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.
Basketball has always been considered a big man’s game, but on a few rare occasions a giant has emerged who didn’t necessarily have the stature of a traditional “big.” Larry Johnson was one of those players.
Larry Demetric Johnson was born March 14, 1969 in Tyler, Texas and his basketball prowess began to blossom during his time at Skyline High School in Dallas where, as a senior, he was a consensus All-American, earned Mr. Basketball USA honors, and was named a member of the 1987 McDonald’s High School All-American Team.
Initially Johnson intended on remaining close to home to play for the Southern Methodist Mustangs but a university dispute over an SAT score landed him not far away at Odessa College where he spent the 1987-88 and ‘88-‘89 seasons.
He averaged 22.3 points per game his freshman year and over 29 per game as a sophomore, becoming the first player ever to win the National Junior College Athletic Association Division 1 Player of the Year award twice. Some believed Johnson could have been a first round draft pick in 1989, possibly even a lottery pick, had he declared for early entry.
He may have been a 6-7, 235 pound undersized power forward, but what really put him on the map was his short two-year stint in Las Vegas (1990-1992) as captain of the University of Nevada, Las Vegas Runnin’ Rebels.
Following his success at Odessa, Johnson made his way west to Las Vegas to play for renowned (and sometimes controversial) head coach Jerry Tarkanian.
It was also there where he would play alongside future NBA stars Greg Anthony and Stacey Augmon, and with a host of other players that would have been stars on any other team in the country, and helped build the popular Runnin’ Rebel basketball brand worldwide.
With an outstanding 34-5 record in tow, Johnson and the Rebels faced the Duke Blue Devils in the championship game of the 1990 NCAA Men’s Division I Basketball Tournament and went on to win the title 103–73, with Johnson posting a 22 point and 11 rebound stat line.
“When I was in Vegas,” he once said, “people asked, ‘Did you ever regret not going to SMU?’ “What? I’m in Vegas. I’m on TV every Saturday. I’m winning titles. Did I regret it? That’s a silly question.”
During a turbulent offseason, however, UNLV was cited for a series of recruiting violations by the NCAA and it was agreed that the university would be allowed to defend its title the upcoming (1990–91), but would be suspended from post-season play the following year. Johnson and the Rebels responded by going 27–0 during the regular season.
Fast forward to that year’s NCAA Tournament, UNLV went on to win the West Regional only to be upset by eventual champion Duke in the Final Four. Johnson was named a First Team All-American, Big West Conference Player of the Year and tournament Most Valuable Player in both of his seasons with the Rebels. He also won the prestigious John R. Wooden Award and was named Naismith College Player of the Year in 1991.
By the time his college playing days had come to an end he was the only player to win a version of national player of the year at the high school, junior college, and NCAA Division I levels. It’s also important to note that he returned to school and earned his Bachelor’s of Arts degree in social science studies at UNLV in 2007, a full 16 years after leaving the school for the NBA.
Johnson’s outstanding collegiate career made him the No. 1 overall pick in the 1991 NBA draft by the Charlotte Hornets, and he would go on to win the NBA Rookie of the Year Award that season.
The following year he was voted a starter in that year’s All-Star Game, making him the first Hornet in franchise history to receive that honor.
In 1993, Johnson signed what was then the most lucrative deal in NBA history, a 12-year, $84 million contract with the Hornets, however, a back injury led him to miss 31 games that season. The following summer he played for the USA National Team (Dream Team II) in the 1994 FIBA World Championships, winning the gold medal. He would spend five successful seasons with the Hornets before being traded to the New York Knicks prior to the 1995-96 season.
As a Knick, Johnson struggled to return to his former All-Star form due to the injury, but he was a big part of the New York’s 1999 Eastern Conference championship team. In October 2001, he announced his retirement from the game.
Post-retirement Johnson dabbled in acting on television and the big screen with roles on the sitcom Family Matters and in the original Space Jam movie with Michael Jordan, among other roles. But he may be more widely remembered for his string of sneaker commercials after signing an endorsement deal with Converse where he appeared as his “Grandmama” playing basketball.
“These are my new shoes from Converse,” Johnson said in the first in the series. “They’re so light and so fast my grandmama can whoop you in them.”
I have to admit I dressed up as “Grandmama” one Halloween in the early ‘90s. Good luck finding those photos.