Jarin Stevenson, Alabama freshman and former top UNC target, embraces ‘full circle moment’
Jarin Stevenson left home on the final Wednesday of last June, riding in the passenger seat of a car packed with his belongings – duffel bags, 10 pairs of Nikes, no shortage of ramen noodles, a PlayStation 5. The essentials. All he needed for his freshman year at the University of Alabama. His father pulled out of the driveway slowly. His mother stood behind, watching and waving.
And then he was off. A new world awaited.
Stevenson then had just completed his junior year at Seaforth High School, outside of Pittsboro and near Chapel Hill. He’d graduated early. He’d thought over his options one final time, as one of the most coveted basketball prospects in the class of 2024 – and then in the class of 2023, after he’d reclassified. There were a lot of roads he could travel toward his ultimate goal of the NBA.
The options included spending a year at an elite basketball-focused prep school, like Montverde Academy in Florida, or Link Academy in Missouri. He could’ve spent a year with Overtime Elite, in Atlanta. The NBA’s G-League Ignite expressed interest. If it was college he wanted, North Carolina had recruited him for years. Plenty of other schools wanted him, including Virginia.
Alabama came on late. He felt a connection with coach Nate Oats, and his program. He believed in Oats’ message. The chance to play early intrigued him.
Soon, at last, Stevenson was off to Tuscaloosa.
His basketball journey now comes full circle, in a way. Alabama, where Stevenson has emerged as a significant role player in his first college season, will play against UNC, the school everyone thought Stevenson would attend, on Thursday night in the NCAA Tournament West Regional semifinal.
It’s a little bit of a crazy thing. About a year ago, Stevenson was playing 2-A high school ball at Seaforth, mostly against kids with little to no chance to play beyond that level. A couple hundred people, if that, might come out for his games.
And now here comes Thursday night. Millions will watch the UNC-Alabama game on CBS, with the winner advancing to the Elite Eight. It will be played in front of what’s expected to be a full house at Crypto.com Arena, home of the Los Angeles Lakers and LeBron James, and where Kobe Bryant became one of the most revered athletes of his generation.
If Stevenson felt overwhelmed, he didn’t show it here on Wednesday. He walked onto the court for a practice with that same trademark smile he often wore around Seaforth. He joked with his teammates. He went through warm-ups with an air of looseness. Way up above, all the Lakers’ retired numbers and championship banners added to the mystique of the place.
He’d gone from his home in Chapel Hill to Tuscaloosa and now to Los Angeles, and the Sweet 16 against UNC. The school that offered Stevenson a scholarship near the beginning of his sophomore year at Seaforth. The school where his mother, Nicole, played basketball for Sylvia Hatchell back in the mid-to-late 1990s. The whole thing felt a little like a “full circle moment,” Stevenson said.
And to be sure, it had to conjure thought of his recruitment. Stevenson’s father, Jarod, played professional basketball for years in South Korea, where Stevenson spent part of his childhood. When the Stevensons moved back to the United States, permanently, they settled in the home they’d kept in Chapel Hill, and Jarin had visited UNC’s campus countless times.
It was about 15 minutes away. He could have been the latest in a long line of top in-state prospects to stay home, and play for the Tar Heels. Now he finds himself playing against them.
“I still feel like I made the right decision,” Stevenson said. “I feel like I’m getting better, getting stronger. And yeah, I feel like my game’s improving just all throughout – defensively, ball handling and just different things. I feel like I made the right decision.”
Stevenson has carved out a niche that might’ve been more difficult to do at UNC or Virginia, which were the other two schools he most seriously considered. Virginia coach Tony Bennett expressed interest in redshirting Stevenson, and letting him develop. At UNC, meanwhile, coach Hubert Davis has fought the perception, fair or not, that heralded freshmen get lost on his bench. (Elliot Cadeau, the freshman point guard who also reclassified, has started almost all season.)
At Alabama, Stevenson has been playing a fair amount, at least. He has averaged almost 17 minutes per game, along with 5.2 points and 2.6 rebounds. There have been growing pains, at times. There have been plenty of lessons. There have been moments when Stevenson’s considerable potential shines through; when he shows why all those college coaches kept visiting him.
Davis was among them. During one of Seaforth’s games last season, he sat near the corner of the baseline and watched Stevenson. During another, Davis came back and brought his whole staff. Up until the end of his recruitment, it still seemed like UNC was Stevenson’s most likely destination. And then it wasn’t. And now he gets to play against the Tar Heels.
“I’m excited about it, for sure,” he said, and there was that smile again.
Stevenson’s parents made the trip out to Los Angeles and planned to be there Thursday night – “they gotta be,” he said – when their son plays in the biggest game of his life. This is the kind of moment they’d been trying to prepare him for, for years, one with no shortage of pressure and stakes, with a nation watching.
And it just so happens to be against Nicole’s alma mater. Stevenson laughed at that.
“I still think she’ll cheer for me because, you know, I’m her son and stuff,” he said with a laugh. “But yeah, she’s torn in two different ways a little bit.”
A year ago, Stevenson still had not yet finalized his decision to reclassify and graduate high school a year early. He knew he wanted to, but he wasn’t quite sure. He made up his mind in the months to follow. He listened to the final pitches from Davis and Bennett and Oats. He liked what he heard from Oats and felt at home in Tuscaloosa. He thought about it some more. He made up his mind.
And then, on a hot and humid morning late last June, he carried most of his possessions out to a bright red Tesla and filled the trunk to its capacity, folded his lanky frame into the front seat and left home. That was nine months ago. And now, on Wednesday, Stevenson walked onto the court where the Lakers play. He went through a practice.
The media relations folks at Alabama put him on the dais for the team’s official day-before press conference. On one side of him was Mark Sears, the Crimson Tide’s All-SEC guard. On the other was Nick Pringle, the senior forward. And there was Stevenson, in the middle.
“It’s definitely surreal,” he said of playing against UNC.
“A full circle moment,” he said again.
He’d come a long way.
This story was originally published March 28, 2024 at 10:42 AM.
