Jahlil Okafor

I've done this a couple times, been to a couple different camps and a couple different AAU practices to talk to kids. I tell them you have to be dedicated, have to decide if you want to be a serious basketball player or not. They always ask, 'What if you get discouraged?' You have to remember what your goal was in the first place.

I just want to go to the right environment for me and the right team.

I do three different workouts a day. In total, it's about six or seven hours.

Every game is going to be different.

Coming out of college, I got a lot of notoriety for being the old-school center.

I became a better talker on the floor, being at Duke, being in leadership with Coach K, and I think I got better defensively as the season progressed.

Basketball was my thing I was always able to use to forget everything.

Being from Chicago, an inner-city kid, I'm fortunate enough now to be able to help the kids here when I come back, when I'm in town.

My dad is the opposite of me. He's so outgoing and so loud.

Being an NBA player, a lot of stress comes with that: realizing there's a lot of pressure on me and accepting that for what it is, realizing that I might need help, I might need somebody to talk to, accepting that there's nothing wrong with that.

I think from losing my mother, I appreciate having good people around me.

I've talked to a bunch of big men who told me they didn't really start playing basketball until seventh or eighth grade. That wasn't the situation with me.