18 Things You Probably Didn't Know About Zion Williamson

Image via Getty/Lance King

There was a time when Zion was one of the two biggest names in high school hoops social media circles. The other was LaMelo Ball. The month after Zion appeared on the cover of Slam, he and LaMelo, playing for the Big Ballers squad led by LaVar, squared off in a highly anticipated AAU game at the Adidas Uprising Summer Championships. Zion’s club won, 104-92, with the scene described as chaotic because of the number and intensity of fans. Kansas coach Bill Self said it was “unreal” and he had “never seen anything like it.” A number of NBA players, including Damian Lillard, Jamal Murray, and Andrew Wiggins, were there to watch.

Sometimes, like in the case of LeBron James, we can’t trace the genetic roots of transcendent athletes’ greatness. That’s not the case for Zion. His father, Lateef Williamson, was a standout defensive lineman who originally committed to N.C. State before playing at Livingstone College. His mom, Sharonda Sampson, was also an athlete at Livingstone, a sprinter on the track & field squad. So, Zion is the product of a defensive lineman and a sprinter—sound about right? Zion’s parents divorced when he was 5, and Sharonda married former Clemson hoops player Lee Anderson, who helped train the young blood.

When her boy was competing in youth leagues on the AAU circuit, suiting up for the Sumter Falcons, Sharonda served as coach. He got trial-by-fire experience at the time, competing with kids four years his senior. She also coached him at Johnakin Middle School in Marion, SC. Back then, he ran the point (which helped refine his impressive handles), averaged 20 PPG, and led his team to an 8-1 record and conference title. Shout out to Mom.

As noted above, Williamson’s step-father played basketball at Clemson, and it long seemed the Tigers would sign Zion, who had played his high school ball in South Carolina. Clemson blew what Anderson called a “mile-and-a-half lead” in recruiting, though. (During his lone college matchup with Clemson, Zion had 25 points, 10 boards, and one insane 360 dunk that seemed to say, “You could’ve had this.”) So, why didn’t he go to Clemson? Well…

Zion wasn’t a huge name early on in his high school career. As a freshman, he only had an offer from Wofford. But his profile started growing during the summer 2015 AAU hoops circuit, where he played with the South Carolina Hornets. By the time his sophomore year had wrapped, he had 16 DI offers, including several from major conferences. It wasn’t until the end of August 2016, though, that he landed an offer from Duke. He chose to sign with the Blue Devils in January 2018, in a live ESPN telecast, after they had already inked top recruits R.J. Barrett and Cam Reddish. Zion said Duke “represents a family,” adding that Coach K is “just the most legendary coach that ever coached college basketball” and “I can learn a lot from him.”

Who doesn’t love watching Zion play? At 6’7” and 285 pounds, with absurd power and dunking ability, Zion has already commanded praise from some of the biggest names in the NBA. John Wall said Zion dunks like Vince Carter, Kevin Durant called him a “once-in-a-generation type athlete,” and Steph Curry was stunned by Zion’s talent all the way back in 2016.

Zion’s late AAU career was well-documented on social media, but before he turned into an Instagram celebrity, he was running the court with a fellow future top draft pick: Ja Morant. Zion and Morant played together on the SC Hornets the summer before Zion’s freshman year and Morant’s sophomore year of high school. At the time, both were unheralded. Zion and Ja may now go 1-2 in the draft. “Zion was always a mild-mannered kid, never showed much expression,” Ja’s father, Tee Morant, recalled, according to CBS Sports. “He was probably 6’3” then. He had hops, but he didn't have the hops that he possesses now.”

As is often the case with college stars who were under the radar early in high school, Zion had a big growth spurt at the end of middle school. He grew from 5’9” to 6’3” between eighth and ninth grade, and from 6’3” to 6’7” over the course of high school. It was in eighth grade that he first started dunking, the defining feature of his game today.

It was the craziest shoe news, and maybe the craziest college basketball news, of the year. Only 36 seconds into the Duke-UNC rivalry game February 20, Zion burst through his Nike Paul George 2.5-model sneaker—the thing literally exploded! As a result of the slip, Zion suffered a knee injury that kept him out of Duke’s final six games. Also a result: Nike’s stock value dropped by $1.1 billion the day after the wild incident. Nike ended up immediately visiting Durham to investigate and custom-manufacture a new pair of sneakers for Zion, which he seemed to really like. We’ll see whether it was enough to win his affections, because…

He’s not a businessman; he’s a business, man. Zion might rewrite the rules for a draft pick shoe deal, with the Swoosh, Adidas, and Reebok leading the charge to sign him, but receiving serious competition from others. A legend in sneaker marketing, Sonny Vaccaro, said in April he thinks it will be “the biggest bidding war ever done” and compared it to Vaccaro’s recruitment of Michael Jordan to Nike in 1984. The shoe mogul added some bold words about Zion’s earning potential: “If Zion doesn't change, I predict that he will be the first basketball athlete at 18 years old that the world is rooting for to become a billionaire. I say billionaire, very easily. He is going to have an opportunity to be the face of every company and every major corporation. He is the most marketable person I've seen, for a lot of different reasons.”

These days, talk of impermissible benefits practically goes hand-in-hand with being an elite hoops prospect. For example, Arizona allegedly paid last year’s top pick, Deandre Ayton, during his lone college season. Zion received similar scrutiny early in April when attorney Michael Avenatti accused Nike of paying Zion's mom for “consulting services” in 2016-17 “as part of a Nike bribe to get Zion to go to Duke.” Duke officials are reportedly “looking into” the matter, but whether this accusation has any legs is TBD.

Zion is must-watch entertainment. That prompted CBS to dedicate a camera to him—dubbed the "Zion Cam"—for the NCAA tournament. He didn’t disappoint. Zion was consistently great throughout the tournament, from his 32-point, 11-board game against UCF to his 24 and 14 against Michigan State in their epic battle in the Elite 8, which the Spartans won 68-67, ending Zion’s Duke career.

We’ve always wondered what would happen if LeBron James went back to football since he was a star wide receiver in high school. Imagine if Zion were on the gridiron? That’s what LSU had in mind. Eric Mateos, the Tigers’ tight ends coach, offered Zion a football scholarship. Zion wasn’t interested, though, because...

Early in his life, basketball won Zion’s affections. He started out playing hoops, soccer, and football (quarterback), but decided to focus on basketball at 5 years old, with the decided goal of becoming a college standout. At 9, he started a regimen of waking up each day at 5 a.m. for training.

Zion went viral during the 2016-17 season because of his insane, highlight-reel dunks. With his buzz building, he opened that season with a 42-point, 16-rebound performance. Later in that month is when he really blew up and got the nod from Steph Curry. At this point, he was casually dropping 50 and really starting to look like a man among boys. But perhaps his real “I made it” moment occurred in January 2017, when Drake posted an IG photo of himself sporting a Zion jersey. Today, Zion has 3.2 million followers on the gram. For reference, last year's No. 1 pick, Ayton, has 374,000.

Zion’s middle name, Lateef, matches his father’s first name. It has a spiritual connotation: Al-Lateef is one of the names of God in Islam. As for his first name? Well, the inspiration for that came from Zion’s great-grandmother. “When I was pregnant, my grandmother kept telling me he is going to be extra special, so when you go look for a name for him, look for something extra special,” his mom recalled. “Flipping through the Bible and Zion just caught me. Now, he is so big he looks like a Mount Zion.”

Given all the information and data points available to us these days, it’s possible to pick apart any athlete. Despite his historic success, some have criticized Zion’s shot—likely a result of his strange-looking mechanics. But his J improved throughout the season at Duke. Though he shot 34% from downtown for the year, he hit 41.2% in the NCAA tournament. If he becomes a consistent outside shooter, he’ll be truly unstoppable.

It seemed to be the Zion Show from Day 1 in NCAA hoops this year, but he actually wasn’t the top recruit in his class. In fact, though ESPN had him at No. 2, most sites—Rivals.com, Scout.com, and 24/7 Sports, among others—positioned him at No. 5, behind his two Duke teammates, Barrett and Reddish, among others. Barrett, who also had a sensational freshman year and is expected to go in the top three of the draft, was, at the time, the consensus top player in the class. But during Duke’s preseason Canada Tour, it became clear Zion was the main attraction on the Blue Devils’ roster.

There’s been a lot of talk about Zion, both here and elsewhere. But will it all turn out to be hot air? Don’t count on it. This season, he joined an elite list of freshmen who have racked up 500 points, 50 steals, and 50 blocks: on that list are Zion, Kevin Durant, and Anthony Davis. Moreover, ESPN’s Kevin Pelton ran some advanced stats that indicate Zion is the most surefire NBA prospect since AD, and is more of a lock than Kyrie Irving or Blake Griffin were. Given his efficiency, explosive athleticism, all-around skillset, age (he’s 18!), and likeability, Zion is poised to become the face of the NBA.