O. J. Mayo

In Kentucky, grade schoolers can play high school basketball, and Mayo averaged 23.1 points for Rose Hill's varsity team while in 7th grade.

He scored a 29 on the ACT, placing him in the 95th percentile nationally.

Mayo had given Kansas State a soft verbal commitment to play for them, but retracted it when head coach Bob Huggins announced he would take the same position at West Virginia.

Frank Martin, by whom Mayo was recruited, was named head coach.

Former teammate at North College Hill High School Bill Walker opted to stay and play for Martin.

Ovinton J'Anthony Mayo (born November 5, 1987) is an American professional basketball player who plays for Zamalek SC of the Egyptian Basketball Super League and Egyptian Basketball Federation.

He played a single season of college basketball for the USC Trojans while earning first-team All-Pac-10 honors.

(Mayo referred to him as his "grandfather" but the two aren't related.) Mayo enrolled at North College Hill High School in North College Hill, Ohio in April 2003.

The Cincinnati Enquirer and local television stations sent reporters to cover Mayo's first day of school at NCH.

Mayo was selected as Mr. Basketball of Ohio for the second consecutive season, in addition to being named Associated Press Division III Player of the Year for the second consecutive season.

He averaged nearly 29 points, nine rebounds, and six assists per game.

He also led his team to three consecutive AP poll titles and appeared in the pages of Sports Illustrated among other publications.

In February 2006, Mayo attracted the largest crowd to ever see a high school game in Cincinnati, Ohio when 16,202 fans watched North College Hill fall to the nation's number one rated team, Oak Hill Academy.

Mayo had been considered a lock to make the leap straight from high school to the NBA, but the Collective Bargaining Agreement between the NBA and its players instituted a rule that a player must be at least a year out of high school before he can enter the NBA, effectively curtailing those plans.

On July 5, 2006, it was reported by ESPN that he would attend USC.

Mayo enrolled at Huntington High School in Huntington, West Virginia for the 2006–07 school year.

He formally committed to USC in November 2006.

Mayo led the state in scoring for the 2006–2007 season at 28.4 points per game.

Runner-up in the voting was teammate Patrick Patterson.

However, he was retroactively declared ineligible when it was discovered that he had received improper benefits in violation of NCAA rules before he even played a game, and the Trojans vacated all of their 21 wins from the 2007–08 season.

In January 2007, Mayo allegedly assaulted referee Mike Lazo after being ejected from a Huntington High game vs. Capital High School at the Charleston Civic Center.

In accord with West Virginia Secondary School Activities Commission rules, Mayo was suspended for two games.

However, due to allegations that Lazo had overreacted and faked the incident, a temporary restraining order was signed by Cabell County Circuit Court Judge Dan O'Hanlan, temporarily lifting the suspensions on Mayo and five other players suspended due to incidents at that game.

However, shortly after, the restraining order was nullified, and Mayo was suspended for three games, a punishment that Mayo described as "fair".

Mayo was selected by the West Virginia Sports Writers Association as the 2007 recipient of the Bill Evans Award for the state's boys basketball player of the year.

On March 17, 2007, Mayo led Huntington High School to its third consecutive Class AAA basketball championship in the state of West Virginia with 103–61 rout of South Charleston.

Mayo finished with a triple-double: 41 points, 10 rebounds, and 11 assists.

He graduated in May 2007 and signed a letter of intent to enroll at USC.

Mayo enrolled at the University of Southern California (USC) in the summer of 2007, taking two classes.

While waiting for the season to begin, he played pickup basketball at the UCLA men's gym against NBA players such as Kobe Bryant, Sam Cassell, Kevin Garnett, Mike Dunleavy Jr.., D. J. Augustin, Jason Kidd, Adam Morrison, and J. J. Redick.

Mayo earned All-Pac-10 first team honors.

Mayo entered the 2008 NBA draft and was selected by the Minnesota Timberwolves with the third overall pick.

He was later traded to the Memphis Grizzlies, with whom he played four seasons.

In the 2008 Pacific-10 Conference men's basketball tournament, the Trojans lost to UCLA, featuring Kevin Love and Russell Westbrook, in the semi-finals.

Mayo signed with the Dallas Mavericks in 2012, and then with the Milwaukee Bucks in 2013.

In 8th grade he was just turning 15 and tallied 27 points per game and was named a first-team all-state player by the Louisville Courier-Journal.

Mayo then moved to suburban Cincinnati to live with club team coach Dwaine Barnes.

In July 2016, Mayo was banned from the NBA for violating the league's anti-drug program.

After a two-year hiatus, he resumed his career with Atléticos de San Germán of the Baloncesto Superior Nacional (BSN) in Puerto Rico.

Mayo began playing high school basketball at Rose Hill Christian High School in Ashland, Kentucky.