"My first sports role model was Michael Jordan. I grew up in Chicago so you couldn’t miss it. My grandparents were big Chicago Bulls fans everywhere. My grandmother and my grandma on my mom's side are big sports fans. Michael Jordan was all over the house. He was all over the city. 

 

My favorite thing about working with high school basketball players is I'm back at my high school working. That's where I grew up. That's where I played and it's a different feel with the kids because you’re seeing them go through the same things you've gone through. My least favorite part is patience. That is where I have to grow. But it was fun. Being back in my community with those kids was a good experience for me.

 

Going to Alabama, they recruited me pretty hard but they kind of came in at the end. I had a teammate that was playing AAU with me. He was a point guard and he was always able to find me on the court. I was a shooter, and you want to play with a point guard that’s looking for you and I was able to knock down shots all summer. I was like, “Yo, wherever you’re going to school, I'm going.” So he ended up coming to Alabama. I loved playing in the SEC. Unfortunately it didn't work out. The coach ended up leaving and I transferred to Georgia State. It was a no brainer, coming back to play for those guys and I was able to do some really special things. 

 

As far as being ranked high, I was super competitive. I'm a Jordan and Kobe fan, so that stuff didn't really bother me. I wouldn't say it was pressure, per se, but you always want to play well, you always want to make sure that when you're out there, you are going to play well. From that standpoint, I wouldn't say it was pressure, but you do have a certain responsibility to be who they say that you are. That's like the give and take with that but it helped me. I felt like I was more prepared because I didn't want to show up and not be who they said I was or be who I thought I was.

 

You have to run your own race. That's what I tell the kids now, run your own race and set your own standard. Those are the two things you can do to keep you locked in. I lost track of it at one point when I went to Alabama and left to go to Georgia State which was a lower conference. It was different for me. I went from playing in a 15,000 seat arena every night, to Georgia State where it’s maybe 3000 people in the arena. And if you don't win your conference, you don't go to the NCAA tournament. It was different for me so I had to adjust and get back to it. It was definitely a challenge.

 

I would say I’m not sure if I found my purpose yet. What I would say to everybody is dive into everything. You're not going to know what to get into until you do it. You have to be able to adjust and I think that's why athletes are looked at a certain way, because we're good at that. We adjust quickly, and every game is different. Every scout is different. All those things come into play when you're in the real world and if you haven't experienced that, it's going to be really really hard for you to find what your purpose is. You might end up doing something that you don't want to do but I think we're lucky as athletes because we get to go through that."