Markquis Nowell: The under-the-radar talent

Marquise Noel, the tough New York City point guard. Marquise's personality is very humble, but at the same time, he's like a silent killer. We're down to eight seconds left. They blitz him. You have somebody who's 5'8", and he's lightning fast, and he can shoot from across half. It takes you out of your comfort zone. My name is Marquise Noel. I'm 23 years old, and I play basketball. What up, what up? I was wondering where y'all was at, man. Isaiah must have got lost or something again. A detailed description of my day would look like, wake up, get breakfast, probably stretch, you know, do some yoga, and then I head to the gym around nine o'clock, get my work in for about an hour and 32 hours. The trainer I have in the shot, his name is Basil, and we work on ball handling, shooting off the dribble, creating space, everything. Some things that we're working on is working on his dribbling, of course, his left hand, his jump shot, and his floater. Right now we're in the gym with Basil and Keys. We're working out for the pre-draft combine. We're just making sure that all the tools in his chest are sharp. Combine is in two days. We just want to make sure all of our finishes are sharp, all of our long-range shots are sharp, to make sure that we're fully prepared for the combine. I'm locked in, you know, I'm more prepared than ever. I can't wait, you know, I'm going there, be a dog. Mentally, I'm sharp. I feel like I'm the most sharp I've ever been. Just preparing for the G League, preparing for the competition. I'm ready. I'm from Harlem, New York. Grew up on the Upper East Side of Harlem. Just growing up, you know, it wasn't the prettiest, it wasn't the best, but, you know, basketball gave me that escape from everything that was going on in my outside life. So growing up, Marquis always showed glimpses somebody that was interested in basketball i was more focused on my game but i've seen his love for it and i knew that he kind of at that moment loved it more than me and um i would never forget that day that he talked about when we sat across from each other on the twin beds and i asked him i said what do you want to be when you grow up he said an nba player and from that day you know i told myself that i was going to do everything as a brother to pour into him um to at least get him to his goal so one of my clients who plays for the New Orleans Pelicans Jose Alvarado he's connected with Marquise and Marcus and then just through a mutual nba person who connected me to jose he thought i did such a good job with jose that he thought you know me working with marquise would be you know a good idea and so far so good what i love about my position the most is that i'm like the coach on the court so i get to you know hold my teammates accountable while holding myself accountable and just be you know the leader that my team you know may need what makes marquis stand out is his heart his intellect his ability to be connected with other teammates and players on his team and be an extension of the coach you know this year as you've seen him and his coach got along his coach let him run whatever play he wanted so his coach had full trust in him and gave the keys to the car i think the way that he plays is unique in the fact that As a leader, he knows what his team needs. So if he needs to go out and score 30, he can do that. If he needs to go out and have 20 assists, he can do that. If he needs to, you know, go out and play defense, he can do that. I think he's one of the few players in this draft who can take over a game in every aspect of basketball statistics, not only scoring or rebounding or, you know, assists, but defensively as well. Having him We're going to go 5-5-5. There you go. What I think the future holds for Marquise is He's gonna be one of the smaller statured guards to come out of our city and inspire so many guards and open up a door for the NBA to put some respect on smaller guards. You know, don't overlook me because I'm not four inches taller. The motto of Heart Over Height means just everything you do flows through your heart. If you have a big enough heart, it don't matter how tall you are, how short you are, or how talented you are. If you got heart, you can do anything you put your mind to. For me, my goal for Marquise is just to be the best point guard in the NBA, right? I don't want him to be the best, you know, point guard for a certain team, or I don't want him to imitate or emulate another player. I want him to be the best version of himself. And I think what that brings to a team, the right team, will be more impactful than him trying to, you know, go be, you know, Stephen Curry or John Moran. Success to me will be impacting kids and people's lives, similar to how Kobe Bryant and Michael Jordan did for me and Nipsey Hussle. So I feel like mentally to prepare for the draft, I'm keeping my faith high. I'm speaking to God a lot more. I'm being around a great group of men who keep me grounded and who keep me, you know, on the right track. And I'm just continuing to be myself. There was a quote that Nipsey Hussle said that the greatest human act is to inspire. So I feel like that really sat with me because the way that they inspired me to push and persevere and be successful, that's how I want to be to somebody else.