In this episode of the Draymond Green Show, host Draymond Green interviews NBA guard CJ McCollum about his basketball journey from a 5‑foot‑2‑inch freshman in Canton, Ohio, to an NBA star. McCollum recounts the anxiety of a late growth spurt, his physical development through high school (5‑6, then 5‑11), and how he honed his shooting and ball‑handling to compensate for limited size. He describes his AAU experience, the pivotal game against John Wall, and the moment he broke his high school record with 8 threes and 54 points, earning a scholarship offer from Lehigh. McCollum admits he exaggerated an offer from Boise State to generate interest, eventually amassing 11 mid‑major offers before narrowing his choices. He explains why he chose Lehigh—authenticity, academic fit, distance from home, and a clear role—highlighting how the school shaped his personal life (meeting his wife, earning a journalism degree) and his leadership development. The interview ends with a typical YouTube call‑to‑action.
Chapters
You know, coming from Canton, Ohio, your freshman year, you 5'2". But I know at that point you had to wiggle 'cause it's just in you. Like, that's how you play. That's how your older brother play, which a lot of people don't know. CJ's older brother, Eric McCollum, has played in EuroLeague for 10 years, bucket getter. So that's just in you. But at 5'2", going into your freshman year, or, or your freshman year, were there any worries that your future in basketball wouldn't be quite what it shaped out to be just because you were small? Or did you think, "I'mma hit my growth spurt"?
There was times where I thought that my growth spurt might come too late. You know, once high school starts, you know, everybody's taller than you. Girls is taller than you. It's hard to create separation in the games. The finishing around the basket is nearly impossible. You gotta have a crazy floater just because of the way they close space. I seen that my dad, my dad actually graduated high school at 5'8" and my dad is 6'3" now. And I thought to myself, like, I hope that it doesn't take that long, you know what I mean? For me to grow.
Mm-hmm.
'Cause 5'8" might be too late my senior year. Like, it'll be hard for me to get scholarships. So that was the, the only concern was that my growth spurt would take too long. And I was worried about that because I started school early and I graduated high school at 17. So I knew my talent was there. I knew I had the skillset. I worked, you know, harder than most. And I just kind of refined my skills. But I was just hoping that I would get tall early so that I could get a scholarship and then kind of settle into the hype.
And at what, at what point did you actually hit that growth spurt?
So I was 5'2" and I played 3/4 JV, 2/4 varsity, 'cause that was when you could only play 5/4 in Ohio. And my brother, you talked about, he was a starting point guard, so I wasn't better than him and I wasn't gonna play over him. So I kind of watched and played at the end of the games. My sophomore year I was 5'6", 100 and, 8 pounds. And—
I can see.
Yeah, like 5'6", 108 pounds. And I was taller, so like that was cool, right? Like being a little bit taller, like I didn't have to create as much space. But that's when I was really worried. Like I was like, damn, I'm only 5'6". I ain't got no scholarship offer. Nobody's really recruiting me. I'm coming off the bench on my varsity team, even though I probably should have been a starter. I'm coming off the bench, not really contributing, hitting threes every now and then. Like certified, like high school role player, like, think like I'm better than Skip Bayless, but like, but the point, but the points per game wasn't like where, where it should be, right? For my skillset. So like that's where I was at. And then my, my junior year I really dedicated myself to like shooting, right? 'Cause I could always shoot a little bit, but I was like, this is a, this is gonna be the separator for me is, you know, I'm a good passer, but I'm not a great passer, right? I can play defense, but I'm not a great defender. I got some athleticism, but it's not elite. So I was like, what can I do? Well to like get noticed. And it's like, I gotta be able to shoot and I gotta be able to dribble and I gotta be able to create shots off the bounce because that was my like superpower, so to speak. Where it's like, I can do this better than everything else. So I really worked on that in the summer with my brother and I grew to 5'11". And when I got to 5'11", it was like the game was easy at 5'11". It was very easy because I had been so small for so long.
Mm-hmm.
I got used to having to do everything harder, you know, creating space harder, you know, step back's gotta be harder, floaters gotta be more crisp. You only get so many shot attempts 'cause you're so short. And I got, taller and that made the game better. And actually my first career start, I broke the school record. I hit 8 threes and I had 54 points and I got a letter from Lehigh the next day. And, uh, that's when I knew it was like, okay, I'm good enough to go to school at this size, but hopefully I can get bigger.
And so you ended up getting a letter from Lehigh, but why, like ultimately did you have more offers? Why Lehigh in the end?
Yeah, I mean, I went through this. Bowling Green was the first Ohio school to offer me. They offered me first after I played that year out. So I go from averaging 6 points a game to 25. I was 25, like basically 5 and 5 as a junior at 5'11". And I go play for King James, shout out to Bron. I go play for his AAU team that year. And that was my first time like really on the scene because I sat the bench for all of Ohio Red. Like at 5'7", I didn't really play. Like I was like the third string point guard. Well, you know, Second string point guard don't really play in AAU because the starter play the whole game. So I would come in and pick up full court and run the offense and then go sit down. So I played like 7 to 10 minutes a night, like not really impacting the game. And that was my first year. And I, I started playing really well. I played against John, John Wall at a tournament at Boo Williams and I played well. I think I had 25 and 5 and obviously John was killing us, but everybody was watching 'cause it's John. And I started getting letters, started getting recruited, and I actually lied. You know how after the games you get interviewed? And I lied and said I had an offer from Boise State and I didn't. They had just recruited me. And I got a few offers after that. I got a few offers after that. I said like the university department offered me at Boise State. And then I got like, I had like, at one point I had 11 offers. It's all small schools. So Eastern Michigan, Central Michigan, Bowling Green, Lehigh offered, University of Furman ended up offering, St. Francis, PA, a bunch of mid-majors. But I was getting recruited by like St. Louis, Michigan, Notre Dame, and Penn State. And it's funny because I really wanted to go to like, I call it like a bigger conference, but like a more academic-based school to where like I'm playing against these good schools, but like I can still play and still get, playing time, right? Like this is when Notre Dame wasn't that good. This is when Penn State, this is like Taylor Battle days. Like they was kind of becoming better, but they wasn't really like known for football, you know what I'm saying?
Absolutely.
So they ended up not offering me. I wanted to go to Akron University, right? 'Cause it was down the street from the crib. It was a small school. I'm like, bet I can play in the MAC, 15 minutes from the crib. My cousin played football there. Shaka trained me since I was a kid. And this is when Shaka was on staff. And Dan Brown looked me in my face and said, I don't have any more scholarship offers. Zeke Marshall was our only scholarship for your class. Zeke was a 7-foot, 7-foot blue chip center. I said, look man, if you can get me a scholarship, I'll come, but I can't redshirt. I won't make it through school. Like, I love basketball and if I can't hoop, I won't be able to be as locked in and engaged and I can't do a year without it. I gave 'em 2 days. They didn't offer me. Took a visit to Lehigh. And at that point, like, I started with 11 offers. Guys start committing, you know how it go. I go from 11 offers to 8. That's what's up. The 6th, the 5th, I got 3 offers left. Like, guys is committing. I'm going into my senior season and Lehigh was the school that was with me from the beginning. They was authentic, they was genuine. They kind of told me what my role would be. I knew I was gonna be in the Patriot League, so it was a good education. It was a 6-hour drive from home and I didn't wanna be too close to home. So I was like, bet, I can still drive home, but you gotta really wanna see me to come see me type of thing.
Absolutely.
And it ended up working out. And that's, I always say, that's the best decision I ever made in my life was going to Lehigh. I met my wife there. I got to play the game I love. I got a degree. I majored in journalism. I won a couple championships. And that kind of, that propelled me to learn how to carry a load differently, right? Like the academic load, the course load was crazy. To be able to work out, to have to lead a team, to go through like being a freshman to being a man and like what comes with that, what comes with empowering, being a leader, how to lead by example, how to curse people out when I need to. Like it gave me the perfect balance on like what I felt like I was gonna need when this game is over. So I'm thankful for it.
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