Today, we move on to the Cavaliers smooth combo-guard, Larry Hughes ...

I was about 16 … when I felt like I could play a little bit. I came into high school and played Varsity, but I still didn’t really understand what was going on. I started my first game as a freshman – did the Nike camps, the McDonald’s All-American and all that. I think it was just prior to going into AAU Camp – age 16 or 17 – that I felt like maybe I had a chance.

My growth was … pretty gradual. In eighth grade, I was almost six-feet tall. In high school I grew to 6-2. At the end of high school, I was 6-4 1/2. It was pretty slow.

I think I was 5-11 … for the longest time and my mom is 5-9, so it came to a point where we’d stand in the mirror and check each other out and see how fast I was growing. So I definitely remember leaving out of eighth grade being 5-11, because soon after I out-grew her.

The first time I ever dunked … I was 15, during my freshman year. It was at a pep rally going into Districts. That was my first actual dunk. I had some touch-the-rim, finger-tip dunks before that, but this was a DUNK. The crowd went nuts, with everybody doing their thing. It was fun.

I didn’t play … other sports. As a kid, I sat in front of the TV – like I do now – played basketball and when the day was done, I’d go back and watch more TV. I never really got into organized sports. I never even really watched basketball until really late. It was just something I was good at that came natural.

I played schoolyard … football and schoolyard “kill-the-man” and that was fun. But I never really got into being out in the sun with all the equipment on or having some guy throw a baseball 60 mph at me. I passed on that.

My best coach was … probably my high school coach, Derrick Thomas – who moved on to St. Louis University with me. And Coach Spoonhour – my college coach. Other than that, I just had a lot of people and a lot of coaches. I played in an organization where we had six teams. And in my age group we were always the best team. So all the coaches would come to our team and try to throw their two cents in.

My mom took me … to my first actual practice when I was 11. So I started actually going to the gym when I was 11. And I never really worked on my game until, probably, high school. It was one of those things where I had a lot of talent but I had to figure out a way to get it all together.

You get a lot of work done … in the gym. You don’t get a lot done on the schoolyard. It’s a lot of ‘freelancing’ and things you wouldn’t do on a regular court.

I started playing schoolyard ball … in University City. It was a lot of older guys that were in high school or just getting out of high school so there wasn’t one name, but a lot a guys were going at it. There were about 30 or 40 guys going on four courts. And I guess I was just able to separate myself. A lot of the guys remember me now.

Nelly is one of the guys … who played there. And a lot of guys are still with him now that he’s doing his rap thing were guys from the courts. So we reminisce now when I run into the guys. He’s good. He was short but he’s an athlete. He’s a guy who played football and baseball and that stuff. We were younger so we just watched.