Tyrese Rice

Rice is an agile point guard who loves to drive to the basket and to create plays for himself and his teammates. He is an excellent shooter and passer who excels at the fast break and who plays with a lot of positive energy. He is perfectly suited to the thrilling style of play fans like to see at Nokia Arena.

Rice, who was born in Richmond, Virginia, played for four years at Boston College before moving on to Europe, where he has played for the last four years. He was a star at BC from 2005-2009, scoring 2,099 points and earning the fifth place spot on the college's list of all-time greatest scorers.

Rice finished his junior year with an average of 21 points, with his career-high game coming against the University of North Carolina, where he scored 46 points. In his senior year, Rice averaged 16.9 points, 5.3 assists, and 3.8 rebounds per game. In 2008 he was named to the All-ACC first team (the conference includes such perennial powerhouses as Duke and UNC).

In 2009 Rice made his way to Europe, where he signed with Greek team Panionios and averaged 12.1 points per game. The following year he played in Germany for the Artland Dragons, where he averaged 17.2 points and 5.1 assists. In 2011-12 he joined Lithuanian team Rytas Vilna, enjoying a successful season in the Eurocup and leading his team to the semifinals while earning averages of 11.1 points and 4.7 assists per game.

Last season, Rice joined Yotam Halperin in the backcourt of Bayern Munich of Germany. In 40 games (regular season and playoffs) Rice posted averages of 15.8 points and 4.4 assists in the German League, with 88.2% free throw shooting and 35% shooting from downtown. Bayern swept Alba Berlin 3-0 in the quarterfinals, but lost to Bamberg, who ended up winning the championship, 3-2 in the semifinals.