NBA draft prospect Alijah Arenas refuses to see his dreams derailed

Barely a minute or two ticked away at Galen Center last month,but USC freshman Alijah Arenas already was exhausted. His legs felt like anchors dragging across the court. Every trip down and back left his lungs howling.

Not 48 hours earlier, Arenas was confined to his bed, sick with a particularly unforgiving form of the flu. The virus sapped him of the strength he’d built during his first seven games at USC — another frustrating setback during a season with too many to count.

At practice the day before, Arenas felt so tired he spent most of the session lying down, trying not to move. But after all the games missed and all the opportunities lost during the past 10 months, Arenas would never willingly give up another.

He came to USC, after all, as a surefire NBA lottery pick, a sinewy playmaking marvel capable of creating his shot anywhere, anytime. He seemed like the sort of tantalizing five-star talent who could change not just the present but future of a program.

USC guard Alijah Arenas celebrates after hitting a three pointer against Indiana Feb. 3 at the Galen Center.

(Jae C. Hong / Associated Press)

But he spent almost three-quarters of what could be his only college season sidelined. So, with a top-10 Illinois team coming to town, Arenas fought to play. He ended up slogging his way through 18 minutes and scored eight points. USC lost to Illinois by 36, its largest margin of defeat of the regular season.

That was three weeks ago. USC hasn’t won a game since. It opens Big Ten tournament action against Washington on Wednesday in need of a miracle run just to make the NCAA tournament.

Arenas isn’t one to make excuses. “I’m not going to blame it on [being sick,]” he said the day after the Illinois loss.

There has been plenty of blame to go around during USC’s seven-game losing streak. But Arenas blames himself. He should have been more prepared for this season, he says. He should have been working out harder, recovering faster.

“The facts speak for themselves,” Arenas said. “I just have to point out the obvious.”

He thinks about his little brother, Aloni. He’s only 14. He’s been hounding Alijah about getting in the gym. Why hadn’t he listened?

“It’s becoming a problem,” he said. “Lately, I’ve been talking about striving for perfection, instead of actually practicing it.”

He’s spent all night thinking about this. Obsessing over it.

But on the other hand … maybe he’s being a bit hard on himself.

One morning last April, Arenas was driving home from the gym when his Tesla Cybertruck malfunctioned, crashed into a tree and burst into flames, briefly trapping him inside. He managed to escape, but he was placed in a medically induced coma to aid recovery from smoke inhalation and hospitalized for six days. Then, within days of finally being cleared to practice during the summer at USC, Arenas learned his meniscus was torn. He had one surgery on his knee, only to learn he needed a second about a month later.

Doctors told Arenas at the time that the knee injury was likely season-ending. But he refused to accept that fate. When his knee responded well to the second surgery, doctors conceded he might be able to return sometime in February. He ran with it.

“He worked so hard to come back,” said Zach Becerra, Arenas’ trainer, “that he got it to mid-January.”

USC guard Alijah Arenas dribbles under pressure from Wisconsin guard John Blackwell on Jan. 25 in Madison, Wis.

(Kayla Wolf / Associated Press)

But while his knee might’ve technically been healthy as he suited up against Northwestern on Jan. 21, Arenas didn’t have his stamina back. It’d been 10 months since he last played five-on-five basketball.

Arenas still played 29 minutes. He shot 3 of 15. Afterward, USC coach Eric Musselman worried he might’ve thrown the freshman into the fire too soon.

But Musselman told the Arenas family from the beginning that he would give Alijah a blank canvas on which to create and the space to make mistakes, to grow. So he kept his word — and kept giving Arenas the ball. Musselman stuck with the freshman even as he shot just 29% and struggled to find his footing during his first four games. And he has continued to stick with his star freshman, even as USC’s season unraveled.

He’s done so because Musselman and his staff have seen glimpses of what Arenas could be.

During a three-game stretch in early February, Arenas showed the world his sky-high potential. He dropped 29 against Indiana, 25 at Ohio State and hit a game-winner at Penn State. It seemed, at the time, like he was on the brink of his long-awaited breakout.

Then, he got sick.

“It’s a shame that the circumstances were what they were,” USC assistant coach Michael Musselman said. “Because I truly know that [Arenas] would have been one of the best players in the country with a full season.”

Arenas, though, doesn’t waste any time feeling sorry for himself. Even that stellar three-game stretch, he says, “wasn’t what I was waiting for.” He calls it “decent towards bad.”

Two days later, USC blew a lead to Oregon in the final minute. The ball was in Arenas’ hands during the final two possessions. He missed a contested jumper on the first trip. On the second, he drove into traffic and lost the ball.

After the game, Becerra said Arenas was “crushed.” “He feels like, ‘It’s all on me. ‘It’s all on my shoulders.’”

Arenas took a half-hour after the game to shoot and clear his head.

When he finally got home that night, Arenas headed straight for his father’s sauna. He sat inside for a while, alone, hoping to sweat away whatever was holding him back.

Seventh grade was when it all started to click. That’s the version of himself Arenas wants to recapture.

Back then, he said, it was fun to set his alarm for 4 a.m., getting to the gym hours before another soul would show up.

“I was a very disciplined kid in seventh grade,” he says. “I’d get eight workouts a day in.”

Eight? Really? Yes, at his middle school, Core Prep Academy in Northridge, Arenas’ entire day was consumed by hoops. There were pre-dawn workouts, mid-morning core, mid-afternoon skills training and late-night shooting sessions. Lunch was usually sacrificed to get up extra shots. Sometimes he’d get in a short morning nap on a couch in an office. Classes, somehow, were crammed in the between workouts.

It was a pretty grueling schedule for a seventh grader. But Arenas chose it. He fell in love with the work. “That kid was obsessed,” Arenas says of his younger self. “Nothing distracted him. No outside noise, no talking, no anything. Just gym, school, sleep, repeat.”

Becerra, his trainer, saw that shift firsthand. He’d started training Arenas’ dad, former NBA star Gilbert Arenas, when Alijah was in the fifth grade. Alijah was only 5-foot-4 when Becerra took him on as a client, too.

Alijah Arenas was a top scorer at Chatsworth during his high school career.

(Craig Weston)

“But he was already a madman,” Becerra said. “He gets that from his dad.”

That motivation wasn’t the product of his famous father nudging him. Alijah said Gilbert never put any expectations on him to follow in his father’s footsteps.

In middle school at Core Prep, Alijah was pinned against older, stronger prospects on a daily basis. When it came time to choose a high school, instead of sending him to Sierra Canyon, where other local top prospects congregated, Alijah enrolled at Chatsworth High, the local public high school.

“I just think Gilbert wanted him to have to fight,” said Etop Udo-Ema, the founder of Compton Magic, Arenas’ AAU program. “You’re gonna do everything [at Chatsworth.] You’re gonna have to carry the team and wear every game on your shoulder.”

Some nights, Chatsworth coach Sam Harris would ask Alijah to play the point. Others he played center. He posted up in the paint, with his back to the basket. He initiated the offense. He rebounded. He even did the opening tip.

“He had to learn to do everything,” Harris said.

Arenas ended up staying all three of his high school seasons at Chatsworth. Most nights, Arenas was the sole focus of opponents’ game plans. Still, in three seasons, he became the Los Angeles City Section’s all-time leading scorer.

He developed an uncanny ability to create his own shot under the most difficult of circumstances, manipulating defenses and contorting his way through the lane with ease. He learned how to elevate his teammates, putting them in positions to succeed. And he also sprouted up to 6-foot-7, which didn’t hurt.

“Every game I was getting triple teamed,” Arenas said. “At first it was frustrating. But then I realized, like, that’s just preparing me for the next level. I had to learn how to read the game differently, how to stay patient, how to trust my work even when things weren’t going right.”

Those lessons have been tested at USC, where very little has gone as planned for Arenas so far this season. The Trojans have lost nine of the 13 games in which Arenas has suited up. They dismissed leading scorer Chad Baker-Mazara last month and their NCAA tournament hopes are on life support.

It hasn’t been easy. But whenever life has been the hardest, he has found himself thinking of his Cybertruck crash. It’s made him slow down, made him take a breath.

“I just tell myself, like, ‘You’re still here,” he said.

In the same breath, Arenas refuses to let himself off the hook. He insists again this season hasn’t been good enough, that he hasn’t been good enough.

His former coaches, however, happily come to his defense. They insist this version of Arenas is, as Udo-Ema put it, “a shell of what he’s going to be.” They point to the fact that he’s only just now in playing shape.

That’s what the Compton Magic founder has told any NBA teams who have asked. “If he’s not a top-10 pick, there are 10 dumb NBA teams that are going to miss out,” he says.

Harris, the Chatsworth head coach, said Arenas is still just getting comfortable. He was supposed to be a high school senior, but he chose to reclassify and head to college early. Then suddenly he was thrust into the fire of a Big Ten slate at midseason.

USC guard Alijah Arenas shoots in front of UCLA guards Trent Perry and Brandon Williams at the Galen Center on Saturday.

(Allen J. Schaben/Los Angeles Times)

“It’s just growing pains,” Harris said.

Stepping in during the final six weeks certainly required adjusting — not just from Arenas, but also his teammates. At Chatsworth, Arenas did everything because he had to. At USC, that instinct has sometimes led him to try too hard, to do too much.

“He can get a shot off whenever he wants, which is super unique,” said Michael Musselman, the USC assistant. “So he’s trying to figure out, ‘When do I need to use that?’ versus ‘When do I need to find my teammates or get other guys involved?’”

It may be too late to figure it all out at USC. The expectation has long been that Arenas would play one season of college basketball before declaring for the NBA draft. But considering how the past year has gone, could that change in the coming weeks as we learn more about how the NBA views Arenas’ limited freshman tape?

No one is ruling anything out. But those closest to Arenas assure that his struggles this season have done nothing to alter his trajectory in the NBA.

“Just the things he can do, the IQ he has, what he can see, the way that he moves, the length, the size — he’s the most talented guy I’ve ever seen,” Udo-Ema said. “Now realizing that talent is a whole different story. But let’s say everything perfect happens for him, he’s going to be the face of the NBA.”

Of course, nothing has gone perfectly to this point for Arenas. But if this past year has taught him anything, it’s how critical it is to keep on course. He won’t allow himself to veer any further.

“Because talent isn’t enough at this level,” Arenas said. “Everybody is talented. So if I’m not out working people, I’m behind.

“I know what I’m capable of. And I’m not there yet. Simple as that.”