By Lee Strawther
The Sporting Tribune
The John R. Wooden Award will celebrate it’s 50th anniversary this season. Leading up to the award ceremony on April 10, 2026, The Sporting Tribune in partnership with the Wooden Award and the Los Angeles Athletic Club will highlight past winners of the Wooden Award and the Legends of Coaching Award.
Would you want to play alongside a teammate who sometimes goes by the moniker “The Slim Reaper”? From most hoopheads the answer would be a resounding yes!
Kevin Wayne Durant, also known as KD, was born September 29, 1988 in Washington, D.C. and was raised by his mother and grandmother. He and his siblings would grow up in nearby Prince George’s County, Maryland, and after playing two years of high school basketball at National Christian Academy and one year at Oak Hill Academy (both in the DMV area), he transferred to Montrose Christian School in Maryland for his senior year, growing 5 inches to 6-7 before the start of the season.
By season’s end Durant was named the Washington Post All-Met Player of the Year, as well as the Most Valuable Player of the 2006 McDonald’s All-American Game. The all-american, who committed to the University of Texas prior to the start of his senior year, was widely regarded as the second-best prep prospect of 2006 behind seven-foot center Greg Oden.
“Every memory I had growing up was involving a basketball,” he would say. “I didn’t go to the prom and stuff like that. It was always basketball for me.”
Durant visited Connecticut and North Carolina, and also considered Duke, Kentucky and Louisville, but when asked why he chose a lesser-regarded program like Texas, Durant simply uttered, “Wanted to set my own path.”
He also stated that he would have declared for the 2006 NBA draft had the NBA’s one-and-done rule not been in affect. Ironically, his favorite team growing up, the Toronto Raptors, had the first pick in that year’s draft.
Durant’s college career was short but he accomplished in one year what many failed to in four.
For the 2006–07 college season he had grown to 6-9 and averaged 25.8 points, 11.1 rebounds, and 1.3 assists per game for the Longhorns, who earned a No. 4 seed in that year’s NCAA Tournament.
Texas lost to USC in the second round despite a 30-point and nine rebound performance from Durant, but for his body of work he was recognized as the unanimous national player of the year, winning the coveted John R. Wooden and Naismith College Player of the Year Awards, in addition to the eight other widely recognized honors handed out to players each year.
“I don’t know how our team is but I will tell you this, we’ve got the best player in the country,”Texas head coach Rick Barnes would say of Durant when he arrived on campus.
Following the season he declared for the NBA draft, had his No. 35 jersey retired by the Longhorns, and would go on to be selected with the second overall pick by the Seattle SuperSonics (currently the Oklahoma City Thunder).
By the end of his first professional season (2007–08) Durant was named the NBA Rookie of the Year after averaging 20.3 points, 4.4 rebounds and 2.4 assists per game.
He played nine seasons with the franchise, leading them to an NBA Finals appearance in 2012 and winning the MVP award for the following year. He signed with Golden State in 2016, who won a record 73 regular season games the previous year, and would win consecutive NBA championships and Finals MVPs in 2017 and 2018 with the Wariors.
After suffering an injury to his Achilles in the 2019 NBA Finals, he joined the Brooklyn Nets as a free agent in the offseason but requested a trade three years later and was dealt to the Phoenix Suns. After two full seasons with Phoenix, he was traded to the Houston Rockets in July 2025.
Durant has won two NBA championships, four Olympic gold medals, an NBA Most Valuable Player Award, two NBA Finals MVP awards, two NBA All-Star Game MVP Awards, four NBA scoring titles, in addition to his Rookie of the Year honor. He has also been named to 11 All-NBA teams (including six First Teams) and selected as an NBA All-Star 15 times. In 2021, he was named to the NBA 75th Anniversary Team, and ranks eighth on the league’s all-time scoring list.
As a member of the U.S. National Team, Durant’s Olympic gold medals came in the 2012, 2016, 2020 and 2024 Games. He is the leading scorer in Team USA’s Olympic basketball history, and in 2024 he became the first male athlete to win four Olympics gold medals in a team sport. He also won gold at the 2010 FIBA World Championship, which made him the only player in basketball history with MVPs in the NBA, Olympics and World Cup.
Off the court, Durant is one of the highest-earning basketball players in the world, due in part to his endorsement deals, most notably his shoe and apparel contract with Nike. He is regularly among the league leaders in All-Star voting and jersey sales, and in 2018 he was one of Time Magazine’s 100 most influential people in the world.
“With everything I do, I just try to be myself,” he’s been quoted as saying, another time adding, ”I don’t know what I’m going to do tomorrow. I just know for sure I’m going to keep playing basketball.”