injuries to the Sixers’ regular starters thrust Edwards into a prominent role for the team last year, where he had a surprisingly strong rookie season after going undrafted. One game into the Summer League contests and the former ‘Cat is already bettering his average from last season, so we could expect to see some big things from Edwards during his sophomore campaign.

He’ll have to compete with VJ Edgecomb, the third overall pick out of Baylor, who Kentucky flirted with during Pope’s initial roster building. Edgecomb had 28 points and 10 rebounds in his debut, showing signs he could be a future star.

We will see other Kentucky players in Las Vegas

The only other former Kentucky player on a team participating in these early Summer League contests is Adou Thiero for the Los Angeles Lakers. Unfortunately, the team is holding out Thiero all Summer as he continues to recover from a knee injury.

KSR will have a full BBNBA Summer League preview once every team gets around to releasing their official rosters, something a handful of organizations aren’t exactly showing urgency to do. However, we can expect Las Vegas to showcase all five Kentucky rookies, plus a few more familiar faces from the past.

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