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The draft was reduced from three rounds in the previous year to the two-round format that is still in use to the present day. As a result, NBA drafts from this season until 1995 produced the lowest number of total draft picks selected at 54 overall selections.
This was the first draft for the Minnesota Timberwolves and Orlando Magic, prior to their inaugural season. This was also the first draft televised prime time on U.S. national television.
For the seventh year in a row and the eleventh time in twelve years, no college underclassman would withdraw their entry into the NBA draft. Not only that, but this would be the fourth year in a row where a player that qualified for the status of a "college underclassman" would be playing professional basketball overseas, with the French-born Rudy Bourgarel playing for the Boulogne-Levallois in France after leaving Marist College. In addition to that, this would also be the first year where an international player would be considered a direct underclassman to participate in an NBA draft, with Vlade Divac from the KK Partizan Belgrade of the Eastern Bloc nation known as SFR Yugoslavia (now since separated, with Divac representing Serbia) being the first ever international underclassman to be taken directly from an overseas team without previously going to an American college or playing for any prior American institution. Including those two players and Andrew Gaze, who had previously played in Australia for multiple years before playing only one season at Seton Hall University while being over the age of 22 by that time, the number of underclassmen would officially be considered a grand total of fourteen players instead of eleven (or twelve including Gaze). Regardless, the following college basketball players successfully applied for early draft entrance.
This would be the first time in NBA history where an international born and raised player would be considered an underclassman in an NBA draft. The following international player successfully applied for early draft entrance.
This would be the fourth year in a row with at least one player that previously played in college entering the NBA draft as an underclassman. It was also the second year in a row where a player would qualify as an eligible underclassman for the NBA draft while previously playing for a French-based team in order to do so.
Left Marist in 1988; playing professionally since the 1988–89 season
Notes
Nationality indicates the player's national team or representative nationality. If a player has not competed at the international level, then the nationality indicates the national team which the player is eligible to represent according to FIBA rules.
^ The Pistons traded the rights to Kenny Battle and Micheal Williams to the Suns for rights to Anthony Cook on the draft day. Berry, Walter (June 28, 1989). "Associatred Press sports news". Associated Press.
^ "1989 Underclassmen". The Draft Review. August 4, 2007. Retrieved December 14, 2022.
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Nick Anderson – G, Illinois (junior)
Martin Den Hengst – C, Sheridan (freshman)
Andrew Gaze – Seton Hall (freshman)
Alex Soyebo – C, Northland Pioneer (freshman)
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Vlade Divac – C, Partizan (Yugoslavia)
Rudy Bourgarel