LAS VEGAS — A self-described late bloomer who grew into a standout college basketball player at Utah, Pace Mannion figured his son might be an even more extreme case.
Nico Mannion was born on March 14, 2001, about six weeks early. Fourteen years later, Nico was just 5 feet 6 inches tall and weighed about 130 pounds.
Pace and his wife, Gaia, didn’t think their son had caught up yet.
“He’s always been tiny,” Pace said.
Nico was talented, there was no doubt. Bloodlines made sure of that. Pace played professionally in the NBA and in Europe, and Gaia was a professional volleyball player in Italy. The parents could see elite skills emerging out of their red-topped boy as early as third grade.
So to hope that talent had a better chance to pair with a developed body, they put Nico through a second year of eighth grade, a deceleration Nico reversed last week when he announced he would skip a grade and join the class of 2019, instantly making him a top priority among the rising high school seniors Arizona is recruiting.
“The doctor says he’ll probably grow until he’s 20 because he was a preemie,” Pace said. “We just didn’t know what his growth was going to be so we held him back. We told him, ‘You can always go back if you feel it’s right.’ It was the maturity and all of those things. Now we don’t feel there’s any need to play the last year of high school.”
This summer, Pace said, it became obvious. Nico was already a five-star prospect in the class of 2020 and playing well for the high-level West Coast Elite club in the Under Armour travel-ball circuit, even as he wasn’t sure if wanted to reclassify.
“I really wasn’t into doing it until two or three months ago,” Nico says. “My dad had kind of got it in my mind, like ‘Hey, you should think about reclassifying.’ He didn’t force me but he told me, ‘These are the pros, these are he cons.’
“Once he told me, it was more towards the pros so I figured I might as well do it and get it over with. It’s about development and not having to spend another year in high school. I’d rather just get to college and take a year there.”
The decision was cemented when Nico trained with and played for Italy’s national team in the FIBA World Cup qualifying game earlier this month (he’s a dual U.S.-Italian citizen, with Gaia being Italian and Pace having played professionally in the country). He had nine points and two rebounds while playing a team-high 29 minutes in Italy’s 81-66 loss to the Netherlands.
The preemie, suddenly, was thriving against the big boys.
“He played in Italy with grown men for a month. Once we saw that, we knew he could play at the college level,” Pace said. “The college game will never be as physical as what he went through over in Europe. They don’t call moving screens and they let you handcheck. It’s much more physical.
“That’s when we really realized ‘OK, there’s no doubt he’s ready to play at the college level.’”
The Italian experience also gave Mannion another opportunity to take advantage of: Lots of time in between practices, meetings and meals to hop online and take courses.
Knowing he might reclassify, Nico took courses in English and math over the summer. He and his parents went through Pinnacle High School to find an online program that could help him get ahead.
Nico says he has to take two more extra courses during what is now his senior year, and he doesn’t appear a bit worried about it.
“It hasn’t been so crazy,” Mannion said. “Classes went pretty smooth. Whenever I had downtime I’d knock some hours out and go from there. When I was in Italy, I had a lot of downtime. If I’m on an airplane and I can connect, I’ll do it, or if I’m at home and have nothing to do.”
But the athletic and scholastic hurdles aren’t the only ones Nico is clearing. He’s also mature and confident, having been aware since he started excelling in the sport that his skills and appearance make him something of a target.
That all became more intense after Sports Illustrated approached him during his freshman season to write a longform profile on him as a teenager straddling the lines between normalcy and athletic stardom. But that’s also when Pace realized his son could handle that spotlight.
The story, published in Feb. 2017, was headlined: “A 15-year-old (sorta maybe) basketball prodigy.”
“I talked to Nico before the article and we discussed do you want to do it?” Pace said. “I said to him, ‘If you do it, it just puts a bigger bullseye on your back.’ He said, ‘Dad, I’m a white kid with red hair. I’ve got a bullseye already. … Everybody knows me. There’s no hiding. He handled it really well.”
“Nico’s been in the limelight for a long time. He’s not the arrogant kid. He just handles it how you’re supposed to handle it. We’ve always told him, ‘You don’t’ need to celebrate a 3. You don’t need to show somebody up when you get a dunk. You just need to get back and play defense.’ He’s taking that to heart and trying to do that.”
He just plays very well. So much so that Nico’s reclassification actually set back his plans to announce a list of five finalist this week, because, well, Roy Williams and John Calipari suddenly decided to pick up the phone.
“North Carolina did call, Kentucky called,” Mannion said Wednesday, after leading West Coast Elite to a 79-71 win in the Under Armour tournament. “I didn’t get to talk to Roy (the UNC coach) but my dad talked to him. I talked to Calipari (of Kentucky) twice in the last week.”
That’s probably not good news for Arizona, although the Wildcats have impressed the Pinnacle High School star during several unofficial visits, including last season’s Red-Blue Game and regular-season games against UConn and UCLA.
“I’ve been there quite a few times,” Mannion said. “The environment is great. Even the Red-Blue Game is just a scrimmage and a dunk contest but it’s sold out. There’s not much you can say about it — it’s just a great environment.”
Mannion said he’s planning to cut his list down sometime after the July evaluation period ends this weekend and then start scheduling visits. But he said he isn’t planning to make a commitment until January or February because he wants to take official visits during the season in order to get a feel for the regular-season environment.
Mannion said he thinks Arizona might change to a more perimeter-oriented, faster style next season and that he’s curious to see how it plays out.
“I want to watch them play and see how their style changes, if it changes,” Mannion said, and “see who they recruit, who’s coming in and who’s staying and stuff like that.”
While Nico is watching his final choices play next season, everyone will keep watching him, too. He’ll be busy, and under the spotlight as much as ever.
But, in more ways than one, Nico is now big enough to handle it.
“I believe he’s the best point guard in the country, so (reclassifying) is something we’ve been thinking about for years,” said Ryan Silver, director of the West Coast Elite club. “He’s a special, special kid.
“He’s ready. He’s ready.”
