Originally, the Lakers were at risk of losing their own first round pick this year to the Philadelphia 76ers due to the stipulations of a previous trade involving Steve Nash and the Phoenix Suns and having less than 50% odds of keeping the pick despite having the third-worst record that season. However, they not only kept the pick, but also moved up a spot in the process. The Lakers will ultimately lose their first round pick for the 2018 NBA draft, regardless of whether it goes to the 76ers or the Boston Celtics later on, but they will at least keep their first round pick for the 2019 NBA draft as opposed to giving it to the Orlando Magic as a result of their Dwight Howard trade around the same period. Their original second first round pick at #28, however, came from the Houston Rockets as an incentive to trade away Lou Williams in exchange for Corey Brewer. On June 20, two days before the draft began, the Lakers would acquire a new first round pick by getting the worst of the Brooklyn Nets' first round picks at #27 alongside their star center Brook Lopez in a trade in exchange for star combo guardD'Angelo Russell and Russian center Timofey Mozgov. On draft night, though, the Lakers acquired two more picks in the draft by trading their weakest first round pick to the Utah Jazz for Picks #30 & 42 in this year's draft. With the 2nd pick of the draft, the Lakers selected their hometown star Lonzo Ball, who played point guard during his sole season at UCLA. During that time there, Lonzo averaged a league-leading 7.6 assists to go with 14.6 points, 6.0 rebounds, 1.8 steals, and 0.8 blocks per game in 36 total games there. He also earned the Wayman Tisdale Award, the Pac-12 Freshman of The Year Award, First Team All-Pac-12 Honors, and consensus First-Team All-American Honors in the process. Next up, with the pick they acquired from the Brooklyn Nets, the Lakers took power forward Kyle Kuzma from the University of Utah. In Kuzma's final year at Utah, he joined Ball in being a member of the All-Pac-12 First Team by averaging 16.4 points, 9.3 rebounds, and 2.4 assists as a junior. With their last pick in the first round of the draft, the Lakers selected senior shooting guard Josh Hart from Villanova University. Throughout his time there, Hart averaged 13.1 points, 5.5 rebounds, and 1.8 assists per game at Villanova while earning plenty of awards in each of his last three seasons there. The Lakers ended their draft night by taking sophomore power forward/center Thomas Bryant from Indiana University. In his time at Indiana, Bryant averaged 12.2 points, 6.2 rebounds, 1.2 blocks, and nearly an assist per game throughout his college career. He made the Big 10 Conference's Freshman Team and the All-Big 10 Third Team Honors in his first season there.
