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Utah Prep high school basketball star AJ Dybantsa, the No. 1 ranked recruit from the Class of 2025, may still be only 17, but he has shown that he can outplay grown men. He showed this during the Drew League last year and talked about it with Paul George during an episode of Podcast P.
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The Philadelphia 76ers star brought up Dybantsa playing at last year's Drew League in LA and winning MVP honors there while he was still 16. This led to George asking the Utah Prep star what led to him playing against adults.
"I mean you get offered to play in the Drew League," Dybantsa said. "Like, you want to play in the Drew League. I'm not about to say no, right, I mean, I went in there and played before the game like I was miked up during the game." (52:39-52:50)
"If you go watch that yo here like yo like I mean I got to come kill you and I was, you know, I hit my first bucket I was like it's over," he added. "I'm about to get crazy like my first bucket was like a dunk, I was like yeah it's over. So I mean grown men like I'm not really worried about the age gap no more." (52:50-53:02)
He then touched on playing much older players and pointed out the reasons why age gaps do not matter anymore.
"I've been playing up all my life so I mean. trying to get the NBA I'm playing against, you know. LeBron's gonna be 40. I mean age gap not going to really matter I just you know," he added. "It's just more physical that's why I really learned about it but I mean just getting stronger but I mea,n I came out I played my game and you know, I got 20 points, one MVP and it was a great feeling." (53:05-53:17)
Over the summer, while competing at Peach Jam in Georgia, AJ Dybantsa trained with Paul George and fellow high school basketball star Kiyan Anthony.
AJ Dybantsa realizes playing in the NBA is hard
The conversation then led to Dybantsa getting to play with people who have played with the NBA, with the five-star recruit admitting that even those who have been benched or not part of the active roster are tough to play against.
"I mean you you play against some pros that like aren't All-Stars and you're like yo, the NBA is hard," he said. (53:34-53:37)
It remains to be seen how AJ Dybantsa charts his career.
