Signing with Arizona Wildcats 'a dream come true' for KJ Lewis

KJ Lewis made it official last week: the former Tucson resident is returning home to play for the Arizona Wildcats.

The four-star shooting guard, who spent the first half of his childhood living in the Rita Ranch-Vail area, inked a national letter-of-intent to join the UA next season.

“It feels pretty good. It’s a dream come true,” Lewis said. “Not too many know how much time I’ve spent in the gym, just me and my mom, putting in hours. It’s a blessing and one step closer to my ultimate goal.”

The 6-foot-4-inch, 185-pound Lewis is the lone signee of Arizona’s 2023 recruiting class after 17-year-old five-star point guard Kylan Boswell — who finished Thursday’s rout of Utah Tech with one rebound and one turnover in 17 minutes — reclassified to 2022.

“I feel great where we’re at because Kylan Boswell (was) a class of 2023 (player) but we have him here right now,” said Arizona coach Tommy Lloyd. “So, basically we have two All-American level guards and I think that’s a great place to start and we’ll have some flexibility moving forward, which is a great position to be in this day and age in college basketball.”

Lloyd compared Lewis to Boston Celtics guard Marcus Smart, who was named the NBA Defensive Player of the Year last season, the first guard to earn those honors since Gary Payton in 1995.

“He’s a great two-way player who really really impacts the game at both ends,” Lloyd said of Lewis.

Lewis joined the Star’s Justin Spears on ESPN Tucson’s “Spears and Ali” on Thursday.

Here’s how the conversation went down:

What about signing with Arizona makes it a “dream come true?”

A: “I grew up an Arizona fan, so that’s part of the dream, but also just playing at the highest level of college basketball and being put on that stage, competing on the highest level and getting to my ultimate goal, which is the NBA. As a little kid, I always dreamed about going to the U of A and playing at McKale in front of the fan base. It’s crazy how life comes full-circle.”

Do you remember your first game at McKale Center as a kid?

A: “Ooh, I don’t. I went to a couple actually, but I don’t remember my first one.”

How unique was the viewing experience earlier in the season, when you visited for Red-Blue Game?

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A: “The thing that was going through my mind was how much the fans are invested in the basketball program. It’s a basketball school and it’s just crazy to see that energy given to the players and the coaching staff. As a basketball player, that’s what you want to play in front of. I enjoy that, and I’m the type of player to feed off energy. To have a supporting crowd like that, it’s amazing.”

What’s your recruiting timeline and how did you land at the UA?

A: “At the start of the recruiting process, Coach (Steve) Robinson was the one to first start recruiting me — I wanna say, like, early January of my junior year. Coach Lloyd had just gotten the job and they were trying to figure out things with their team. Coach Robinson came to a game, saw me play a few weeks later at another game, then two days later, Coach Lloyd was there and he offered me. I took a visit there in February to see them play against USC. I committed later in March and have been committed since. They’ve been solid in my recruitment. They’ve been telling me the truth and what I needed to work on. They came to every game they could’ve (gone to). … I’ve felt love from every coach on the staff and even some of the players on the team, like Dalen (Terry) and Benn (Mathurin). I felt the love from the first moment I stepped on campus.”

How do you envision your role at Arizona?

A: “I see my role being both Benn and Dalen, but more of Dalen’s energy and defensive side of the ball, then Benn on the offensive side, making the right plays and keeping people involved. I think I’m a little bit of both when it comes to my role next year.”

Lloyd compared you to Marcus Smart, is that an accurate comparison?

A: “I think that’s a great comparison, actually. I watch a lot of film of Marcus Smart. I get after it on the defensive end and guard the opposing team’s best player and make it rough on him. On the offensive side, if the team needs a bucket, I can get that or feed the hot hand to my teammate. I think that’s a great comparison. I just want to come in and affect the game in different ways, get on the court and make winning plays. I just want to win some games, that’s the biggest thing. I want to come in and make an impact right away.”

What do you make of Boswell’s skill set and how do you think it will complement your game?

A: “I’ve been playing against Kylan since my summer as a sophomore. He’s a great player and another two-way player. He can score the ball, he can shoot, gets his teammates involved — he’s a real PG. I think it’s going to be deadly. I think we’re going to have one of the best backcourts in the nation actually. We have good chemistry, we’re both unselfish and we both get after it on the defensive end, so it’s going to be fun playing with him.”

Are you planning on enrolling early this spring or will you join the team in the summer?

A: “As of now, me and my family are going to wait until the summer and get here in the summer. If anything changes, I’ll let the coaches know. As of now, we’re just going to get through my last high school season.”

You said earlier that Lloyd and the other coaches were honest with you and told you about things you need to work on, what are they?

A: “Staying confident in my shooting ability, making better reads, being a better leader and just little things, like my defensive stuff, ball handling, change of pace — just a bunch of little things. That’s what I’m doing and, again, I’m just trying to come in and make an impact right away.”

Photos: Wildcats defeat Utah Tech, men's basketball