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CLEVELAND — Even though he has not played as much as he probably would have liked this season, Kentucky sophomore Dakari Johnson was laughing and enjoying everything about the NCAA Tournament experience.
“The season has been really fun. It has been a great ride to be part of,” said Johnson the day before UK played Notre Dame in the Elite Eight here. “It is really hard on this team but at the same time I talk to my coaches and get extra work to get better. When things are not going well, you just have to work.”
He’s averaged 6.7 points and 4. rebounds per game this year while shooting 51 percent from the field, down slightly from 57 percent last year. He also had played only 16.7 minutes per game, just a slight increase from his playing time as a freshman.
However, he doesn’t begrudge teammates Karl-Anthony Towns and Willie Cauley-Stein the success they have had that will make both likely high NBA draft picks in a few months.
“It is great for them. They definitely deserve all that and work hard. I am proud for them,” a smiling Johnson said. “We are winning games. That’s what I want.”
He really enjoyed talking about his “other” sports with ESPN’s Shannon Spake.
“My first sport was soccer and then in high school I kind of played ping pong. I went to an international boarding school, so we had a lot of Chinese kids there. I used to play ping pong with them. I am actually really good at it. We used to have tournaments in the dorm rooms and stuff,” he said.
“I remember last year me and Jarrod Polson would play each other. He is pretty decent.”
However, sophomore guard Andrew Harrison said that was news to him.
“I have not seen him play. I can’t imagine him playing ping pong, but maybe he does,” Harrison said.
Johnson said he does.
“Only a couple of guys on the team now know how to play it. In high school I played it all the time. It is a real cool sport,” he said.
It’s just as intriguing to think about Johnson on the soccer field.
“I was a lot smaller when I was playing soccer when I was 8 or 9 years old living in Brooklyn,” Johnson, who said he was a defender, said. “As I started growing, I didn’t want to balance things so I just ended up playing basketball. But actually me and my cousin when we were little played on the same soccer team, so it was family tradition.”
Basketball worked out to where he became a McDonald’s All-American. He played for Team USA Basketball's under 17 squad in 2012 and averaged 20 points and five boards a game for the world champions. He was rated as the No. 11 overall player by ESPN and the top player at his position in his recruiting class.
He lived in Lexington during his middle school years and attended Sayre. He still says that is one reason he picked UK over Syracuse, Georgetown, Kansas, North Carolina and Ohio State.
“I had a lot of close friends and family down here. Most definitely I still have close friends from middle school here and that is pretty neat,” he said. “Definitely Brooklyn is home but my three years before in Kentucky were special. The school I went to, Sayre, they treated us great and helped me there. I have a lot of old friends from Sayre that come visit me and just hang out with me. We got to movies and stuff.
“My little brother (Kamini Johnson) actually goes there now, so I am in contact with them and stay close. I went to a couple of their games. My brother plays on freshmen/JV team, but he wasn’t as good as me at my age when I played.”
That again was the playful side of Johnson that he doesn’t always show.
His mother, who lives and works in Lexington now, also comes by to visit.
“She actually does my laundry. Not all the time, but sometimes,” Johnson laughed and said. “When I first got here she would buy me some snacks and stuff but not anymore. I told her to give me a little space.”
Plus, he worked to drop weight and make him more mobile.
“It made me a better player. I can play on the floor a little bit. Defensively, I can move my feet a lot better. I think it has helped a lot but sometimes I do miss those snacks,” he said.
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