At 18 years old, he never imagined he would have already worked out with LeBron James or traveled to Paris as a guest of NBA Commissioner Adam Silver. He never imagined he would have an endorsement deal with Nike, or that Alicia Keys would follow him on Instagram. Or that high schools and colleges would offer him millions of dollars just to spend a year wearing their team uniforms. “Sometimes,” AJ says, “it’s all hard to believe.” Yet when he plays against the Arizona prep powerhouse Dream City Christian School that night, it all becomes believable. He is 6 foot 9, with a power forward’s build and a point guard’s fluidity. And with apologies to Hall of Famer Patrick Ewing, Dybantsa is the most highly touted basketball recruit in Massachusetts history. Ace Dybantsa, who retired last summer after 19 years as a Boston University police officer, is sitting a few rows behind Utah Prep’s bench wearing a black winter hat, a black jacket, and jeans. In addition to being AJ’s father, he is his agent, security detail, promoter, chauffeur, and roommate. Ace carries two cellphones and constantly sprays text messages to people trying to enter his son’s orbit. It never stops. Agents, companies seeking endorsements, college coaches, and, yes, journalists hoping for interviews. “He’s getting older, and all people see on him are dollar signs,” Ace says. “Somebody’s got to protect him. Who can do a better job than the guy who changed his diapers?” When asked if he is vocal at AJ’s games, Ace smiles and shakes his head. At one point, he is frustrated that a referee did not call a foul when his son was hit. But AJ, wearing a white headband and an untucked No. 3 jersey, is unbothered as he roars to the hoop for a vicious one-handed dunk. Most often, AJ himself speaks in short, direct sentences, and if he doesn’t know you, it’s unlikely that you’ll receive a smile. But on the court he emanates confidence, barking instructions and encouragement to his teammates while shredding defenses. In the final minute of the first quarter, he drills a 3-pointer at one end before swatting one away at the other, sending a jolt of electricity through the arena. “When it comes to prospects I’ve evaluated in my 10 years, AJ is easily one of the best I’ve ever seen,” says Travis Branham, a national recruiting analyst for 247Sports. Anicet “Ace” Dybantsa Sr. grew up with five brothers and five sisters in Brazzaville, the capital of the Republic of Congo. The city’s primary language is French, but Ace wanted to communicate with his grandparents in rural villages, so when he was 7 he began teaching himself the Kilari and Kikongo dialects. At 13, Ace’s family sent him to France to pursue a better education. He lived with one older brother in the southern city of Toulouse for five years, and then with another in Paris for three. But the opportunities America offered had always enchanted him, and when he was 21 he moved in with a cousin in Boston. Ace put himself through Massasoit Community College by working as a janitor at the school and flipping cheeseburgers at McDonald’s. He taught himself English by watching television, studying newspapers, and starting conversations with strangers. After earning his associate’s degree, Ace worked at a women’s clothing store, a rental car center, and as a security guard before taking the BU police job in 2005. That same year, Ace was leaving a fitness center in Brockton when a young woman with a bright smile rolled down her window and asked where he’d parked, because she needed a spot. Chelsea Hudson had grown up in Jamaica and moved to Boston with her family when she was 13. She had graduated from Salem State with a sociology degree and became a managed care consultant. Ace was too smitten to talk to Chelsea about parking spots, but thanks to that chance meeting the two started dating and got married. And in 2007, they welcomed a son, Anicet Jr. AJ showed little interest in sports as a toddler but loved superheroes. When AJ was 5, his father bought a Spider-Man mini hoop, attached it to his door, and taught him to take shots from his bed. AJ was rapt. Ace later installed a 25-by-25-foot blacktop court in the backyard, and whenever someone was looking for AJ, that was the place to start. He carried his basketball everywhere and slept with it tucked under his arm. In sixth grade, AJ started working with trainer Brandon Ball, whose sessions at Jubilee Christian Church in Stoughton usually involved older, stronger players who were unafraid to assert themselves. “He’d come home crying because the bigger kids were beating him up at workouts,” Ace recalls. “I’d tell him, ‘If you don’t want to do it, you don’t have to.’ And he’d say, ‘I am not quitting.’” Before long, AJ was the one overpowering his older opponents. After graduating from middle school at Trinity Catholic Academy in 2021, AJ enrolled at St. Sebastian’s in Needham and repeated eighth grade, a fairly common tactic among college basketball prospects. Known as “reclassing,” the move provides an extra year to develop skills and strength. This turned out to be unnecessary for AJ, who had grown to 6 foot 6, made the varsity team, scored 34 points in his fourth game, and never looked back. “We knew we were getting a really good player,” says former St. Sebastian’s coach Dave Hinman. “But you never think you’re getting the number one kid in the country.” As a freshman the next year, AJ was named the Massachusetts Gatorade Player of the Year, and he truly burst onto the national scene that summer. He led USA Basketball to a gold medal at the FIBA U16 Americas Championship in June. A month later, while playing for his New England-based travel team, he was the leading scorer at the prestigious Nike Peach Jam tournament. St. Sebastian’s had a good basketball team and a sterling academic program. But it was obvious that AJ’s stay there would be temporary. Basketball-focused academies with more resources than many college programs had begun circling at summer events. Told by Ace that AJ might transfer, Hinman pointed out that St. Sebastian’s had given AJ a generous financial aid package. “Coach, you don’t understand,” Ace recalls responding. “If he goes to another school, they will actually pay him. So you want him to pay when he can get paid?” Hinman understood. “That,” the coach says, “was the beginning of the end.” For decades, student-athletes were barred from monetizing their skills outside of school-funded scholarships and benefits. But following sweeping changes to state laws and NCAA rules in recent years, high school and college athletes can now profit off their name, image, and likeness (known as their NIL). They are eligible to be compensated for various endorsement deals, as well as through school-affiliated donor groups known as NIL collectives. Last May, the NCAA also ruled that universities in Power 5 conferences can pay players directly. NIL funding remains most prevalent in college athletics, because few high school students are famous enough, and few programs drive enough revenue to merit substantial payments to players. But generational talents such as AJ are the exception. Prolific Prep is a 10-year-old basketball academy in Napa, California, that has produced seven NBA players, including Houston Rockets star Jalen Green. Head coach Ryan Bernardi, a Milton native, first saw AJ play in the Nike Elite Youth Basketball circuit the summer before his freshman year, when there were rumblings that he might eventually switch schools. “The time zones worked great for us,” Bernardi says, “because we’re on Pacific time and Ace was working his night shift at BU. So he’d be sitting in his cruiser at 1 a.m. and I’d call and make our pitch.” Prolific offered an NIL package to AJ, who would move back up to the class of 2025 to accelerate his path to the NBA. The school then began recruiting a host family for its newest student-athlete, and with the Dybantsas’ blessing, he was placed with Giancarlo and Karyn Bettinelli and their four young sons. Giancarlo Bettinelli is a sixth-generation wine farmer who operates vineyards in Napa. On the family’s vast, glistening property, a creek separates the main house from two barns. One was converted into the guest house where AJ lived, and the other was turned into a basketball gym. AJ is usually guarded around people he does not know, but he quickly felt at home. He learned to drive on the vineyard’s dirt roads, attended his first rodeo, ate elk and pheasant, and learned how to make wine after picking his own grapes. But Ace and Chelsea Dybantsa made it clear to the Bettinellis that their son should not be treated as if he were on vacation, and the hosts agreed. “They were like, ‘All right, since you’re one of our kids now, after dinner you also have to help clean the dishes,’” AJ says. Another Prolific Prep player, University of Michigan recruit Winters Grady, moved in with the Bettinellis later that year, and most nights AJ would team up with one Bettinelli boy, Grady would join another, and the losers of their two-on-two game would have to jump into the swimming pool with their clothes on. “Our 7-year-old calls AJ his stepbrother,” Giancarlo Bettinelli says. Ace Dybantsa flew to Prolific Prep’s weekend games to support his son, but back in Brockton, it was difficult for Chelsea Dybantsa and AJ’s sisters, Samarra and Jasmyn. Chelsea said she didn’t set foot into AJ’s room that entire school year because it would have made her too sad. On the court, AJ continued to blossom. Prolific’s coaches had a win/loss board that tracked various competitions and drills, and Bernardi said nearly two months passed before AJ lost one. That season he averaged 20.1 points and 7.3 rebounds per game while shooting a sparkling 52.9 percent from the field. “There’s very few with his natural talent coupled with consistent development,” says Branham, the 247Sports analyst. “We’re talking about a very, very special player.” Bernardi says that in this era of NIL deals and increased competition for top high school talent, elite players essentially commit for a year and keep their options open beyond that. So it was no surprise when other programs began contacting Ace, who had some reservations about Prolific’s academic program and financial agreement, though he won’t go into detail. “I didn’t like the business part at Prolific,” Ace says now. “Let’s just leave it at that.” Utah Prep, which sits at the foot of Zion National Park, opened last fall on a 55-acre campus in Hurricane. Its founders dreamed of a massive multi-sport academy to rival the prestigious IMG Academy in Florida, but this vision was, at least temporarily, scaled down due to financial hurdles. So at the start of this academic year, all 35 students were basketball players. The school saw an opportunity to make Dybantsa its cornerstone, but it would not be cheap. Ace declines to reveal specifics of the NIL deal that reportedly also includes partial ownership in the school, but he acknowledged that several high schools were prepared to pay AJ millions of dollars this year. “And Utah Prep offered us a nice package, put it that way,” Ace says. “America, it’s the land of opportunity.” The agreement also included free rent at a three-story apartment complex near campus, where AJ and Ace now live together. The only bad part, AJ says, is that his father cannot cook, and he misses his mother’s meals. They often end up at a nearby Texas Roadhouse. For Utah Prep, the early returns on their investment have been encouraging. The team has been invited to prestigious games and tournaments in large part because of AJ, many of which are broadcast on national television. The school has been selling Dybantsa jerseys for $85 apiece. And headmaster Adam Cheney has received countless calls from students wanting to play for the same team as the rising star whose highlights flood their social media feeds. “We just tell them to tell their parents that they’d like to come here,” Cheney says. “But of course when you have somebody like AJ who’s such a big name and so popular, we’ve had a lot of people inquire.” AJ’s presence has also created some urgency. In a rare move at the high school level, coach Justin Yamzon was fired midseason after a slow start and replaced by Keith Smart, a former head coach for the Golden State Warriors, Cleveland Cavaliers, and Sacramento Kings. Utah Prep is not a local high school with traditional rivalries; it is a secluded basketball factory. So although there are no home games, the team appears just about everywhere else. It has gone to China, Jamaica, Hawaii, and Toronto, among other locales, often as part of the “Grind Session,” a league of high-profile academies that face each other at neutral sites. During the week, Ace sets his alarm for 5:08 a.m. — Brockton’s area code — and waits for AJ to wake up about 20 minutes later. Then he drives him to the gym for a pre-practice workout. While AJ is at school, Ace’s other job truly begins. AJ received his first scholarship offer from Boston College when he was a freshman, and about 35 other schools followed. Ace refused to give AJ’s cellphone number to coaches until the list had been whittled to seven finalists because he did not want to overwhelm his son. “I said, ‘If you want to talk to someone, you can talk to me,’” Ace says. North Carolina, Kansas, Kansas State, USC, Auburn, Alabama, and Brigham Young made the cut. BYU got an important head start, however. Last April, when Ace and Chelsea were visiting Utah Prep to see if it would be suitable for AJ, they also spent time at BYU’s Provo campus some 250 miles northeast. The stop was organized by donors to Utah Prep who also support BYU. Then-Phoenix Suns assistant coach Kevin Young, who had been named BYU’s coach about a week earlier, was notified of the momentum involving AJ. The fact that a player of his caliber might consider the Cougars, who last produced an NBA draft pick in 2011, was creating buzz. Even though the Suns were in the middle of a first-round playoff series, Young flew to Provo to meet Ace and Chelsea. He joined them on their campus tour and laid out his vision. Last fall, AJ took his official recruiting visits. At Kansas State, local supermarkets put messages in their storefront signs urging him to consider the Wildcats. At USC, he met Chicago Bears quarterback and Trojans alumnus Caleb Williams. At Alabama’s football game against Georgia, students excitedly called out to him as he walked along the sidelines. When AJ visited BYU in October, Young emphasized his pro-level staff that included coaches, analytics experts, and a nutritionist from the Suns’ organization. “This stuff doesn’t resonate with all players,” Young says. “But a guy like AJ is going to be just a few months from playing in the NBA.” Young showed AJ how he had helped superstars Kevin Durant and Devin Booker in Phoenix, and then Durant — AJ’s favorite player — called and vouched for Young. While NIL deals were an important part of the process, Ace and Chelsea did not want a dollar amount to influence AJ’s choice. So the family requested the same flat number from the finalists: BYU, Kansas, Alabama, and North Carolina. “Everyone met it, and we didn’t ask for an extra penny,” Ace says. What if they had asked for more? “We would’ve gotten more,” Ace says. “Way more.” He declined to disclose the final number, but a source with knowledge of the college basketball NIL landscape said it is believed to be more than $5 million for one season. Soon after the campus visit, AJ told his parents he wanted to commit to BYU. They were concerned he might be acting hastily, so the family came to an agreement: AJ would submit a letter of intent during the November early-signing period, but wait until December to announce the decision. That would allow AJ to request his release if he had a change of heart, and give Ace time to organize a splashy reveal. Young was driving his son home from basketball practice when AJ called him on FaceTime and told him his decision. “He had this authentic look on his face,” Young says, “a smile that you can’t fake.” On December 10, with the choice still under wraps, AJ and Ace flew to New York, where AJ would announce his decision during an interview on ESPN’s First Take. After unzipping his jacket to reveal a BYU T-shirt and donning a Cougars hat, AJ told commentator Stephen A. Smith that he sees himself as a cross between Tracy McGrady, a Hall of Fame forward, and Shai Gilgeous-Alexander, the Oklahoma City Thunder All-Star. Sitting a few feet away, his father offered a slightly more high-profile comparison. “He plays more like, to me, LeBron,” Ace piped in, “because he does everything.” Soon after AJ’s appearance, the news crawled across a billboard in Times Square. Undeterred, other college coaches continued to reach out to Ace and make final pitches. Ace, Chelsea, and Jasmyn, a sophomore volleyball player at Cardinal Spellman High School in Brockton, plan to move to Provo for what will almost certainly be AJ’s only year there. (Jasmyn had been hoping for a school in a warmer climate, but is excited to reunite with her brother.) AJ will once again be able to savor his mother’s Jamaican specialties — rice and peas, curry chicken, oxtail, and codfish — without needing to take a red-eye flight. He will live on campus, but has already told his family he wants them to move in with him when his NBA career begins. “Next year will be like old times,” AJ predicts, “just better.” Though it was a relief for AJ to finalize his college choice, the business world swirling around him never stops. And despite having no formal training in this realm, Ace has made this his primary responsibility. In the summer of 2023, Ace and AJ went to Los Angeles and met with six agents in seven days. LeBron James even came along for the visit with Klutch Sports, the group that represents the Lakers superstar. But the Dybantsas left the city without an agreement, and Ace mostly continues to navigate the process on his own. “Ace loves to talk and he loves to negotiate,” Chelsea says. “He’s a no-nonsense type of person.” Ace has been flooded with endorsement offers for AJ but has chosen judiciously because he does not want to dilute his son’s brand. Also, he has insisted on maintaining flexibility with shorter-term agreements so AJ will be positioned to strike when he reaches the NBA. AJ ultimately agreed to NIL deals with Nike and Red Bull, but on his own terms. Ace says Nike, for example, was seeking a pact that stretched through AJ’s freshman season in college to help ensure that AJ ended up at a university that was under contract with the sneaker giant. “I said, ‘He might go to a Nike school on his own, but we don’t want to be bound by that,’” Ace says. Ace says Nike eventually softened its stance and agreed to a deal that expires this June. BYU is a Nike school, however. “They just happened to be lucky,” Ace says, smiling. Ace met NBA legend Shaquille O’Neal through a mutual acquaintance two years ago, and O’Neal asked Leonard Armato, his longtime agent, to be a sounding board for the Dybantsas. Armato referred to himself as the family’s “consigliere,” and he’s been impressed by Ace’s acumen. “Shaq used to always say, ‘I do homeboy marketing,’ which means he’s not classically trained but has great instincts, and those instincts sometimes serve you way better,” Armato says. “And I think Ace has great instincts in terms of how to manage his son effectively.” Armato says possibilities for AJ are endless. He pointed out how the NBA’s headliners — including James, Durant, and Stephen Curry — are in the twilight of their careers, and how the next wave is led by international talent such as Victor Wembanyama of the San Antonio Spurs and Luka Donˇcic´ of the Los Angeles Lakers. Armato believes there is an opening for an American-born superstar to thrive. “AJ is everything the NBA could want,” he says. It is mid-January, and Utah Prep’s game at the Hoophall Classic in Springfield has given AJ a rare opportunity to rush home to Brockton. He is fiercely loyal to his small city and talks about opening a gym there someday. “We’ve had boxers Rocky Marciano and Marvin Hagler, but not a lot of basketball players,” AJ says. “I just want to put on for my hometown. I want to be the first.” On this icy afternoon, he is back at his old elementary school, Edgar B. Davis K-8, to give Nike sneakers, socks, and basketballs to members of the boys and girls basketball teams. He has done giveaways at other schools and recreation centers in the area over the years, too. AJ says his charitable side was instilled in him by his parents. During a trip to the Republic of Congo when he was 5, his father brought boxes of pens and pencils to donate to schools there. AJ didn’t understand why they were just giving them away. “I said it’s because they don’t have what we have, so we have to do what we can,” Ace recalls. “I told him one day it would be his turn.” At Davis, handmade signs congratulating AJ on his commitment to BYU and thanking him for his visit are taped to concrete walls. He takes questions from students and poses for pictures. One girl holds out her cellphone to take a selfie with him, then walks away gasping and staring at the photo with her friend. That night, AJ will sit courtside at TD Garden when the Celtics face the Magic, and Jayson Tatum, Jaylen Brown, and Orlando star Paolo Banchero will all seek him out. But before all that, the Dybantsas are heading home to enjoy a rare quiet moment as a family. With the court tucked in the backyard, there are no obvious indications that teenagers live here, much less one of the nation’s best basketball prospects in years. Chelsea does not think many of her neighbors even know about AJ, and the family is enjoying the anonymity while it exists. Inside, AJ, Jasmyn, and Samarra, who attends the University of Massachusetts Boston, needle each other like they did when they were kids. It’s irrelevant that one is now famous. All three still receive a monthly allowance, and during this visit, AJ’s name was put back onto the chore board on the refrigerator. When a visitor asks to see AJ’s room to look at some of his basketball honors, Ace smiles and says it’s just too messy right now. After AJ picks up a basketball, and leaves to go pick up an order from IHOP, his mother pulls out a book made by his first-grade class, in which the students share their interests and dreams. She opens it to AJ’s page, where four sentences are written cleanly in black marker. “My name is Anicet Dybantsa. I am seven years old. My favorite thing about first grade is gym class. When I grow up, I’d like to be a basketball player.”
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