The Texas Tech Red Raiders haven’t had many first round draft picks in program history, but Christian Anderson recently became the most recent.
After two great years of helping elevate the Texas Tech men’s basketball program with Grant McCasland, Anderson is now leaving Lubbock and officially heading to the Charlotte Hornets after getting picked in the first round of the NBA Draft.
The Hornets ended up getting Anderson with the No. 18 pick of the 2026 draft, which is a really solid spot for the now former Red Raider to land. And of course, so much of that is because of what Anderson accomplished during the 2025-2026 Texas Tech basketball season.
A central figure for MCCasland and the Red Raiders during this past season, Anderson managed to provide a dynamic scoring threat while being on the court at the same time that he enabled others to thrive as well.
Charlotte Hornets pick up Christian Anderson in the first round of the 2026 NBA Draft
Texas Tech was able to get 18.5 points per game from Anderson, which was huge as the Red Raiders had to navigate a late-season injury to JT Toppin, who had previously been leading the team in points per game.
Beyond that, Anderson also added in 7.4 assists per game, placing him among the best in the Big 12 and also the country, while dishing out a total of 244 assists (which is a lot of assists).
Prior to Anderson being drafted in the first round, just three other Red Raiders had earned that sort of selection. Tony Battie was the first Texas Tech men’s basketball player to get picked up in the first round when the Denver Nuggets chose him at No. 5 overall in 1997.
After Battie was Zhaire Smith, who was selected by the Phoenix Suns with the No. 16 overall pick in 2018. In 2019, the Suns came calling for a Texas Tech player again as they chose Jarrett Culver with the No. 6 overall pick.
Add us as a preferred source on Google