Freshman Sensation Jeremiah Wilkinson Says He's `Comfortable' at Cal

Cal freshman guard Jeremiah Wilkinson says he tries to live in the moment, but admits that can be challenging. He is 18 years old with the world in front of him, and trying to envision what that could look like is tantalizing.

“I think about the future a lot. I like to stay in the present because we still have games this season, but it’s hard not to picture the future and what can happen,” Wilkinson said this week. “I look at how far I’ve come even from the beginning of the season. And the goal is to keep ascending, as a team and as a player.”

The 6-foot-1 native of Powder Springs, Georgia, has made remarkable improvement this season even as the Bears’ progress has come in fits and starts.

Wilkinson is averaging 14.5 points, on pace for the sixth-best scoring mark by a Cal freshman, just behind Jaylen Brown, who produced 14.6 points per game in 2015-16. But Wilkinson’s stats are a bit misleading because he was at 11.7 points while playing 21 minutes per game off the bench through 18 games. In eight games since joining the starting five, he is on the floor for 34 minutes each night and his output has soared to 20.6 points per game.

He scored 25 points in the Bears’ 90-88 overtime loss at Georgia Tech on Saturday, when his parents along with other family members, friends and former coaches made the short drive to Atlanta to watch his homecoming. Wilkinson scored a season-high 30 points in a win over Miami late last month.

Climbing Cal's freshman scoring chart

With 12 more points, he will move past Lamond Murray (387 points) into 10th on Cal’s freshman list for total points scored. Leon Powe and Allen Crabbe are within reach.

So it’s natural Wilkinson would dream about what’s next even while nervous Cal fans may be wondering if they’ll get the chance to watch his next chapter unfold at Haas Pavilion.

In an era of collegiate sports where athletes continuously move from one school to the next in pursuit of more playing time or a richer NIL financial deal, Wilkinson seems, to use his word, comfortable at Berkeley.

Asked what answer he would provide those fans about his intentions, Wilkinson said, “I can say I would like to be here. I feel like I have a good support system here. I’m far from home, but the family feel here, being able to talk to the coaches, having a good head coach ultimately helps me be comfortable. And I can say I’m comfortable.”

He talks about the potential makeup of next year’s team, with most of the current roster eligible to return, including sophomore guard Andrej Stojakovic, who averages 17.7 points. Also headed to Berkeley is guard Jovani Ruff, who recently scored 51 points in a game for Long Beach Poly High School and set the program’s career record with more than 2,000 points.

Still, how tempting might it be, he was asked, if or when other programs come courting?

“There’s always temptations out there. Everybody who’s recruiting is going to sell you a dream,” he said. “So just being able to take those and look at what’s a real opportunity and what’s fool’s gold. When people talk to you, the grass is always going to look greener.

“But just knowing it’s important to be comfortable, it’s important to be around people who really like you and believe in you. I’ve found people here who like me as a person and believe in me on the court. So there’s no point in throwing that away, trying to chase this bell, this whistle when playing in the ACC I have a situation here.”

It’s worth noting that former Cal quarterback Fernando Mendoza said even more emphatically toward the end of the 2023 season that he would not leave Cal for another school. And yet, he entered the transfer portal late this past season and will play next fall at Indiana.

Wilkinson, who averaged 33.5 points and scored 57 in a game as a high school senior last season for The Skill Factory in Atlanta, said he chose Cal because “I really saw a culture turnaround happening” under coach Mark Madsen, now in his second season.

*** Madsen talks in the video above about Wilkinson's development and future at point guard.

Madsen has been just what Wilkinson hoped he would be.

“It’s great,” he said of his relationship with his head coach. “Madsen’s definitely an interesting guy. There’s a lot of people who are super businesslike in basketball, especially in the high majors. Coach Madsen’s one of the most genuine people you could play for.

“The person you see is the person he is all the time. He’s super genuine, wants the best for me, he’s not scared to challenge me. He’s all about instilling confidence. I feel like he’s really helped me know I can play my game and be free, obviously while taking coaching and taking tweaks.

“If you know the dude on the sideline believes in you it helps you a lot when you’re on the court.”

Former Cal star Jaylen Brown | Photo by Darren Yamashita

Counsel from Jaylen Brown

Wilkinson met former Cal player, Atlanta area native and Boston Celtics all-star Jaylen Brown during a visit to Berkeley his junior year in high school. Brown was part of an activism conference that Wilkinson took in and he got the chance to visit with him, “pick his brain a little bit.”

Brown’s advice: “He just told me he knows it’s a challenging place, there’s a lot going on in Berkeley, there’s a lot to get distracted by. You’ve got to stay focused on why you’re here, which is school and basketball.”

Wilkinson said he’s spoken with Brown on multiple occasions since but has not had the chance to get to know Cal’s other former star from the Atlanta area, retired NBA player Shareef Abdur-Rahim.

He also is supported by his parents, who have made the five-hour flight to the Bay Area to watch most of his home games. The fact that Cal is playing in the ACC — near his home base — has been a benefit, although the cross-country trips are challenging. Wilkinson noted that the announcement of Cal and Stanford joining the ACC was made two days before his official recruiting visit to Berkeley.

“It felt like it was meant to be a little bit,” he said.

Even so, Wilkinson was curious about how he’d fit in the locker room with mostly older new teammates. That has turned out to be no problem at all.

“Life at Cal’s good. I’ve got good friends, close friends. The locker room’s been good,” he said. “I was kind of nervous about coming to college. I’m a big personality, I know that. I was concerned about how I was going to be accepted by older guys. I went from being a big fish to being the youngest guy on the team.

"But I can say everything’s been pretty good. We all got to know each other at the same time.”

Playing with joy and confidence

Wilkinson describes himself as a happy person, confident in his basketball abilities and everything else he pursues.

“I’m happy and joyous. I’m going to laugh a lot. High energy,” he said. “I really enjoy what I’m doing and I feel like I live life with a lot of joy. I try to bring happiness and pleasure to people’s’ lives.

“I feel like I’m playing my best when I’m having fun and I’m playing free. When I’m tense or nervous I’m not playing as well.”

He relied on “being ultra confident in everything you do” when he began practicing with his new teammates.

“From the beginning of the season trying to tell myself I can play with these guys,” he said. “I really wasn’t playing as much at the beginning of the season but I’d get into the game and, `OK, I can feel it.’

“I came to college but it’s still basketball. Remembering that even though these guys are older, when we step on the court I’ve got to stop them, they’ve got to stop me. I can say my confidence is through the roof. I feel like I’m one of the best guards in the country. I have to show that to everybody but I feel like I can.

“When I’m on the court, nobody cares that I’m 18 years old and I might be playing against a sixth-year senior. I just have to remain confident. If you’re not confident that a shot’s going to go in, then it’s not going in. I feel like I can score on anybody and I can stop anybody.”

Madsen brought him off the bench early in the season, often at shooting guard, as Wilkinson began to figure out the nuances of playing the point in college. But the Bears recruited him as a point guard and that’s where Wilkinson wants to be as he envisions a future someday in the NBA.

Jeremiah Wilkinson | Charles LeClaire-Imagn Images

“Early in the season I wasn’t as comfortable, I got caught up being with older guys and trying to please everybody,” he said. “Now I know that playing my game and being aggressive and getting others involved is the best way I can help them out.

“I feel like I’m reading the game a lot better now. More comfortable on the ball, initiating plays, which over the summer I struggled with that a little bit. As I’m getting reps, I feel like the game has slowed down a lot, I’ve matured and lately I feel like I can score and I can get everybody involved, make everybody around me better.”

Wilkinson said his offseason goals include becoming a more consistent shooter and developing a mid-range game. He currently is shooting 41 percent from the field, just under 32 percent from the 3-point arc. A left-hander, he said he’s constantly working on his right hand and his ability to drive to the right.

Expecting a late-season breakthrough

The Bears (12-14, 5-10 ACC) will try to break a three-game losing streak when they return to the court Saturday night at Stanford (16-10, 8-7). Tipoff is 7 p.m. on ESPN2.

Six of Cal’s losses have been by single-digit margins and Wilkinson believes a breakthrough is coming.

“We’re like a step away,” he said. “I feel like this team has the ability to get hot and go on a winning streak. Anybody can get hot. It’s almost March and it’s time for a couple Cinderella stories. Why not us? That has to be our mentality.

“We’re not at the top of the ACC right now, but when we line up against people in the ACC tournament they still have to beat us. We have to make them beat us. We’re not going to lay down. Even if it’s Duke . . . we’re not going to say our season’s over. We have to go into that with a mentality of it’s our time to shock the world.”