Boys basketball: Joliet West guard Toby Onyekonwu’s winding journey will stop next at Stony Brook

If anything can be validated by the recruiting process of Joliet West guard Toby Onyekonwu, its that Division I programs will follow talented players no matter how much their path may wind before they arrive at the collegiate level.

Onyekonwu played in less than half of Joliet West’s games in his senior season, but that extremely productive stint was more than enough to convince Stony Brook University, a D-I program in New York, that he’d be worthy of a scholarship offer, which Onyekonwu recently accepted.

Onyekonwu didn’t get the opportunity to play a full season with Joliet West because of an eligibility snafu. After starting his high school career at Plainfield East, Onyekonwu left the area during the pandemic and ended up at Trinity Prep in Las Vegas in order to get some additional playing opportunities.

Eventually, Onyekonwu elected to return to Illinois but wasn’t cleared to play until Jan. 7 where he made a dynamic debut scoring 33 points in a double overtime victory over Minooka.

He continued at a fantastic clip for the remainder of the season and finished with a scoring average of 23 points a game , along with five rebounds, three assists and three steals a game.

Those numbers came in his shortened 15-game season, so short that Onyekonwu was looking to move to a school that might afford him the opportunity to not wait very long to get back to playing in games.

“Honestly, I made my choice because the coaches from Day 1 made me feel like I could come in and produce from the jump for them,” Onyekonwu said.

It also didn’t hurt that he saw some striking similarities to the Joliet West program that should make for an almost seamless transition.

“They play very similar to how we play here, so I thought it was a good fit,” Onyekonwu said. “Their play style is pretty much like we play at West, and that’s what drew me to them.”

His coach, Jeremy Kreiger, is confident that Onyekonwu can make the transition to the next level.

“Essentially it is Jamere Hill [former Joliet West standout who went to Toledo] all over again. It is a highly skilled slender guard that didn’t play on the open circuit to get as much exposure as maybe he needed,” Kreiger said. “A Division I University invested the time to have a conversation and learn about him and they were the first school to offer him. He felt the utmost respect with that, so he didn’t want to go through the whole process of waiting for someone down the road, especially with the way the transfer portal is.

“In terms of fit, he can score. I don’t know if he’s a New York-style guard because he has more bounce to him. If he can put on a little more weight and get more physical, he has the tools to score on Division I defenders because he can stretch out and shoot the 3-ball. As far as what the coaches have told me, and where I see him playing from watching them, he’ll slide right into that program.”