It was senior night time, so Johnuel “Boogie” Fland knew his feelings can be operating excessive. And that was earlier than the day even arrived. The day of took issues to an entire different degree.
He was at school that morning when the textual content got here via. It was John Calipari: I’m coming to the sport immediately. Understanding the man who had simply recruited him can be within the constructing, the Arkansas commit abruptly had much more motivation for that night time’s sport. “My household was there, my future head coach was there—and only for him to pop up like that was very particular,” Fland says. “I simply needed to placed on a present.”
All of it hit even more durable on the gymnasium that night time. “I used to be tearing up earlier than the sport, after which as soon as I noticed they had been honoring me for making the McDonald’s All American Crew, the tears got here operating down,” he says. As soon as the sport tipped, Fland instantly made clear that the emotion of the event wouldn’t derail him from performing on the degree that has made him a top-20 recruit and arguably one of many high level guards within the 2024 class. The road: 29 factors, 8 rebounds, 3 assists and a pair of steals to guide his Archbishop Stepinac (NY) squad to a senior-night dub.
His solely slight disappointment afterward? “Man, I used to be attempting to get 50,” Fland says. “I used to be locked in.”
It was a dominant however under no circumstances stunning exhibiting from Fland, the 6-3, 175-pound, Bronx-born guard who checks all of the containers for an elite flooring basic. Explosive and in-control, he dictates tempo as a scorer and playmaker, a talent set made clear by the gamers whose video games he works to emulate: everybody from LeBron and SGA to Ja Morant, Tyrese Maxey and Immanuel Quickley. That features working to good one of many sport’s most unstoppable pictures.
“In case you go on YouTube and search my title, you’ll see a step-back because the thumbnail. Simply watch what number of step-backs I do,” he says. “I’m so fast, they attempt to play the shot and the drive, and once I see that they’re taking part in the drive, it’s straightforward for me to grab again and step again.”
The trail that took Fland from the Bronx to White Plains (the place Stepinac is positioned) and can see him in Lexington main a sometimes loaded Wildcat recruiting class subsequent winter has included loads of stops that allowed him to point out his talent set and sky-high potential. He’s been among the many finest hoopers at his age degree since anybody can bear in mind. “After I was in, I believe, second grade, we had been ranked high 25 within the nation,” he says of his AAU squad. “Yeah, second grade, but it surely was one thing to us.”
A couple of years later, he led his AAU crew to the nationwide championship sport, the place he missed what might have been a game-winning shot. “That second taught me that, you understand, there’s going to be lows,” he says now. “I used to be so used to profitable. That was an eye-opener for me. That taught me I gotta get higher.”
The development actually hasn’t stopped, as he’s proven repeatedly towards elite competitors. He was a member of the U17 US nationwide crew that took gold on the 2022 FIBA World Cup and was chosen to affix the stacked US roster for the 2024 Nike Hoop Summit. With that résumé, the place can he nonetheless enhance? “Earlier than Coach Cal left on senior night time, he mentioned I want to speak extra, be extra vocal—it helps all people on the ground, and it helps me.”
That shouldn’t be too troublesome. Fland brings the identical power to each court docket he steps on, together with his Bronx roots at all times on show.
“New York is totally different. When folks say that, it undoubtedly is true,” he verify emphatically. “You gotta have some swagger to you. You possibly can’t be stiff. While you stroll within the gymnasium, they gotta know, Oh, he’s from New York.”
Portrait by Marcus Stevens.
