{"id":19094,"date":"2023-06-01T19:19:55","date_gmt":"2023-06-01T19:19:55","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.nbanewsinsider.com\/?p=19094"},"modified":"2023-06-01T19:19:55","modified_gmt":"2023-06-01T19:19:55","slug":"the-mack-is-back-riders-return-kimbal-mackenzie","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.nbanewsinsider.com\/the-mack-is-back-riders-return-kimbal-mackenzie\/","title":{"rendered":"The Mack is back! Riders return Kimbal Mackenzie"},"content":{"rendered":"<p> <br \/>\n<\/p>\n<div>\n<p><strong>The Mack is back! The Leicester<br \/>\nRiders have announced their first acquisition of the summer as they\u2019ve secured<br \/>\nreturn of point guard Kimbal Mackenzie for the 2023\/24 season. <\/strong><\/p>\n<p>Mackenzie, who has signed a<br \/>\none-year deal, is entering his third consecutive campaign with the Riders and capped<br \/>\noff a great campaign last time out with averages of 12.7 points and 3.8 assists<br \/>\nto earn a spot on the Molten British Team of the Year.<\/p>\n<p>Reflecting on the return of<br \/>\nMackenzie, Riders Head Coach Rob Paternostro said:<\/p>\n<p>\u201cKimbal has been excellent<br \/>\nfor us and we are thrilled to have him back at the club. We have enjoyed<br \/>\nworking with him these past two seasons, he is a player who comes ready to play<br \/>\nevery day.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cHe is a versatile guard who<br \/>\ncan be effective in many different spots on the floor and has shown the ability<br \/>\nto make winning plays in important moments of the game. <\/p>\n<p>\u201cHis ability to fill<br \/>\ndifferent roles last seasons was very impressive.\u201d <\/p>\n<p>Mackenzie\u2019s form in the<br \/>\n2022\/23 campaign for Leicester certainly turned heads, with numerous<br \/>\ngame-winning performances for the former Champions \u2013 his 31-point explosion<br \/>\nagainst the Cheshire Phoenix in February proving a particular highlight. <\/p>\n<p>\u201cMy family and I are thrilled<br \/>\nto be returning to Leicester for my third season.\u201d Mackenzie said.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cSince day one, Leicester has<br \/>\nfelt like home, and in the business of being a professional athlete, it can be<br \/>\nrare to be with the same team for multiple years, so I\u2019m thankful for that. <\/p>\n<p>\u201cIn deciding to come back,<br \/>\nit\u2019s the culture that Coach Rob has built for years that played a big part. Rob<br \/>\nis a players\u2019 coach, and the ultimate competitor, someone who I love going to<br \/>\nbattle with. I look forward to playing with a great group of guys, and to<br \/>\nwinning a lot of basketball games!\u201d <\/p>\n<p>Mackenzie\u2019s form earned him<br \/>\nhis first call-up to the Great Britain Senior squad, making his debut in a FIBA<br \/>\nWorld Cup Qualifier against Serbia in Belgrade. <\/p>\n<p>Head to our YouTube channel<br \/>\nto relive some of Kimbal\u2019s greatest performances for the Riders last yseason!<\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<p><script>\n!function(f,b,e,v,n,t,s)\n{if(f.fbq)return;n=f.fbq=function(){n.callMethod?\nn.callMethod.apply(n,arguments):n.queue.push(arguments)};\nif(!f._fbq)f._fbq=n;n.push=n;n.loaded=!0;n.version='2.0';\nn.queue=[];t=b.createElement(e);t.async=!0;\nt.src=v;s=b.getElementsByTagName(e)[0];\ns.parentNode.insertBefore(t,s)}(window,document,'script',\n'https:\/\/connect.facebook.net\/en_US\/fbevents.js');<\/p>\n<p>fbq('init', '1011873635634879'); \nfbq('track', 'PageView');\n<\/script><br \/>\n<br \/><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The Mack is back! The Leicester Riders have announced their first acquisition of the summer as they\u2019ve secured return of point guard Kimbal Mackenzie for the 2023\/24 season. Mackenzie, who has signed a one-year deal, is entering his third consecutive campaign with the Riders and capped off a great campaign last time out with averages<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":19095,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[175],"tags":[4213,3989,198,479],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.nbanewsinsider.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/19094"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.nbanewsinsider.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.nbanewsinsider.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nbanewsinsider.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nbanewsinsider.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=19094"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.nbanewsinsider.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/19094\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":19096,"href":"https:\/\/www.nbanewsinsider.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/19094\/revisions\/19096"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nbanewsinsider.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/19095"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.nbanewsinsider.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=19094"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nbanewsinsider.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=19094"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nbanewsinsider.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=19094"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}