On his podcast Mind the Game, NBA superstar LeBron James said he wanted to play for Bob Huggins at Cincinnati.
James, considered the greatest basketball prospect of all time, never attended college and would be drafted out of St.Vincent-St.Mary High School by the Cleveland Cavaliers No. 1 overall in 2003. Since the NBA changed the minimum age a player could be drafted in July of 2005, with a player having to be 19 and at least one-year removed from high school.
“When I was growing up I wanted to go to Cincinnati, because of the uniforms and because of Huggs,” James said.
Huggins started his collegiate coaching career at Akron, James’ hometown, then spent 16 seasons at Cincinnati (1989-2005) , before coaching Kansas State for a year (2006-2007) and ended up at West Virginia where he has coached since until last summer’s fiasco where he ended up resigning.
In the NBA James, has lived up to if not exceeded the expectations he had as a prospect, winning four MVP’s, four NBA championships, four Finals MVP’s and being named to 19 All-NBA teams, while also breaking record including the most points in NBA history surpassing Kareem Abdul-Jabar’s 38,387 with 40,000+ and building.
James’ eldest son Bronny has just finished his freshman season at USC, recently entering both the draft and transfer portal. He averaged 4.8 points, 2.8 rebounds and 2.1 assists per game for the Trojans in 25 games, having started in six.
With his impressive size and athleticism in high school there was no question that James was going straight to the league, but if the NBA’s age requirement for the draft had been introduced earlier, one can only imagine what could have been.
