When Connecticut Sun rookie Jonquel Jones finished practice on Thursday, she had a pressing question for one of her coaches: “Coach, do you have your phone on you?”

Jones was too busy with her rookie WNBA season to watch childhood friend Buddy Hield get drafted into the NBA, but she made sure she caught up on social media after the big news.

https://twitter.com/jus242/status/746149867265757184

[wnba_video id=”30901″]

Their friendship dates back to their days growing up in Freeport, Bahamas, where they both attended the Hugh Campbell Primary School (grades 1-6). By high school, they were getting up at six o’clock in the morning to work out together with coach Gladstone “Moon” McPhee before school.

“She’s a hard worker and we’d get to compete against each other every day in practice,” Hield said at the NBA Draft. “She used to play against us, the boys, and she used to kill us. From Day 1, I knew she was going to make it. She told me we were going to see each other at the Draft. Now we’re here.”

Before they entered the pros within two months of each other, Jones and Hield made a bet on who would be drafted with the higher pick. Jones went sixth to the Los Angeles Sparks on April 14 (she was traded to the Sun on draft night); Hield went sixth to the New Orleans Pelicans on Thursday.

They called it even.

“The whole Bahamas is really excited about it,” said Jones. “Having two first-rounders in the same year, that’s unprecedented.”

In fact, there’s not much of a precedent for Bahamian basketball players reaching the NBA or WNBA at all. Jones is believed to be the third Bahamian girls’ basketball player ever to earn a Division I scholarship; Hield grew from “class clown” — Jones’ words — to the best player the country has produced since No. 1 pick Mychal Thompson in 1978.

Jones said she didn’t even bother reaching out to Hield on his big night, remembering how messages flooded into her inboxes when she got drafted and knowing that Buddy’s experience would be “10 times that.” Instead, Jones reached out to his sister, Pepper — a former track and field teammate — to tell her how proud she was.

“Everything that he’s done he deserves it because he works so hard,” Jones said. “Every time you hear a story about his work ethic, everything I’ve heard has been the exact truth.”