Staying put: Brandon Johns bucking trend of top talent leaving state
EAST LANSING - Brandon Johns is well aware of the trend.
The East Lansing High School standout has seen plenty of the other highly regarded basketball players from Michigan leave the state to polish their games against elite competition at prep schools.
Flint's Miles Bridges, who is now starring on the court a few miles away as a freshman at Michigan State, did it.
Detroit's Josh Jackson, who is now at Kansas, did it.
Saginaw's Brian Bowen, who would have been the top senior in Michigan this season, departed Arthur Hill to go the prep school route a year ago.
And locally, former Sexton and Everett standout Trevor Manuel left the area a few years ago to attend a prep school as a junior before returning to Lansing for his final season.
But the 6-foot-8 Johns, who is regarded as one of the nation's top 50 players in the 2018 recruiting class and the state's top junior, is bucking that trend.
Johns, who has offers to continue his basketball career at Michigan, Michigan State, Iowa, Purdue and Alabama, has contemplated following in the footsteps of others and going the prep school route. He sees the positives of attending a prep school, but also saw plenty of good things about staying put in East Lansing and playing with longtime friends.
"It's a really tough decision," Johns said. "It took us awhile to come down to that decision to stay here. You're going out and you're going to play with top-notch competition all the time (if you go), and then here you're not playing as good as competition as you would face at a prep school. It just makes you work harder. That's part of the reason why I chose to stay too is because it's going to make you work harder (not playing the best). It's going to make you learn how to dominate."
Johns started seriously thinking about prep school in the middle stages of last season. He’s heard positives from people like Bowen about the prep school experience, but to Johns the pros to staying in East Lansing were more appealing.
“What we have here already – we already have great chemistry,” Johns said. “We already have things going for us. I thought, 'Why not finish this out here just because we have things going for us?' Plus (leaving), it would ruin some of the goals and achievements I would like to do (here) that I can’t do if I go to a prep school.”
While he may not be facing prep school caliber competition on the courts in the Lansing area this winter, Johns has the AAU season to test himself against the best. He has gained USA basketball experience the last two offseasons and was part of the loaded Spiece Indy Heat AAU squad this summer that featured top talent like elite 2019 guard Tyger Campbell and MSU commits Xavier Tillman of Grand Rapids Christian and Jaren Jackson Jr. of La Lumiere in Indiana.
The high quality of AAU basketball and the exposure it offers to players is why East Lansing coach Steve Finamore believes the prep school route isn’t something players like Johns have to do.
“Of course you want to play against the better players or the best players you can play, but these kids play AAU,” Finamore said. “They play 80 games in the spring and the summer and they play against the best competition.
“I’m all for the best opportunity for kids, I really am. When you play AAU basketball, it’s a great opportunity because with almost every tournament you go to in the spring and the summer, it’s a live period and there’s college coaches there. I’m all for the opportunity, but the AAU exposure is enough for high school basketball players.”
Johns agrees and sees his decision as a win-win because he has the opportunity to play with childhood friends and try to accomplish something special. East Lansing enters the season as a Class A state title contender following a season in which it finished 23-1. The Trojans’ lone loss last winter was in the regional final to CAAC Blue rival Everett.
Johns, who averaged 19.7 points and 10.3 rebounds while earning Associated Press and BCAM all-state honors last season, is one of four returning starters for an East Lansing squad that has unfinished business to take care of on the court this winter.
“I think that’s the main thing that we’ve been thinking about is just winning a state championship,” Johns said. “We were so close last year and we had it in our hands and we just let it go. I think that Everett game is probably going to be one of the fires under us. It kind of teaches us what we have to do under those type of pressures. It’s going to be an exciting year.”
Contact Brian Calloway at bcalloway@lsj.com. Follow him on Twitter @brian_calloway.