MIDLAND — Highly touted freshman prospect Damar Johnson has officially transferred to the Lincoln Park program coming into his freshman year of high school.
Athletic Director and head coach of the Lincoln Park boy’s basketball program Mike Bariski is excited to have Johnson join the school and also join the basketball program after he toured the Midland-based charter school earlier in the summer.
“It's great to have a kid like Damar join the program. Kids come from Lincoln Park for multiple reasons and he chose to come here because he already knew some kids that were attending the school that weren’t athletes and did not play basketball. He went to Kennedy Catholic first and then wanted an option on where to go to school and this was the best choice for him.”
While Johnson was touring the school, Bariski, who along with his roles within athletics is also the department director for the Health Sciences and the Arts department, had no idea that Johnson played basketball before inquiring about athletics during his tour at the school because the Lincoln Park head coach stays away from the AAU side of the sport which Johnson has played in for several years.
When Bariski first met Johnson, who had been interested in the school since he was in fifth grade, he looked just like any other normal student touring the charter school.
“He is a nice kid and the family said that they have been interested in Lincoln Park since he was in the fifth grade," Bariski said. "Looking back at the time, they didn’t know if it would ever be possible when we had our conversation. Whenever we have a student who has any type of athletic inquiry, it usually goes to someone else in my department because we try and watch how we do that since I am the athletic director and basketball coach. When he was taking a tour of the buildings at Lincoln Park he looked like a normal kid about 5-foot-10 a little skinny and he looks like a normal kid that is going into ninth grade.”
But once Johnson was accepted to the school, word started to get around to Bariski about what type of player the rising freshman was. After watching some film on Johnson, Bariski saw him in the light of some of the top players to ever come out of Lincoln Park.
“Since he has been accepted, I have watched some videos of him and he is nothing but normal," Bariski said. "There is absolutely nothing normal about his basketball ability. His ability is in the lines of Maverick Rowan, Elijah Minnie, Nelly and Brandin Cummings and Meleek Thomas, he is that kind of talent.”
The 2024-25 season will look a lot different for Lincoln Park due to the roster turnover that the team has experienced. From players like Brandin Cummings, Vinnie DePaula, Dorian McGhee and Mikey Crawford graduating, to Meleek Thomas taking his talents to the Overtime Elite basketball league, Bariski will have a young program this season.
But for Bariski, this isn’t the first time that a massive roster overhaul has happened and is ready for the road ahead this upcoming season.
“This has happened at Lincoln Park several times because this is not like the NBA, you have these guys at most for four years. It happened back in 2019 when we had a roster turnover like we had this year and we got a very high influx of ninth graders. We have had a good amount of eighth graders who are now moving up to high school this year. This team coming up is going to be heavy on ninth graders; we will have about seven or eight in total on this team, and they will be very young. We got a couple of kids from Midland and some Pittsburgh kids as well.”
Even though Lincoln Park does have a young roster and the Leopards have enjoyed a plethora of success over the past decade, Bariski does not let that distract him from the real reason why he does the job that he does.
By being able to coach a player like Johnson for four years and see a player of a kid of his caliber grow, he is excited to be able to play a part in helping him get to the next stage of his life.
“The people from the outside, they think that wins and championships are important,” Bariski said. “Those are important but what is really important here is to get kids to grow and develop and get them to the next level. That is what makes me prouder than anything. I have not coached a kid who has played and hasn’t gotten into college one way or another or wherever his next step in life is. So Damar is going to be that same type of kid because he is coming in as a somewhat talented kid and we are going to make him into a young man that can flat-out be a dawg. We are going to get him somewhere where he can succeed in life and that is more important to me than putting all those medals around our necks.”
This article originally appeared on Beaver County Times: Damar Johnson transfers to Lincoln Park ahead of freshman season
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