INGLEWOOD, Calif. — Practice just wrapped up at Morningside High School on a January night, and the vibes around the gym are high. It’s been a few days since Jason Crowe Jr. played in the Hoophall Classic, known as one of the premier showcases in high school basketball. The event in Springfield, Mass., is full of private and prep school teams, which Inglewood High School — the school Crowe attends and the community he knows best — is not.
It’s symbolic, in a way, of why Crowe is considered an anomaly in the modern high school basketball landscape. He is the only player ranked inside the top 10 of 247Sports’ rankings of the 2026 recruiting class who has played his entire high school career at public schools.
It’s during this showcase, on the complete other side of the country, that many in attendance are watching the future Missouri Tiger and the most prolific scorer in high school basketball for the first time. The fans in attendance certainly got their money’s worth after Crowe set an event record by dropping 48 points in a win over Notre Dame-West Haven, a prep school in Connecticut.
For most prep basketball players, that would have been a historic outing. But for Crowe, it’s just another night.
“He’s the best high school scorer since probably Chris Jackson (now known as Mahmoud Abdul-Rauf),” Missouri coach Dennis Gates told CBS Sports over the phone in late January. “From a scoring standpoint. This is something that hasn’t been done. And how he’s able to do it, he’s not overpowering guys. … A lot of kids can’t do what Jason Crowe Jr. is doing in three games, let alone in one.”
Crowe has averaged at least 35 points per game in all four of his high school seasons, including a jaw-dropping 43.8 points per game this year. He began his prep career at Lynwood High School, located outside of Los Angeles, before transferring to Inglewood ahead of his junior year. The latter is a place with deep meaning to his family. His father, Jason Crowe Sr., who is also his high school coach at Inglewood, played basketball at the school in the 1990s. His grandfather, Kenneth Crowe, was a principal at Inglewood in the 1990s.
Instead of following the trend of many that came before him and many that are sure to come after him by going the prep/private route for high school, Crowe remained loyal to his hometown. When Crowe exits high school basketball for good, he will leave with a comfortable cushion on the California scoring record that others will have a hard time passing.
Crowe broke the previous record (3,569 points) that was set by current Baylor forward Tounde Yessoufou last year. He has 4,600 points and counting in his prep career.
“My whole life I’ve been doing the untraditional route,” Jason Crowe Jr. told CBS Sports in January inside the weight room at Morningside High School. “Playing with a newer AAU team, going to Lynwood (High School) my freshman and sophomore years, and then going to Inglewood and staying at a public school when everyone (else goes the) prep route. Doing the untraditional route is what I’m accustomed to. It’s what I’m used to.”
Even if this is what Crowe had been accustomed to, it would’ve been easy for him to jump ship under the current circumstances. Inglewood High School is currently under construction, which means Crowe and his classmates are temporarily enrolled at Morningside, a school that was built in the early 1950s. Morningside closed down at the end of the last school year due to declining enrollment. Inglewood High School is expected to reopen sometime in late 2027 or early 2028.
It’s one of the reasons why the family was aligned on staying in their community. The younger Crowe is a recognizable face in town because of his talent and his ties to the community. Inglewood is extremely tight-knit. That’s why so many people return — or never leave in the first place.
“The difference between Inglewood and Los Angeles is that we actually know our mayor,” Jason Crowe Sr. said. “And we can get in contact with him. This is a real small community. So, when you represent a community like this, there is so much pride being from here and representing from here.”
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With his history, it shouldn’t be surprising that Crowe didn’t chase a blue blood for his college choice. Crowe is the most highly-regarded recruit that Missouri has had in almost a decade. Ranked the No. 5 overall player in the 2026 recruiting cycle by 247Sports, Crowe committed to the Tigers last summer despite interest from programs such as Kentucky, Arkansas, USC and Washington.
Crowe’s connection with a basketball Hall of Famer
When Jason Sr. played at Inglewood, he crossed paths with a very familiar face for basketball junkies: Paul Pierce. Crowe and Pierce aren’t just former classmates. They remain very good friends to this day.
When Pierce was enshrined in the Naismith Memorial Hall of Fame in 2021 — the same place where Crowe dropped 48 points last month — his family was there for the moment. During Pierce’s HOF speech, he gave Crowe Sr. a shoutout while reflecting on their high school days.
“J Crowe, my best friend,” Paul said during his induction speech in 2021. “You’re my best friend … You weren’t highly recruited, but I think we really pushed each other. We didn’t have trainers like we have today. We would push each other, six in the morning.”
After high school, Pierce played at Kansas for Roy Williams before a 19-year NBA career with the Boston Celtics, Brooklyn Nets, Washington Wizards, and Los Angeles Clippers. As for the elder Crowe, he competed at L.A. Trade-Tech, American, and Cal State Northridge before playing for a decade overseas.
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The bond Crowe Sr. and Pierce shared from their playing days led directly to the former 10-time NBA All-Star watching over his son’s basketball journey. Pierce, Tony Allen and Rajon Rondo — Pierce’s former teammates with the Boston Celtics — showed up to support Crowe Jr. during the first game of his senior season.
The younger Crowe dropped 43 points in front of basketball royalty that night.
“That’s always great as a parent when you have a Hall of Fame guy that’s there giving advice,” Jason Sr. said. “I don’t always have to be the guy. I can let Paul do it. Paul is going to be encouraging. But he’s going to be honest. It’s helped him tremendously to have Paul in his corner.”
How did Crowe end up at Missouri?
When Crowe was trying to make the jump from playing overseas to the NBA in the early 2000s, he crossed paths with a young Dennis Gates. At the time, Gates was a lower-level staffer with the Los Angeles Clippers while Crowe was trying to land on an NBA roster.
Before Gates became the coach at Missouri in 2022, he grinded his way through the college ranks as an assistant at stops such as Florida State, Nevada, Cal and Northern Illinois before getting his first shot as a head coach in 2019 at Cleveland State. Gates guided Missouri to the NCAA Tournament in his first season with the program.
The Tigers are on track to reach the NCAA Tournament this year for the third time in four years, but the expectations will become sky-high starting next season. The Tigers have the No. 7 recruiting class in the 247Sports team rankings, headlined by Crowe. Missouri also landed four-star recruits Toni Bryant (ranked No. 27) and Aidan Chronister (ranked No. 72). Crowe and Bryant were both selected to the 2026 McDonald’s All-American Game.
What made Crowe’s pledge to Missouri so important was the timing. Crowe was one of the first blue-chip players in his class to make his college commitment, which allowed Missouri to avoid a recruiting war for his services.
“Dennis Gates and his staff really personalized the recruitment of Crowe,” 247Sports Director of Basketball Eric Bossi said. “They put the majority of their focus, as a staff, into him and into building a relationship with him and those who mattered the most to him. It’s one thing to tell a kid that he’s your guy, but they really showed it to him by completely locking in on Crowe and giving him nearly all of their focus on the recruiting trail until they got it done.”
Gates has been part of many high-profile recruiting battles, so landing someone like Crowe was a personal win years in the making. One recruiting battle of note Gates lost was for former No. 1 overall pick Andrew Wiggins, who committed to Kansas over Florida State when he was an assistant coach in Tallahassee.
It’s safe to say Crowe is the biggest high school name he’s landed since becoming a head coach.
“As an assistant, I purposely recruited top five guys,” Gates said. “I wanted to do that in preparation, so even if I failed as an assistant, I would still have the confidence to do it. I was able to sign some. … Different opportunities to recruit kids definitely (gave) me the confidence to do it.”
The Tigers have had six top 10 picks in program history, and Crowe could very well be next. The last time the program had a player picked in the top 10 was during the 2000 NBA Draft, when Keyon Dooling was selected No. 10 overall. Of course, the program’s last lottery pick was Porter in 2018.
Why Crowe may become a polarizing prospect for NBA scouts
The 2026 NBA Draft is expected to be one of the best — and deepest — classes in years. There is a clear-cut “Big Three” with Duke’s Cameron Boozer, BYU’s AJ Dybantsa and Kansas’ Darryn Peterson. However, the 2027 draft class is full of uncertainty — particularly near the top. It doesn’t have a clear-cut No. 1 guy yet, which will make the race for that distinction a major storyline for the 2026-27 college season.
In the long term, there are questions about how Crowe’s game might translate to the college level and especially the NBA, according to CBS Director of Basketball Scouting Adam Finkelstein. Still, what Crowe can provide as a volume scorer makes him confident that he will be a highly impactful college player.
“He’s a tough shot taker and maker,” Finkelstein added. “He plays with an incredible high volume — his Dad’s his high school coach, and he’s got the ultimate and constant green light. So he’s just constantly attacking. And with that type of freedom, there has come this level of, not only skill, but creatively, for how to compensate for some of his physical limitations and get his shot off in a variety of ways with minimal separation.
“That’s his special ability, to figure out how to put the ball in the basket. The question is how well it will translate to the next setting because he’s not going to get the same level of freedom and volume anywhere else that he has had in high school.”
As a prospect, Crowe models his own game after some of the best southpaws in the NBA, such as San Antonio Spurs guard De’Aaron Fox. He likes to play at a fast pace, which makes the fit within Missouri’s system a perfect match. It’s also a place where his usage rate will be high, which should allow Crowe to raise his stock and become a potential lottery pick next summer.
But it doesn’t matter what happens between now and draft night in 2027. Crowe’s unconventional path to get to this point has paid off. Crowe would’ve been welcomed with open arms by probably any prep school in need of a dynamic scorer. Still, that’s not the path he wanted to take.
That’s why his commitment to Missouri makes sense. He can build a legacy and be remembered as one of the all-time greats if he can elevate the Tigers to new heights. Missouri has never been to the Final Four and is one of a handful of power conference programs that have never reached the final weekend of the season.
Whenever his basketball journey ends, don’t be surprised if Crowe ends up back where it started in Southern California. If anything, his loyalty to his hometown has earned him the right to do whatever he pleases when the time comes.
“That’s something I want to tell my kids one day,” Crowe said about his high school experience. “My family is very close. Keeping the family tradition going is bigger than just me. I’m doing it for a bigger purpose. I would like to come back here when I have kids and show them around and show them what I’ve done during my high school career.”
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