Again in highschool, Yaxel Lendeborg wasn’t even on the basketball staff (and had even been lower from the middle-school staff) and performed video video games 12-14 hours every day.
Now, the Michigan Wolverines Ahead is the Large Ten Participant of the Yr—known as “The Dominican LeBron”—and is about to tackle the Alabama Crimson Tide within the Candy 16 on Friday.
His journey from the sofa to the courtroom is the form of story coaches inform recruits for instance the success that may come from a single choice. Forward of his senior yr of highschool, Lendeborg’s mom, Yissel Raposo, realized her son wasn’t on observe to graduate, so she had a heart-to-heart dialog with him that served as a “wake-up call,” she informed Hoops HQ in a December 2025 profile of the participant.
It was a call that largely paid off: Lendeborg’s grades dramatically improved when he enrolled in Camden County Faculty, a lot in order that he was in a position to be part of the varsity basketball staff for the ultimate 11 video games of his senior season. These had been the one 11 highschool basketball video games Lendeborg ever performed.
Proper after highschool, Lendeborg began working together with his mom at a cell-phone accent warehouse, however felt responsible about not doing extra.
“It kind of hurt being in that space with my mom, seeing how much she’s been doing for us,” the 6-foot, 9-inch, 240-pound participant informed Hoops HQ. “So it was like, damn, I really messed my life up. And I’m not helping my mom out.”
That’s when every little thing modified.
Yaxel Lendeborg’s profession timeline
By the grapevine, coaches at Arizona Western Faculty realized of Lendeborg. Though he wasn’t thrilled to be going, in response to Hoops HQ, Lendeborg shipped himself off to Arizona, the place he performed 78 video games in three seasons from 2020 to 2023. There, he was a two-time NJCAA All-American and received the ACCAC Participant of the Yr award twice.
In April 2023, Lendeborg transferred to the College of Alabama at Birmingham, the place he helped the college earn the 2024 American Convention Match Title. He additionally earned AAC Match MVP honors, was named AAC Defensive Participant of the Yr twice, and helped the college attain the NCAA Match, amongst a number of different accolades.
Then in April 2025, Lendeborg dedicated to the College of Michigan, becoming a member of what would grow to be the highest staff within the nation below head coach Dusty Could. His debut was considerably injury-limited, however he shortly turned Michigan’s star participant. He averages 14.7 factors, 6.9 rebounds, and three.2 assists per recreation, in response to ESPN, and led Michigan to a 19-1 Large 10 document (and 33-3 general), this system’s first regular-season title since 2020-2021.
This March, he was named Large Ten Participant of the Yr and helped Michigan earn the No. 1 seed within the Midwest Regional for this yr’s March Insanity match. Now, he’s projected as a first-round NBA draft decide.
A late bloomer who caught fireplace
Lendeborg’s success story defies the everyday blue-chip narrative in basketball recruiting. Usually, recruiters are after a 4- or 5-star participant who has been closely scouted since center or early highschool, seems on nationwide rankings lists, and will get dozens of scholarship provides from high packages earlier than their senior yr.
As an alternative, Lendeborg, now 23, developed a lot later than his friends. This meant he needed to outwork gamers with years of structured coaching—and now he’s competing in what’s extensively thought of essentially the most bodily demanding convention in faculty basketball. However Michigan basketball coach Dusty Could says Lendeborg deserves each ounce of recognition he’s getting.
“I think it’s pretty obvious why he’s player of the year,” Could informed CBS reporter Tracy Wolfson in early March. “He does everything on the basketball court, and he’s incredibly unselfish while doing it. And he’s just scratching the surface of how good he can be.”
The enterprise of breaking via
Lendeborg’s unlikely rise can function a compelling lesson for the enterprise world, too. Expertise with out focus is simply potential. For years, Lendeborg had the innate expertise to carry out at a excessive stage, however lacked the motivation.
A 2007 examine by American tutorial and psychologist Angela L. Duckworth exhibits that grit may be simply as essential in figuring out success as expertise.
“The achievement of difficult goals entails not only talent, but also the sustained and focused application of talent over time,” she and her co-authors wrote within the examine.
So, it wasn’t till Lendeborg dedicated to “sustained and focused” coaching that he met his massive break, and it’s all paying off.
Not solely has Lendeborg earned quite a few accolades lately, however his onerous work can be paying off. His identify, picture, and likeness (NIL) valuation is estimated at $2 million, in response to On3, rating him among the many high 25 in faculty sports activities general and No. 7 in basketball.
However Lendeborg additionally mentioned in a March interview with the Related Press he had turned down an NIL deal from Kentucky value $7 million to $9 million {dollars} to stick with Could and the Wolverines. That’s as a result of he was prioritizing his long-term objectives over cash.
“I was raised without it, and I went my whole life without it,” Lendeborg informed the AP. “Anything was going to make me super, super happy at the time.”
“I was thinking long term. What if I mess up my career because I chased the money instead of a future? Another big reason why I went with Dusty was he didn’t talk about money at all,” he continued. “It was all about making me better and helping me achieve my goals.”
