Mikey Williams was basketball’s next big star. He’s happier now under a smaller spotlight

SACRAMENTO — Mikey Williams is the biggest attraction in the gym. Which says something, because an O’Neal is here.

As his name rings out at Sacramento State’s preseason Hornet Madness, veneration ricochets around “The Nest,” a 1,012-seat shoebox in California’s capital. The applause for Shaq’s son, Williams’ teammate Shaqir, is mild by comparison.

In Williams, fans see a former phenom who starred in a documentary series before his first high-school game and lived a rockstar life before he could vote. The kid who compared the chaos around him to “LeBron when he was in high school.”

They see a player seemingly bound for the NBA, until one night in 2023 pushed him off the court and into a courthouse for nearly a year, facing a gun charge that forever changed the course of his career.

This 21-year-old man, smiling in a college gym smaller than some high school arenas, isn’t that kid anymore.

“(Sacramento State) told me they don’t got a lot of money for me,” Williams told The Athletic. “I was like, I don’t give a f—, I just want to hoop again. I don’t give a f—. As long as I can eat and hoop, I don’t care anymore.”

The fact that Williams is here, in this small gym, is a testament to what can happen when kids soar too early. For every LeBron James, anointed at 16 and strong enough to carry the weight to the summit, there are others, handed the world even younger, whose paths don’t unwind in such a linear fashion.

Williams touched the heights of prep basketball fame, but needed the depths to reach this place. A point where money or fame no longer matters. What’s left is basketball.

But, don’t get it twisted. He did care — once.

The baby in the gym grows into a star

In 2022, Williams was on top of the world. He lounged by the pool shortly after moving into his new $1.2 million home in inland San Diego. After two years on the prep circuit, he and his mother, Charisse, had a falling out, so he moved into a sleek new house with his grandmother, high school teammate JJ Taylor, and two cousins, all on Williams’ dime. By 17, he had become the first American high schooler with a shoe deal, signed to Puma for $12 million over four years.

Legs kicked up, mountain view sprawled before him, the sun melting into a kaleidoscope of light, he took a breath.

“I remember the sunset was beautiful, and really thinking, ‘I made it,’” Williams said.

With more than two million Instagram followers, he was, at worst, the second-most famous high school basketball player in the world after Bronny James.

For Williams, the ascendance wasn’t just comfort, but confirmation of his journey.

Mikey’s father, Mahlon Williams, a former high-school hoops star, worked as a campus assistant at Crawford High’s night school in San Diego in the early 2000s. He also assisted Terry Tucker, then Crawford’s basketball coach. Mikey, born in 2004, was a constant presence.

“Every time there was a timeout, you see this little brown-hair, curly-headed kid running on the court, and we’d have to get him off,” Tucker recalled. “I still remember saying, ‘Can somebody get this baby off the floor?’”

By sixth grade, that baby was starring on an AAU team his father built around him, setting his sights on a national tournament matchup against the North Coast Blue Chips, led by James.

Mahlon called the organizers to place Mikey’s team opposite Bronny’s so they’d face off in the knockouts. They did; Mikey dropped 31 and won.

The next year, he joined the Blue Chips, touring the country. Crowds and social-media videographers who arrived at games eager to glimpse LeBron James’ oldest son often left wowed by Williams.

“I started blowing up,” he said. “It felt fake. I swear to God, I went to sleep and woke up the next day with like 40,000 new followers.”

By ninth grade at San Ysidro High in 2019, Williams already had a national following. His family chose the school because Tucker had taken over as coach.

Overtime, a growing basketball media company, contacted Mahlon about shooting a day-in-the-life video with Mikey. One YouTube video became a documentary series, “Fear Nothing,” which chronicled his daily routine.

In the episodes, Overtime had Williams narrate his life from a throne set in a desert landscape. He said he sometimes felt pushed to overdramatize his experiences during the weekly shoots.

“Some of it was just stuff he didn’t want to do,” Mahlon said. “He thought it didn’t fit his brand or wasn’t honest to him.”

Many viewers agreed it felt inauthentic. However, Mikey called Overtime “family,” and Mahlon said the company allowed the Williamses final authority on all releases. They hoped the series would grow Mikey’s brand.

It did.

Marketable and unstoppable

To date, episodes from the first season of “Fear Nothing” have more than 2 million views.

On the court, Williams’ play met the fanfare. He averaged 29.9 points, 6.7 rebounds, and 4.9 assists in 2019-20, and MaxPreps named him National Freshman of the Year.

He scored 77 points in a game, a San Diego record for high school boys and a state record for freshmen. Against Temecula Rancho Christian, Williams shook the internet with a dunk over future NBA Defensive Player of the Year Evan Mobley.

Throughout his amateur career, he faced future top-three NBA draft picks such as Mobley, Cade Cunningham and Scoot Henderson — matchups that built a towering self-belief he still holds today.

“I don’t think nobody could f— with me,” he said. “I don’t care if you LeBron, Steph Curry, or Michael Jordan. You can’t f— with me. That’s how I feel.”

Williams’ commercial appeal was growing, and shoe brands took notice.

“Puma rated him number one in marketability over any other player entering the NBA draft or free agency at that time,” said Chris Rivers of Excel Sports Management, his former agent.

On Oct. 29, 2021, Williams made history, signing the deal with Puma and becoming the first U.S. high school player to partner with a major footwear brand after NIL was legalized in July 2021.

He had the shoes. The cars. Soon, the house.

But the money couldn’t ease growing tensions within the family. Williams played for a different high school in each of his first three years. First at San Ysidro, then Covid-19 forced a sophomore year move to Lake Norman Christian in North Carolina, where his uncle and eventual business manager, Pat McCain, lived.

In 2021, Mikey, Mahlon and McCain formed Vertical Academy, where he spent his junior season traveling the country, facing the best prep schools.

His father relocated with him to North Carolina, but between their cross-country move and hopping between different schools, Williams missed out on stability.

“He was not in a good place,” Rivers said. “If you’re 17, I don’t care how much money you have, if you’re not connected to the people who love you most, you’re going to be messed up. The money couldn’t mask the pain he was dealing with. He lost his way.”

‘Bad Things Are Going To Find You’

A visit home to San Diego prompted a longing to move at his own pace again. So ahead of his senior season, he left Vertical Academy and returned home. Much to his uncle’s chagrin, Vertical folded.

“The second year (of Vertical Academy) was going to be even more epic,” McCain said. “No, I didn’t want him to do that. But he wanted to go back. He could afford it — he had the bandwidth.”

When Williams returned, he wasn’t the same kid who left. He was a brand now, an early torchbearer for the NIL era. A teenager with a mansion, Instagram models in the stands, and the world bending to his dribble.

“Would I have rather he stayed in North Carolina for his last year? Of course,” Mahlon said. “As a father, I would have, because I’m a security blanket. I’m also not going to fight you going back home. I’m not going to fight putting on for the city.”

Taylor, a Chicago native and fellow blue-chip prospect, was playing at the now-defunct Donda Academy in Southern California. Shortly after the Kanye West-led prep school shut down, he announced he would join Williams, his close friend, at San Ysidro.

Taylor’s family remained in Chicago, so he moved in with Williams, who had the means to purchase a mansion for what he believed would be an easy senior year. It was Williams, Taylor, two cousins, including acting bodyguard Josh Turnage, and his grandmother, with unprecedented freedom.

Then the work began to slip.

“I lost focus,” Williams admitted. “I was looking to the next thing. I’d worked my ass off my whole life. But my senior year, the only time I touched a basketball was at the game. Bro, I didn’t go to practice.”

Williams averaged 23.8 points and 9.2 assists that year, and after committing to Memphis, his coach offered one last piece of advice to the baby who used to crawl on his court.

“Don’t sit in San Diego,” Tucker said. “As soon as the season’s over, finish your classes and go to Memphis. You got money, you’re popular, bad things are going to find you.”

Williams stayed. Trouble found him.

According to the San Diego County Sheriff’s Department, around midnight on March 27, 2023, an argument broke out at the mansion on Bratton Valley Rd., between Williams, 18 at the time, and the people who lived with him and several visitors. According to reporting by San Diego’s NBC 7, a juvenile witness later testified she and a group of friends took an Uber to Williams’ home so she could meet with Taylor. The girl testified that she went inside while the others waited in the car before an argument ensued. As the visitors got into a Tesla and drove off, shots were fired at the car. The vehicle was hit, though no one was hurt.

Weeks later, on April 13, McCain, still in North Carolina, received a call from Turnage, the live-in bodyguard. Deputies were outside the door.

“I heard him say, ‘What’s this all about?’” McCain said. “And then the phone dropped.”

He called Williams. No answer. Called again. Still nothing.

On the next call, Williams finally answered, annoyed at being awakened.

“He knows I be sleep in the morning,” Williams said. “So I knew it had to be something.”

McCain told him law enforcement was downstairs.

“He’s like, ‘Huh?’” McCain recalled. “And then I heard ‘boom!’ and the phone went off.”

Williams says law enforcement used flashbangs to enter his home. He was booked into San Diego Central Jail, facing charges including assault with a deadly weapon and discharging a firearm at an occupied vehicle. The San Diego Sheriff’s Department denied a records request for details about the arrest.

Once McCain learned what happened, he posted Williams’ $50,000 bail just after midnight on April 14. By morning, Williams saw the ESPN headline across his phone:

Memphis basketball recruit Mikey Williams faces gun charge.

Williams faced a maximum of 28 years on nine felony counts.

For the next year, his stardom was reduced to fitting through the metal detectors of the San Diego East County Superior Court. Basketball was an afterthought.

“I was just trying not to go to prison for real,” he said. “That was the only thing on my mind.”

Playing on TV, coming home to ramen

McCain said his nephew’s legal team was prepared to go to trial to argue that Williams did not fire a gun at the Tesla. However, in November 2023, Williams took a plea deal, pleading guilty to one felony count of making criminal threats. The other charges were dropped.

Williams hoped that accepting the plea deal would allow him to get on the court sooner for Memphis, but his father said the athletic department informed him he’d have to sit out all of 2024 and join the Tigers in January 2025. Then-Memphis athletic director Laird Veatch declined to comment for this story.

Williams entered the transfer portal, landing at the University of Central Florida. He missed the first two months of the season rehabilitating an injury and rebuilding conditioning after a year away from the sport. He finally took the floor against Jacksonville on Dec. 21, 2024.

In three minutes, he had one assist and one turnover.

Emotions overtook him anyway.

“I almost went to prison,” Williams said. “I ain’t played in I don’t know how long. First game back, that meant something. While coach talked to us in the locker room, I just went to the bathroom and shed tears. That s— was real.”

Williams struggled to mesh with the coaching staff at UCF and entered the transfer portal for the second time before landing at Sacramento State. (Andrew Bershaw / Icon Sportswire via Getty Images)

Life caught up to him financially, too. Dropped by Puma and left without his main income, mortgage payments and legal fees drained his savings. By the time he arrived at UCF, the once-viral dunker who had soared to fame now felt stuck in the mud.

“I was playing on ESPN, coming home to ramen,” Williams said. “Couldn’t even buy anything from the store. My account was in the negative.”

He averaged 5.1 points in 18 games at Central Florida but struggled to connect with the coaching staff and re-entered the portal. He hoped to find somewhere where he could just hoop again.

New motivations

Inside a small office in Sacramento State’s athletic building, Williams wears a red designer sweatsuit, with limited-edition Air Forces on his feet. Proof wealth hasn’t fully abandoned him.

He admits he’s molded by the years, that he wasn’t in the right mindset sitting by that pool in 2022. That he “had to learn from other situations I’ve been in, God had to sit me down.”

There are glimpses — in his tone, in flashes of confidence — of the once-revered child prodigy, not completely beaten out of him by the San Diego courthouse gavel. The kid who said no one, not even Jordan, could compete with him.

He says he wouldn’t still be here if he didn’t still love the game. However, life has redirected the old desire to prove it to people. External validation no longer carries internal resonance.

“Right now,” Williams said, “I just got s— to prove to myself.”

It’s a mindset forged by the rise and fall in a life few experience so young. The NBA remains Williams’ goal, though whether the 6-foot-3, 193-pounder gets there is uncertain.

“He’s right on the fringe size-wise for an NBA guard,” said Brandon Jenkins, a national scout for the recruiting website 247. “He has the explosion, skill and feel, but to enter that conversation, he’d need to not only lead Sac State to a conference (title) but also deliver a standout NCAA Tournament performance, all with strong efficiency. It’s certainly within reach, though I wouldn’t consider it likely at this point.”

Maybe he doesn’t make the NBA, but that doesn’t make his story a tragedy.

“He’s a man,” Tucker said. “He’s been through things most people can’t imagine. Mike’s talked with Drake, LeBron, millionaires, and billionaires. He’s met people we’ll never meet, been places we’ll never go.

“He’s grown. If basketball ends tomorrow, Mikey Williams is still a success story.”

Midway through the first half of Sacramento State’s Nov. 11 matchup against UC Santa Barbara, Williams found himself on a two-on-one fast break. He swung the ball left to guard Jahni Summers and rounded his approach to the rim, ready for liftoff, a scene the basketball world has seen before.

Summers lofted the pass over the defender. Williams glided in from a step inside the free-throw line, finishing the lob with a one-handed flourish.

He scored 30 points on 10-of-16 shooting from the field and 4 of 7 from 3 in 39 minutes of that game, a 92-87 loss to the Gauchos. Under new Sacramento State head coach and former NBA point guard Mike Bibby, the kid is soaring again.

After Sacramento State’s 97-84 loss Thursday at Idaho State, in which he dropped a college career-high 34 points, Williams is averaging 16.3 points per game on 35.8 percent shooting from the field and 26.3 percent from 3 for the 4-9 Hornets. He also leads the team with 5.2 assists and 34.7 minutes per game.

“You can’t stifle him,” Bibby said. “I recruited him for the way he plays and who he is. I want him to be him. I’m not going to come here and try to shield him or tell him how to do this or that.”

Stars shine, wherever they are

Back at Hornet Madness, after the raucous intro, Williams fades into the background.

Overtime has a camera on him, of course. He’s still a headline. But this time, it’s quieter. One videographer, less production, more observation.

He wears Adidas now, not Puma. Limited-edition blue, white and orange “Madison Square Harden” Volume 4s, only 61 pairs handed out in 2020.

He’s supposed to be in the dunk contest, but sits out with arm discomfort. Shaqir O’Neal takes over, first clearing 6-foot-8 Brandon Gardner, then 7-foot-1 Brad Miller, finishing with a 360 two-hand windmill that Overtime blasts on Instagram. Comments roll in: “Where’s Mikey?”

He’s at the other end of the court, away from the lens, pantomiming dunk ideas to teammate Jeremiah Cherry. Moments later, he’s under the rim, Cherry behind him, as Gardner soars over both. The crowd erupts.

Tonight, he’s a small part of everyone else’s story.

But when the event closes, chants of “Mikey!” rise. A youth team, a smattering of barely-12-year-olds, crowds him, faces bright, hands reaching for a handshake, an autograph, a brush of contact.

“This reminds me of high school,” Williams said. “Everything going on with the campus, the gym, everything is humbling. I feel like I’m back at square one.

“Time to get it out the mud again.”

The kids surrounding him were no older than five when that viral seventh-grader ran with Bronny. Eight, maybe nine, when sheriffs raided his home.

Maybe they were too young to know. Maybe they knew and didn’t care.

Right now, they see a star.