Team goals: Wilson Prep’s 5 starters all to play college hoops

Perhaps even more remarkable than Wilson Prep’s accomplishment of winning back-to-back state 1-A championships in basketball is that all six of its seniors are going to college.

All five starters — Brandon Anderson, David Ellis, Ben Ferguson, Josh Hicks and Leslie Minter — have earned basketball scholarships, which may be unprecedented in Wilson County, while Khristian Woodard landed an academic package from Charlotte to further his education.

For Tigers head coach Anthony Atkinson Jr., graduation day at Wilson Prep on May 25 was a special one, indeed, with all six players and team manager Jaden Davis donning their caps and gowns.

“Very big to see those guys walk across stage and finally accomplish the dream of getting their diplomas and stuff like that,” Atkinson said. “It meant a lot to see where they started from. Most of them I had since they were freshmen or sophomores and along with that, just seeing them grow into men and the fact that I had a part in that, you know, that makes a coach feel good.”

In the days just before graduation, most of them signed to secure their immediate futures at the next level.

Minter, the sharpshooter whose free throws clinched the NCHSAA 1-A championship game in March, signed with Elizabeth City State of the NCAA Division II Central Intercollegiate Athletic Association while Anderson, the slashing guard always around the ball on each end, is headed to Pennsylvania to Div. III Allegheny College. Their three teammates inked deals with National Junior College Athletic Association two-year programs. Ellis, the Tigers’ brawny 6-foot-7 big man, is bound for Davidson-Davie Community; Ferguson, the high-scoring transfer from Northern Nash, will play at Cape Fear Community College in Wilmington and Hicks, the ball-hawking speedy guard, will remain the closest to home at Wake Tech.

“I think the main thing, I guess, I could preach on what got them to this place is they’re winners,” Atkinson said. “And they all have a winning mindset. Every college coach now, they’re pretty much fighting for their livelihood every day they wake up. They’re called on to win, you know, NIL money and all that is good, but, I mean, you’ve got to win at that level. And we have all winners, and we have championship guys that have championship mindsets.”

ALWAYS THE GOAL

Witnessing them matriculate to the collegiate level for academics was the fulfillment of his mission, but to have his starting five going to college to play basketball was truly a blessing for Atkinson and his coaching staff of Dante Artis, Juice Batts, Josh Willingham, Gary Artis and his father, Anthony Atkinson Sr.

“That’s the goal,” said the former Harlem Globetrotters and Barton College star. “As a staff, when I came along, it’s been the goal every year: Get our seniors off to college, whether it be playing ball or not. You want them to get off the college and go out into the world and grow and keep maturing and keep learning and things like that. And we’ve accomplished that goal once again of everybody going off to college.”

Atkinson said that all of his players will have to put in the work in the weight room as well as be coachable to experience the same success at the collegiate level.

“A lot of things are going to thrown at them earlier because they’re winners, and the people that, you know, have recruited and that brought them in and want to be an impact right away. And that’s the good thing when you’re in a winning program, people see it and they want to win at that level. So, they’re going to bring those guys in that, though, how they have that winning mindset, and they want to help them win right away.”

Hicks said that while he was excited about moving up the ranks, having his teammates all do the same was even better.

“I feel great about it!” he chirped. “We had a talk before the season started, all of us would be signed, going to school for free.”

This group of Tigers followed its 2023 title, the second in school history, with a second straight NCHSAA 1-A crown in 2024, going 27-5.

“I feel like that’s a special moment for all of us, because we worked hard for it,” Ellis said. “We had Ben Ferguson incoming, so as we got better in the gym during practice and stuff, it just all came together on the court and we made it. We did it. And that’s a special moment in my eyes.”

Ferguson, who basically took the place of Jahmar Jones from the 2023 starting lineup, led Wilson Prep with 16.4 points per game, followed by Minter with 12.8 and Anderson with 11.4. Ellis posted norms of 6.3 ppg and 9.3 rebounds while Hicks, the team’s top 3-point shooter at 40%, averaged 9.1 points.

While the Tigers were certainly among the favorites in the NCHSAA 1-A ranks as the defending champions, they had to fight their way to a repeat. It’s what endeared his teammates to Ellis.

“The hard work they put in, the dedication that we did as a team, coming together and stuff like that,” he said. “That’s what I really I enjoyed about these guys.”

PARTY ON

But it was far from all work and no play for a team that adopted the nickname, “The Party Boyz,” at least on Atkinson’s expansive social media channels.

“I don’t know if it was social media or somewhere, but somebody said, ‘Them party boys coming,’” Atkinson recalled. “When they said it, I was kind of like, that’s kind of catchy. … It was different. It was hip. It was new. It was something that nobody else was doing, and these guys just added on to it, cutting the lights out before the game. Nobody done it around here right before the game, everything that you see. So, I mean, it was, it was like a culture shock, and it was just a new wave, and it’s just stuck.”

What else has stuck at Wilson Prep is a winning tradition started by program founder Corwin Woodard and taken to new heights by Atkinson since he retired from the Globetrotters and moved home five years ago. This year’s quintet raises the number of Wilson Prep players to move into the collegiate ranks to 11. The program’s first college signee and leader of the 2021 championship team, Nasiar Blackston, will play at Barton College this season alongside former Tigers teammate Devyn Bullock.

“It’s crazy how everything has unfolded,” Atkinson said. “I wouldn’t have scripted it like it came out, some of the games and things like that, but I guess it’s just a testament of when you put things in the atmosphere and you manifest and you trust it, and that’s why I always (say) God’s plan, you know, His plan is not always ours. I wanted it to be like this, but how it has turned out has been even better, because I just follow what God has instructed me to do.”

With this special group of seniors now gone, Atkinson looks to the next big test of replacing them.

“I felt like this year would be my biggest test, because of so much that we lost, but I’ve still got a good core of everybody,” he said. “But the standard is still the same. I guess when you have that standard and kids see it, they believe in and now the kids that are coming up following Dave and Brandon and Les and Josh and Khristian and Ben and all those guys like that, they want to follow the same footsteps. And it makes my job as a coach much easier because now we’ve set that bar, we’ve set that standard that I want to build here, that I wanted to bring back to Wilson. Not just winning championships, but get these kids off to college.

“And you know, in today’s time, anytime a kid can go off and play any level of college, with the transfer portal and everything that’s going on in college right now, it’s a blessing, and the fact that we’ve given our guys another chance to go off or help them get into college, we’ve done our part as coaches.”

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