With pro basketball in his blood, Georgia sophomore on fire at right time

Kanon Catchings is now a 6-foot-9 sophomore forward for Georgia basketball, fresh off becoming the first Bulldog to earn SEC Player of the Week honors this year. Kanon, who transferred from Brigham Young, has caught fire at the right time, helping Georgia finish the regular season strong with wins over No. 16 Alabama and Mississippi State and nabbing a No. 7 seed and first-round bye in the SEC Tournament.

In those two wins, Kanon averaged 27.5 points, shooting 59.4% from the field and 60% from 3-point range. He scored a career-high 32 points and made a career-high seven 3’s against Alabama. He began the week averaging 10.6 points per game this season, but after two explosive performances, his average sits at 11.7.

But scoring isn’t the only thing that stands out to his aunt, who won a WNBA-record five Defensive Player of the Year awards in her career.

Credit: Tauja Catchings

Credit: Tauja Catchings

“Watching him develop into this monster … I’m a defensive player, and offense is great and I love that part, but I also love the fact that he’s really taken over defensively and really put a lot of emphasis on becoming a complete player,” Tamika said.

Most of Kanon’s family plays basketball, including Tamika, a WNBA legend and Naismith Memorial Basketball Hall of Fame member; Tauja, who was first-team All-Big Ten at Illinois; and his grandpa, Harvey, who played 11 seasons in the NBA.

“I feel like it’s helped me just always stay on track,” Kanon said of coming from a basketball family. “You know, if you have a good game or a bad game, you always have people in your family. … It’s something to always chase. I feel like it’s just always kept me wanting to work harder and harder.”

Growing up in the Catchings family, basketball was both a passion and a way to work through disagreements.

“It means a lot,” Kanon said in September on what basketball means to him. “Every argument at family dinner, Thanksgiving, always used to just go to the basketball court — whether it was my 12-year-old cousin or my 45-year-old uncle, just playing all the time in the front yard. … Just literally, it could be anything. Who’s faster? Who can shoot better? Sometimes it was just talk.”

From an early age, Kanon wanted to be good, and he would get frustrated if he made a mistake, Tauja remembers. She stressed the importance of fun, because he took it almost too seriously.

“He wanted almost perfection, and he wanted just to be great,” Tauja said.

Neither Tauja nor Tamika wanted him to put pressure on himself, however.

Credit: Courtesy Tauja Catchings

Credit: Courtesy Tauja Catchings

For Tauja, she has seen the soft-spoken Kanon mature in recent years and has seen him open up while at Georgia, growing socially and spiritually along with the work he puts into basketball.

“I’m just happy that (he’s) happy, you know, and that (he’s) finding happiness not just in the sport, because sports are fickle,” Tauja said. “You know you’re going to have good games and bad games. If you tie your happiness to ‘I’m only going to be happy when I score 20-plus points and have a really good game,’ you’re going to spend a lot of your time being miserable. So, you know, just finding other things to kind of fill your cup and make you happy. And he’s really done that. And, I mean, just the relationships that he’s built while he’s been there.”

Despite Tamika’s basketball history (she retired from the WNBA in 2016 and now serves as an analyst for SEC Network), she tries to limit talking X’s and O’s with Kanon, focusing on her role as aunt. Although both found their way to the sport, Tamika said the sisters were grateful that growing up, their parents didn’t push them into basketball.

She always sends Kanon a simple text before his games: “Good luck. Have fun. I love you.”

“When you grow up in our family, the first thing you think is, like, ‘Oh, I have to be good.’” Tamika said. “… And this is what I tell him, and I tell all my nephews: I could care less if you play basketball or not. You know, my relationship with Kanon is not based on basketball.

“… At the end of the day, whether he wins or loses, I always send him a text. Always watch the game. And it’s just because it’s not about your performance, it’s not about the wins and losses. At the end of the day, like, did you have fun? Did … you get an opportunity to do something that gives you joy? And that’s the only thing that matters.”

That being said, it’s an exciting time of year for all teams hoping to make a run in March, including Georgia, which finished the regular season 22-9 to break the program’s previous wins record of 21 set in 1930-31 and 1996-97.

Before Selection Sunday, Kanon and the Bulldogs will gear up for the SEC Tournament in Nashville, Tennessee. On Thursday night, Georgia will face the winner of Wednesday’s matchup between 15 seed Ole Miss and 10 seed Texas.

“He’s gone through a process of stretching himself, getting out of his comfort zone,” Georgia coach Mike White said after Kanon’s performance in the 98-88 win vs. Alabama on March 3. “It’s night-and-day in terms of his level of competitiveness since the fall, especially since September, October. Dirty work, little things. Little things are big, and all things are big when they lead to winning or losing, and he’s just flying around and playing a lot harder.

“And when you go through that process for young players of learning how hard you need to play to have success at a level like the SEC, it’s often that it takes a little bit away from your offensive rhythm, your flow, your shot making. And it’s just kind of coming together now, coming off his best game, hands down. And he scored … but if you really study the film, he was really solid defensively, too. He played with effort. … He’s just gotten better and better.”