Gatorade Condition Participant of the 12 months in Massachusetts as a freshman. Gold medalist with the United states of america U16 staff in Mexico. Leader in points for each recreation (25.8) for the duration of the EYBL Peach Jam, while actively playing up. Nike NIL deal. No. 1 player in the Class of 2025. AJ Dybantsa.
“Playmaker to start with, two-way player,” Dybantsa states of his own scouting report. “Defense and offense, can do a minor bit of all the things: rebound, score, move, complete. Just a staff participant total, and unselfish.”
We have been subsequent AJ since he was a lanky eighth-grader hailing from Brockton, MA, documenting his meteoric rise around the past few a long time. And despite reclassifying in October, Dybantsa obviously remains just one of the ideal prospective clients in the state. Please, infer for by yourself. With an unrelenting motor and shot-producing means matched by an equally eccentric character, it was a no-brainer that the finest player in his course is having the pen to assist officially relaunch our historic Basketball Diary.
But extra on that afterwards. This is now. And now is Dybantsa’s time. He staked that declare not also extensive back.
“When I was in third grade, I experienced the aspiration of going to the NBA, but it was not truly real looking right until Covid 12 months. That’s when I started taking it mad critical,” Dybantsa claims. “There had been no fitness centers offered and I found myself just operating out outside the house every working day. I just took off. Which is when the rankings started coming, which is when the awareness started off coming and I was like, This could be a reality.”
Just after dominating the area New England level of competition as a freshman—posting 19.1 points, 9.6 rebounds and 2.5 blocks a contest—reality established in even further this past June when Dybantsa elected to transfer to nationwide powerhouse Prolific Prep. The improved opposition as well as going in with a host family—on top of living on the opposite coast as your rapid family—would be a difficult transition for any teen.
“The most hard component [about being AJ] is just folks forgetting that I’m a child,” Dybantsa tells SLAM. “Like, I’m 17 decades old, I have a lifetime outside the house of basketball. But they just see the world-wide-web aspect of me so they just imagine everything’s bouquets and butterflies, when it is definitely not.”
Although Dybantsa finds his footing, he leans on the lifetime lessons and operate ethic instilled in him by his Congolese father and Jamaican mom. “Nothing’s supplied to you, almost everything is earned,” he suggests of his parents’ reminders. “It was significant for me in my daily life improvement.”
Colleges are swarming, the League’s previously within see and he just signed on the dotted line with The Swoosh. SLAM has been covering superior school hoopers for a moment (30 many years, tbh!) and we can say with self-assurance, the subsequent modern-day superior college superstar is in this article, and his name is AJ Dybantsa.
Portraits by Marcus Stevens.
The submit Class of 2025 No. 1 Recruit AJ Dybantsa is the Video game’s Up coming Higher University Celebrity appeared to start with on SLAM.