Ware officially signs to become a Duck
Kel’el Ware has always been a guy of few words, and that didn’t change Friday when he signed his national letter of intent with the University of Oregon.
But the few words that the 7-foot senior center did offer inside
North Little Rock’s Charging Wildcat Arena lobby were enough to elicit a rousing response from family, friends, teammates and coaches.
“I’m thankful for everybody who’s been with me through this journey,” Ware said. “I definitely want to thank my mom for being here with me my whole life, pushing me to keep going. It’s been days where I wanted to stop playing basketball, but she wouldn’t let me. I’m just thankful to her for doing that.”
Oregon’s basketball program, too, is happy Ware’s mother continued to push her son because they’ve now got one of the nation’s top big men coming to their campus.
Ware, who is rated as a five-star recruit and the No. 14 player in the nation by 247Sports, averaged 16.4 points, 8.8 rebounds and 4.6 blocks last season when he helped guide North Little Rock to the Class 6A state title. He had 19 points, 8 rebounds and 2 steals en route to earning Most Valuable Player honors in the Charging Wildcats’ 65-55 victory over Little Rock Central in the final.
“I did a little research, and it’s only 3% of basketball players in high school that get a chance to play at the college level,” North Little Rock Coach Johnny Rice said. “It’s not really high. Going from college to the NBA is even smaller. So this is a really big accomplishment that we should be proud of.
“It shows a lot of hard work and some God-given ability. … you’ve got to do something with it. And he’s done that.”
Ware had offers from a who’s who of Power 5 programs like the University of Arkansas, Baylor, Kansas, Florida, Mississippi and Texas before committing to Oregon in August. He was the Ducks’ second commitment for the Class of 2022.
North Little Rock is to play a benefit scrimmage game at Bentonville today before officially opening its season Nov. 20 in the Hoopin’ for Hoodies event at Maumelle. Ware, along with fellow five-star player and Arkansas commit Nick Smith Jr., are hoping to lead the Charging Wildcats to back-to-back titles for the first time since the team won three in a row from 2013-15.
“As a staff, we’ve been blessed to have [Ware] here,” Rice said. “If you’ve watched his career, you’ve watched his progression, from the ninth grade until now. That’s a little bit of everybody, mom and dad, the family, the community, his teammates, coaching staff. … Everybody. That’s him taking coaching, working and being humble to get to be the player that he is.”