Stanley Johnson

Stanley Herbert Johnson Jr. was born in Los Angeles in 1996. Johnson comes from an athletic background. His mother, Karen Taylor, played basketball at Jackson State (where she was enshrined into the school's Hall of Fame), as well as professionally in Denmark, Italy and Sweden. Johnson blossomed into a superstar at Mater Dei School in Santa Ana, California, where he played a pivotal role in four straight state championships. Johnson averaged 19.4 points and 8.7 rebounds per game as a junior, upping those totals to 25.1 points and 8.1 rebounds per game as a senior at Mater Dei. The Monarchs did not lose a game during those years, going 70-0 as Johnson became the first California player to win a state title in every one of his high school basketball seasons. Johnson then moved on to the University of Arizona, where he played for one season. You can follow Stanley Johnson on Twitter @IAmSJ and on Instagram @Stanimal. Stanley Johnson spent one year, the 2014-15 season, at the University of Arizona. He started in 37 of 38 games during his freshman season as a Wildcat where he averaged 13.8 points, 6.5 rebounds, 1.7 assists, 1.5 steals and 1.1 made threes per game. He ranked sixth in the Pac-12 in steals, 10th in defensive rebounds, and 13th in total rebounds per game. Johnson won the inaugural Julius Erving Small Forward of the Year Award and became Arizona's eighth winner of Pac-12 Freshman of the Year honors. He was one of just two freshmen in a major college basketball conference to average at least 13.5 points and 6.0 rebounds per contest (the other one was Jahlil Okafor from the Duke Blue Devils). Johnson then declared for the 2015 NBA Draft and was selected by the Detroit Pistons with the eighth pick.