Much like Philadelphia, Chicago has long proven to be a city that’s offered fertile grounds for the development of hoops talent.
George Mikan, Mike Krzyzewski, Isaiah Thomas, and Jerry Colangelo. All Hall of Famers, all from the Chicagoland area.
Doc Rivers and Kevin Garnett, a player who Rivers depended upon to win his lone NBA championship as a coach, both spent their high school years in the Windy City. Maurice Cheeks came out of Chicago, and ultimately helped deliver the Sixers a title.
More recently, All-Stars Dwyane Wade, Derrick Rose, and Anthony Davis, and also two-time WNBA MVP Candace Parker, have been among the Chi-town standouts to break into the pro ranks, and achieve success.
All in all, the list of players with Chicago roots is lengthy, and impressive.
Wednesday night at the BMO Harris Bradley Center, the vitality of the Chicago pipeline will be put on full display, as Jahlil Okafor and the 76ers meet Jabari Parker and the Milwaukee Bucks. Born nine months (to the date) apart, Okafor spent his early childhood on Chicago’s South Side, before enrolling in Whitney Young High School on the city’s North Side. Parker, meanwhile, has South Side ties as well, having attended Neal F. Simeon Career Academy, the same high school that produced Rose.
“Jabari’s like a brother to me,” Okafor said Wednesday morning following the Sixers’ shoot-around at the Bucks’ arena. “We grew up together, same area of Chicago. So we’re very close.”Just how close?They faced each other throughout their secondary school days, with Okafor churning out 20 points and nine rebounds in a loss to Parker (15 pts, 6 reb, 5 blk) and Simeon during Okafor’s sophomore season. According to a Chicago Tribune write-up from the game, top college coaches Rick Pitino and John Calipari were in attendance for that December 2011 match-up, as were Rose and Davis. Okafor and Parker’s friendship, though, can be traced back to when joined forces as on the AAU circuit. They were also teammates on the United States Under-16 and Under-17 squads that represented the country in the 2011 and 2012 FIBA Americas Championships, respectively. “First time we played together was when I was in seventh grade, he was in eighth,” Okafor said. “There was a lot of buzz in the city about Jabari Parker, rightfully so. He’s obviously a major player. I was just blessed to have him one year ahead of me, so everything I did, he already finished. I’ve been really blessed to have him by my side.”Tracing their paths, Parker did indeed set a trail that Okafor followed. Parker was named the Morgan Wooten National Player of the Year in 2013. Okafor earned the same honor in 2014. Parker played for Krzyzewski at Duke for the 2013-2014 season, while Okafor suited up for the Blue Devils during the program’s 2014-2015 national championship campaign. Each also wound up as a top-three pick in the NBA Draft. Adding significance to Wednesday night is that the game will mark Parker’s season debut. He’s been out since the middle of last December, when he went down with a left knee ACL tear. Okafor said, “I’m excited to see him back. We were together at Duke over the summer, for certain periods of time. I saw him often, he came to Duke often when I was there last year to check on me, and watch the games. I’m happy he’s finally back out here. I know he is too. It was definitely heartbreaking to see him go down last year, but I think he’s going to come back even better this year.”Okafor and Parker were in touch Tuesday night, once the Sixers touched down in the Cream City, and had even talked about the possibility of catching a movie together. The plans didn’t work out. In addition to Okafor, the Sixers’ roster features two more Chicagoans, Robert Covington and Richaun Holmes. Covington didn’t travel with the Sixers, staying back in Philadelphia to rehab the right knee he re-sprained on Tuesday.
