Some Days It’s Easy Being Green * FREE STORY

Sam Hosey, Jr.

SAGINAW -- Draymond Green followed his life-long dream announcing he would continue his basketball career at Michigan State in a Thursday afternoon press conference, spurning scholarship offers from Michigan and Indiana -- the other two finalists.

Green had a number of scholarship offers, but in the end he had to follow his dream.

“He walked in the Breslin Center with me to watch his aunt [former Spartan Annette Babers] play when he was maybe five-years old,” recalled Green’s father, Raymond Green. “He looked up and looked around and said, ‘Dad, I’m gonna play here one day.’ And he meant it, too.” 

“I realize that boys make decisions without a conscience,” Green said in his press conference speech. “Men make decisions with their heart.”

Green, who also held scholarship offers from Minnesota, Kentucky and Wake Forest, received that same bit of advice more than once.

“I told him, ‘You just have to follow your heart, not your mind,’” said Saginaw coach Lou Dawkins. “’Don’t listen to outsiders. Listen to your immediate family, which is your mother and your father.’ And he did a great job. He made a great choice.”

Green was all smiles after announcing his decision. But he wasn’t the only one smiling on Thursday.

“He just laughed,” Green said of MSU coach Tom Izzo’s reaction when he notified him of the decision. “He couldn’t stop laughing. He’s happy about it. Like he told me before when I talked to him he said we’re going for national championships. We’re gonna try to do that next year but we’re gonna try and do that in Detroit in 2009.”

Green, PrepSpotlight.com’s No. 68 player in the country, already knows a few things about winning championships. He led the Saginaw Trojans to a sterling 26-1 record en route to the Class A state title this season.  

“Like I said after the state championship, I truly believe that he’s one of the top players in America,” Dawkins said (pictured left). “He can play all positions, one through five. Things that he really needs to improve on are his strength and his ball handling. But he’s an all-around basketball player. Any program would love to have him.”

Some have questioned Green choosing Michigan State because of the number of quality players at his position including classmate, 6-8 forward Delvon Roe. Green says he just recently got to know Roe and Korie Lucious, the third member of the Spartans’ strong 2008 class, but they seemed to hit it off right away. They even talked of playing together.

“They would always walk up to me at a tournament and ask me when I was committing to Michigan State,” Green said with a chuckle.

But that’s a question Green won’t have to answer anymore. And right on time according to his coach.

“I’m glad he committed to an institution before July came around because that’s the month of recruiting and it was already hectic for him,” Dawkins said. “One of the questions he asked me a couple days ago was, ‘Well Coach I wonder what OJ Mayo and the top four or five recruits do with phone calls and juggling everything?”

During his press conference, Green thanked all of his current and former coaches, friends and teammates who helped him during the process.

“I spoke with Charlie Bell at the NBA Players Camp last week and he was just telling me about his experience at Michigan State,” Green said of the former Saginaw Valley great. “About how [good] he feels about Coach Izzo and that really said it all right there.”

Former Saginaw teammate Larry Wright, who now plays at St. Johns, attended the press conference to support Green.

“It came down to him and his family,” Wright said. “A lot of schools he had a choice of he would’ve done good at but Michigan State is probably the best fit for him. He likes it so much and he and Izzo have a good connection.”

As a player, Wright knows Green has a few things to work on but has no doubt he’ll be successful.    

“They’ll turn his baby fat into muscle,” he said. “He’ll just have to keep working like I know he is. He’ll have to go through the weight program and conditioning. I know he can do everything [on the court] so I’m just waiting to see what my man can do.”

Even cross-town rival Darquavis Tucker, who will head to DePaul next week, attended the press conference to support Green.

“It’s a good decision for him,” Tucker said with his trademark smile. “It’s where he wanted to go so it’s a good fit. He’s gonna do well. He’s from the Sag baby -- we get it done no matter where we go.”

Green, still nursing a sore ankle, averaged 25 points, 13 rebounds and six assists a game last season and is also ranked the No. 1 player in Michigan’s Class of 2008 and the No. 15 wing forward in the country.

He’ll be in action with The Family next month at the Peach Jam Invitational (July 12-15).

PrepSpotlight.com will continue to update Green’s progress. Subscribe today for as low as $4 a month.