The courts around Fort Greene, Brooklyn, raised Deron Rippey Jr. The No. 16 player in the Class of 2026, according to ESPN, still vividly remembers the familiar faces and rivalries that formed over the concrete as a kid. A sly grin comes over his face when he thinks back to the times he was trying to slap the backboard on each of his layups. Breaking a spontaneous full-court press and scoring constant transition buckets was electric. It was the freest he’s ever felt playing the game. And when the court wasn’t available, he’d grab his ball and head over to the monkey bars. The square openings served as the cup, as he leapt from the bark chips, imagining he was punching it on a regulation rim.
“Those moments really created the love of the game for me,” Rippey says. “I was always excited when I had a free summer day [and] I knew I could go to the park and shoot or work out with my dad. Or I was always looking forward to a game. I feel like having those moments to look ahead to as a kid really made me love the game more.”
The years spent honing his skills on the same grounds where Bernard King, Erick Barkley, Taj Gibson, streetball legend Ed “Booger” Smith and Epiphany Prince first made their names are baked into the 6-2 point guard’s every movement. On any given afternoon, Deron’s family would watch him in a game at one park, and then travel down the block for the next game. He’s collected trophies from nearly every single local tournament in the area, from The Main Event to Project Win, Tillery Park and Hoop Connection. And he’s already got championship pedigree at Rucker and Dyckman. “It wasn’t just Fort Greene he played in. I think Ron Ron,”—as the family calls him—“played in every park damn near in Brooklyn,” Patricia Rippey, his mother, says.
The after-school program his mom helped run remembers him by the nickname “Kobe,” a nod to his extensive commitment to the hardwood. From 6 p.m. to 8 p.m., Deron was running with the youngins. And then he’d rock out until 11 p.m. with the big kids, praying that it wasn’t time to go home just yet.
“I don’t want to say the entirety of who I am, but definitely most of my habits, how I move, how I walk, how I talk—everything I do kind of reflects my love for the game,” Rippey says.
His father, Deron Rippey Sr., a Brooklyn basketball persona in his own right, would have Ron Ron up at 5:30 a.m. as an 8-year-old, building upon the greatness that had already walked the same streets and shot at the same parks. Defensive slides in the blistering summer sun. Full court sprints. Step-ups in the apartment’s stairwell. Calisthenics in the family room. Looking back, the early morning commitments are Deron’s first memory of taking the game seriously
“That moment kind of gave me a vision of what it actually takes,” Rippey says. “I didn’t know if I was going to fully commit to it. But I knew that if I wanted to fully commit, then those were the kinds of sacrifices that I would have to make.”
In turn, the No. 1 point guard in the nation has an immaculate feel for the game. Both naturally and intentionally, he makes those around him better. His speed in the open floor is blinding. The monkey bars are long gone, too. This is one of the best risers in his class, with the scars on his wrists and forearms to prove it. The BK tenacity he plays with extends to both sides of the ball, pridefully picking up 94 feet and gliding behind defenders for blocks above the rim.
Jared ebanks 