Racine St. Catherine’s Tyrese Hunter has earned the recognition and worked too hard to stop now
RACINE, Wis. (BVM) — On June 29, Tyrese Hunter announced via Twitter that he had shortened his list of possible colleges he’d play basketball at to 10.
Just the beginning of my story 🙏🏽 TOP 1️⃣0️⃣ pic.twitter.com/w2b3PsG6LT
— Walking._.Bucket (@hunter_tyrese) June 29, 2020
Hunter has been on the radar of NCAA Division I programs ever since Grambling State became the first to offer Hunter a scholarship the summer after his freshman year. He now has over 20 offers from DI schools from across the country.
“I’ve been around a pretty wide array of talent,” Racine St. Catherine’s coach Nick Bennett said. “Tyrese is as talented as they come. He’s a legit top 50 player in the country. You don’t get to coach a lot of those kids in high school.”
Hunter is currently ranked No. 61 on ESPN’s Top 100 and is among the top three in the state of Wisconsin for the 2021 recruiting class.
“People only know about 20% of my game,” Hunter said. “The games they go to is 10% and the highlights they watch is another 10%.”
To know the rest is to understand Hunter’s “humble beginnings” and the hard work he’s been putting in behind closed doors ever since.
“He’s got a unique story, but it’s only made him work harder,” Bennett said. “He’s one of those kids that you root for just for what he’s had to endure from such an early age.”
Hunter said he was actually a football player as a child, but he would always play basketball with his brothers and his friends. He met one of his best friends, Kamari McGee, through the sport. It wasn’t until eighth grade that basketball took priority.
“Then I lost my mom,” Hunter said. “That was a turning point. Something that made me happy was basketball. Every time I was on the basketball court my mind was clear.”
The tragic loss was amplified by the fact that Hunter had lost his father seven years earlier.
“Growing up knowing that I didn’t have my father, I wanted to make my relationship with my mother close,” Hunter said. “We were like best friends, so when I lost her it hit me hard. I’ve always been the energy of the room, so I didn’t want people to see me being down so they’d be down. I’d just hold it in.”
One of his outlets for letting all of that out was basketball.
“He’s never let that affect his work ethic,” Bennett said. “He’s never let that affect his study habits. He’s never let it affect the person that he is. He’s a wonderful young man behind the scenes. He’s personable and he’s a good teammate.”
Hunter moved in with his brother, Brian, prior to his freshman year at St. Catherine’s where he and the rest of his class was already being talked about.
“I was told my eighth graders were good,” Bennett said. “They weren’t lying to me.”
Last year, as juniors, they helped lead the Angels to an undefeated record going into the WIAA sectional finals against Kettle Moraine Lutheran. Unfortunately, the postseason was canceled due to COVID-19. If it hadn’t ended, St. Catherine’s, led by Hunter, had a great chance to make a deep run into the state tournament.
“This last year the team really became his,” Bennett said.
Hunter averaged 21.3 points, 3.5 assists and 6.6 rebounds as a scoring point guard who can just as easily be a distributor who gets his team involved in the game. Although he’s 6-foot-1, he can play above the rim because of his incredible athleticism.
St. Catherine’s will enter next season as a heavy favorite to make it to the Kohl Center in March, especially with a stellar backcourt of Hunter and his good friend McGee.
“I have two Division I point guards,” Bennett said.
McGee is also getting DI looks, and the two have pushed each other over the years.
“Seeing him push everyday and seeing him get that recognition means a lot to me personally,” Hunter said, “because I know we put a lot of work in behind closed doors. Now that it’s coming out to the light it means a lot to me. I’m excited to show people us this year.”
Hunter is also excited to prove that he is better than his No. 61 national ranking, and that all of the hard work he’s put in and all that he has been through can push him to achieve any goal he has. And he doesn’t plan to stop pushing until he reaches his ultimate goal — the NBA.
“I believe I’ve come too far to not play on the biggest stage possible and that’s my goal,” Hunter said. “It’s just so much work days in and nights out, three-a-day workouts, early mornings and late nights. There was a lot of work that went into this. I’m not going to let it go to waste.”
