It was senior night time, so Johnuel “Boogie” Fland knew his feelings could be operating excessive. And that was earlier than the day even arrived. The day of took issues to a complete 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 in the present day. Realizing the man who had simply recruited him could be within the constructing, the Arkansas commit immediately 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 have been honoring me for making the McDonald’s All American Staff, 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 couple of steals to steer 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 shocking exhibiting from Fland, the 6-3, 175-pound, Bronx-born guard who checks all of the packing containers for an elite ground normal. Explosive and in-control, he dictates tempo as a scorer and playmaker, a ability 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 excellent one of many sport’s most unstoppable photographs.
“If you happen to 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 indicate his ability set and sky-high potential. He’s been among the many greatest hoopers at his age degree since anybody can bear in mind. “After I was in, I feel, second grade, we have been ranked high 25 within the nation,” he says of his AAU squad. “Yeah, second grade, but it surely was one thing to us.”
Just a few years later, he led his AAU staff to the nationwide championship sport, the place he missed what may have been a game-winning shot. “That second taught me that, you realize, 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 advance actually hasn’t stopped, as he’s proven again and again towards elite competitors. He was a member of the U17 US nationwide staff that took gold on the 2022 FIBA World Cup and was chosen to hitch 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 stated I want to speak extra, be extra vocal—it helps everyone on the ground, and it helps me.”
That shouldn’t be too tough. 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. If you stroll within the gymnasium, they gotta know, Oh, he’s from New York.”
Portrait by Marcus Stevens.
