Evan Turner - High School Career

High School Career

Before high school, Turner and fellow NBA player Iman Shumpert were teammates on the 8th grade basketball team at Gwendolyn Brooks Middle School in Oak Park, IL. Turner was a star on the 2002–03 Brooks's 8th grade boys basketball team that finished the 2002–03 season with a record of 23–2. He played in the Summer 2004 AAU Boys 15-under Basketball National Championship Tournament for the Illinois Knights. As a high school sophomore, he helped lead St. Joseph to a run in the Illinois AA Boys High School basketball tournament, which helped him get the attention of NCAA Division I basketball coaches. At St. Joseph's, which had once produced Isiah Thomas, he was part of a Chicago area sophomore class that was considered to be the best in the history of the state of Illinois. It included Derrick Rose, and his St. Joseph's teammate Demetri McCamey, who overshadowed him as the second best Chicago area prospect in the class behind Rose. The class of 2007 was compared to the Chicago area class of 1979 that included Thomas, Terry Cummings, and Darrell Walker as well as the class of 1998 that included Quentin Richardson, Corey Maggette, Frank Williams, Bobby Simmons, Michael Wright.

Turner started getting major Division I offers early in his junior year, and he and McCamey attended 2005 Midnight Madness with the Wisconsin Badgers men's basketball team. At the beginning of his junior season, Chicago Tribune named him to its annual top Chicago metropolitan area basketball players list, and it ranked St. Josephs number three in the area. The team went to the state sectional final before its season ended with a 75–72 sectional final loss to Proviso East High School. After his junior season, he was considered one of the top 25 prospects in the country in his class according to one scout, and he was given special mention by the Chicago Tribune and honorable mention by the Associated Press for all-state honors. During the summer of 2006, he committed to Ohio State, which is located in Columbus, Ohio. Turner's decision was influenced by his relationship with his father, James Turner, who lived in Columbus, Ohio and whom Turner had visited every summer since he was ten years old.

During his senior season, his team was listed second to Rose's Simeon Career Academy in the preseason Tribune Chicago area high school basketball team rankings. That season, he and Rose were both named to the first-team Associated Press 2006–07 Class AA all-state team, a day before Rose's Simeon eliminated Turner's St. Joseph in the Illinois Class AA supersectional. Turner and McCamey finished third and sixth to Rose in the Illinois Mr. Basketball voting, and the Chicago Tribune chose both of them as first team All-state selections along with Rose. Turner was ranked as the #7, #13 and #16 small forward in the nation as a high school senior by ESPN, rivals.com, and scout.com respectively. He received scholarship offers from five Big Ten Conference basketball programs, as well as Wake Forest, DePaul and Notre Dame.