MEMPHIS, Tenn. — A conversation with his father started Jaye Nash on his basketball journey.
"Around eighth grade I wanted to make a living off of [basketball]," Jaye recalled. "My dad told me I have to be serious if you want to be great. All the things you want to do, you have to work for it. I'm working now and I'm just trying to get better every day."
That work has turned into four stars (per Rivals), 18 Division I offers, and counting. The junior point guard's first offer came from his hometown, the Memphis Tigers.
"It was a real humbling and exciting experience," Nash said. "It showed me I could be something if I just keep working."
After the Memphis offer, Ole Miss, Mississippi State, Illinois, Florida, Alabama, Creighton, Mizzou, Texas A&M, Texas Tech, Arizona State, St. John's, Cincinnati, Wake Forest, and Alabama State all followed suit, among others. Nash plans to take unofficial visits to Baylor and USC offers came in July. Auburn, Kentucky, LSU and Seton Hall have also expressed interest.
"That's really big for a kid his age to be getting a lot of the national attention," Jay Nash, Jaye's father, said. "We try to keep him humble because he's still got a long way to go."
The draw to Jaye is his ability to run an offense as an effective pass-first point guard. But, that reputation got around to opposing teams last winter.
"They were playing me like I wasn't going to shoot it," Jaye said. "This year, I'm going to make them pay for sure."
Nash is the latest Briarcrest point guard on the rise. Kennedy Chandler, the newest Memphis Grizzly, once roamed those same halls. Now he is guiding Jaye as he begins his recruiting process.
"Kennedy is like a big brother to him," Jay said. "He critiques him and tells him like 'Shoot the ball!' He gets on him about different things. Looking back it's definitely been beneficial for Jay to have someone like Kennedy there that he can look up to and try to emulate things that he has done."
"I've still got to work," Jaye said. "I've still got to put in the grind. Because this isn't where I want to stop. I want to keep going."