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WHAT'S MY NAME?
WORDS. Andrew Greif PHOTO. adidas
Jordan Tebbutt
Jordan Tebbutt arrived early, so the first time Brad and Jennifer Tebbutt saw their adopted son was four days after his birth, in a Little Rock, Ark., hospital on an August day.
Two years before, the Tebbutts adopted at birth a daughter, Chelsey, in Portland. Wanting to adopt again brought them to Arkansas, where they considered gifts for their new son. For parents who admit to "not being involved in athletic things at all" growing up themselves, they came up with quite the prescient idea.
"We named him Jordan and thought, 'Wouldn't it be funny if we went out and got him Air Jordans for his first shoe?'" says Brad Tebbutt, a chaplain and teacher.
The shoe fit.
Hoops has stayed with Jordan Tebbutt seemingly ever since, and leads to his latest arrival. Tebbutt left small Horizon Christian in a Portland, Ore., suburb after a dominant three-year span to go across the nation to one of the nation's best- known basketball brand names, Oak Hill Academy in Mouth of Wilson, Va., for his senior season.
"I know some guys who are there right now but it wasn't really like they were working on me to come," says Tebbutt, mentioning AAU teammates and friends Jordan Adams, Damien Wilson and A.J. Hammons. "It's always been on the back of my mind and now we just kind of shot out to them and they said we want you to be part of our fam."
How did a combo guard who didn't play national AAU ball until a year ago claim a spot at his "dream school" on one of the nation's toughest rosters, following the likes of Oak Hill alumni guards Bran- don Jennings, Ty Lawson and Rajon Rondo? Certainly, he's good.
Ranked in the top 100 of the Class of 2012, Tebbutt is a versatile 6-3, ripped 210-pound player who can play both guard positions and the wing. As a physically mature slasher – his AAU coach calls him "an Adonis" – his frame allows him to defend guards and forwards alike. Other prep schools offered scholarships, and other Portland- area high schools inquired about a transfer as he averaged more than 20 points and nine rebounds per game playing nearly every position for the Hawks last year. Before winning his second straight Class 3A Player of the Year award and a second straight state title, he dropped 41 at the Les Schwab Invitational in nearby Hillsboro, the same tournament Oak Hill has won four times and will play in again this December.
"He's kind of a quiet kid, he's a quiet competitor, but he definitely competes," says Double Pump Elite coach Christian Aurand, who's directly worked with Tebbutt beginning this summer. "With his
frame he gets down that lane and there's not many guys who are going to get in his way."
He's on the radar of every Pac-12 school, as coaches came away impressed with his play and a humble side that belies his na- tionally touted game with Double Pump.
"I heard one Pac-12 coach tell me that's the best that I've seen him," says Aurand.
But as much as he fit Oak Hill's style, it was equally important the school fit him and his family. The move represents the next progression for the Tebbutts, who guided their son from strictly mid-level regional teams through his freshman year to the national scene as a sophomore. All this despite knowing nearly nothing about the game before Jordan's childhood, when he would watch NBA videos in first grade be- fore mimicking moves in their cul-de-sac.
They believe it's curbed basketball burn- out and fostered a breakout.
"You always heard about it, but the funny thing is there's so much on the East Coast," says Tebbutt of the adjustment. "Definitely it's like, 'Wow.' Because playing in Oregon sometimes no one else is out there, so once I got out to nationals it was alright the first couple times, but guys started picking my pocket, blocking my shots. In Oregon I was dunking or would get a floater, I definitely had to change."
The school's national hardwood profile was the advertisement that caught Jordan's eye six years earlier, but its similarities to Horizon Christian's ideals were the selling point. They offered him a scholar- ship last year after he visited the school with his mother in August. In the myopic AAU landscape, his father believes taking the long view was the right choice.
"I fell in love with basketball because my kid did," says Brad Teb- butt, who was spending vacation at the family's home while his wife traveled with Jordan in Indianapolis. "But it's really easy as a parent to get caught up and make it more important than it is."
Now Jordan Tebbutt is preparing for his first day of school at Oak Hill after a summer of trying to show his versatility.
"I like to drive it more than I like to pull-up," says Tebbutt. "I know what you're trying to expect."
In what is his latest hoops arrival, he believes his game is ready to take the leap with him.
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