Kitchener’s Riley is hot in pursuit of his NBA dream
‘It’s what I’ve always wanted. And it’s important that I stay focused on that.’
The National Basketball Association season started in October with 27 players born or raised in Canada, including big names such as Shai Gilgeous-Alexander, Andrew Wiggins and Jamal Murray from Kitchener.
Will Riley — born in Cambridge and raised in Kitchener — is determined to join the fraternity.
Riley, 18, has spent the past two years at The Phelps Academy in Malvern, Pa., and is being called a potential first-round pick in the 2025 NBA draft by ESPN and others.
Several things will have to fall in place for that to happen, but the possibility is there.
“It’s what I’ve always wanted,” said the humble and soft-spoken Riley. “And it’s important that I stay focused on that.”
There has been a lot of excitement about Riley lately.
Two weeks ago, the six-foot-nine swingman won the MVP award at the Basketball Without Borders Global Camp 2024 in Indianapolis. The event brought together 40 of the best high school players in the world (not including the United States) to be part of the festivities at NBA All-Star Weekend.
The camp featured numerous competitions and the versatile Riley put on a show with his ability to play multiple positions, his knack for scoring and his ability to create opportunities off the dribble.
“It shows the hard work is paying off,” said Riley.
“It’s nice to be recognized, but the job’s not finished until I get where I want to be, the NBA.”
First, there’s the matter of where he will play basketball after high school.
More than 20 of the top NCAA Division I programs have made offers to Riley, and others are sure to follow suit.
Kansas State was first out of the blocks in September 2022, and subsequent offers have come from Oregon, Arkansas, Illinois, Penn State, Villanova and others.
UCLA and Michigan made pitches earlier this week, and there have been discussions with Duke and Kentucky.
This weekend, Riley is on his first official campus visit to the University of Arizona.
“I’m looking for a school with a good environment, a good community, a team that fits my style of play, and, you know, I want to jell with the team and the coaches,” said Riley, who hasn’t ruled out the option of returning for another year of high school.
Riley made his first big impression in 2018 while playing for the K-W Vipers Elite Under-12 squad that won the Canadian Youth Basketball League Grade 6 championship. Riley scored 29 points in the final game, a 71-60 win over the Scarborough Blues, and earned tournament MVP honours.
That early success came as a point guard, but Riley experienced a growth spurt during the pandemic — going from five-foot-nine to sixfoot-six — and reinvented himself as a shooting guard/small forward.
He attended high school at London’s Southwest Academy Prep, with brief stops at Preston High School and Grand River Collegiate, before hitching his wagon to Hamilton-based UPlay Canada and earning a scholarship to play at The Phelps Academy.
UPlay competes at the AAU level in the Nike Youth Elite Basketball League outside of the high school season, and has helped launch the careers of current NBA players RJ Barrett, Shaedon Sharpe, Andrew Nembhard, Caleb Houstan and Gilgeous-Alexander, to name a handful. In the past eight years, the program has had four players selected in the lottery portion of the NBA draft.
UPlay founder Dwayne Washington, a former high school teacher, has nothing but good things to say about Riley, both as a player and a person.
“He has the trifecta — he has skill, he has feel and he has IQ. When you match that with his ability to play multiple positions, his demeanour and work ethic, it’s everything (college recruiters) are looking for,” said Washington.
What happens next, said Washington, is mainly up to Riley.
“The ceiling for him, because of his intangibles and his ability to be multi-positional, it’s unlimited,” Washington said.
“He has the size and skill to be like a Swiss Army Knife and do a lot of things. It will depend on where he goes to university and how they utilize him but, as an individual, he has a ceiling as high as anyone that came before him (at UPlay).”
Riley names Washington and his parents, Ray and Tracy, as his support system/inner circle and said he welcomes their input on his course of action.
Washington offers an early suggestion.
“The recruiting process, for me, is you don’t let them recruit you; you recruit them,” he said. “College coaches, they’re there to win and, if you can help them fill the void, and they’re going to utilize you the right way, that’s a school you want to consider.”
Also this week, Riley was invited to participate in this month’s AllCanadian Games in Toronto. The event, formerly the BioSteel AllCanadian Basketball Game, will feature 24 of the best Canadian high school players.
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He has the size and skill to be like a Swiss Army Knife and do a lot of things.
DWAYNE WASHINGTON UPLAY FOUNDER