For background, Ground-Up is a travel team organization which, by design, has generally focused on working with younger kids, usually beginning around age nine and there are currently teams repping the name in San Diego, Los Angeles, Sacramento, New York and Hawaii.
So where did all this basketball affiliation start?
"I moved from Sacramento to San Diego for high school to play for my grandfather," Manning-Fuimaono said.
The grandfather in the equation was Charlie Paulk who enjoyed his own unique hoops history before passing in 2014. The 6-foot-9 Paulk came out of Northeastern State University in 1968 as the #7 overall draft pick of the Milwaukee Bucks. In his career, he played for the Bucks, Knicks, Bulls and Royals and found himself being traded, along with Flynn Robinson, for Oscar Robertson at one point. He participated in the 1968 Olympic trials and later became the basketball coach at Lincoln High in San Diego. In his initial year of coaching, Paulk' s team beat Drake High 63-50 to take the 1994 D-IV state championship.
To offer a sense of Paulk's wholistic coaching philosophy, here's Mark Sanford, the star player on that 1994 Lincoln team: "“When I think of Coach P ... the thing that jumps out is his availability. He was the guy I turned to when times got hard. It was more than coaching, it was life. His style was not to reprimand but to teach. He was unique because he sincerely cared for us, for all of us. Whatever you needed, he’d get it for you.”
Keep that respectful and loving tribute in mind.
As for Manning-Fuimaono, his involvement with hoops came early on. "I was born into it, it came naturally. At age 5 or 6, I was running around high school, college and NBA gyms and locker rooms. Later, I started keeping stats, keeping book."
He added, "I became a high IQ, feisty point guard being the typical coach's kid who played the game the right way. On my ninth grade team, I was calling defensive and offensive sets and, as a senior, I coached a freshman team. I was always fascinated by the game and how it works, how you put puzzle pieces together."
Manning-Fuimaono then played in junior college before returning to Sacramento.
"I became burnt out of playing basketball. I was away from it even though I followed it. The people closest to me were still in it."
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Manning-Fuimaono's brother-in-basketball-and-life is Jordan Webster and how that came to be in quite unique. "I'm originally from Louisiana," the 32-year-old Webster, who was a top prep player in the Bayou State. I moved to California when I was 16 and Coach Paulk took me in. He's was like my grandfather. I was misguided -- I didn't have any role models. Coach Paulk was the first black NBA player I ever met. It saved my life and I've been paying it forward ever since."
Webster added, "I started my basketball journey and played played JC ball but I fell through the cracks, going through struggle and strife."
Some time later, Webster returned to Louisiana, fielded a number of top tier teams and then started Ground-Up.
He later decided to depart the Pelican State, strongly influenced by life there.. "Louisiana has the highest black incarceration rate in country and one of my goals is to try to not let the kids become statistics. To help them figure it out every day."
He took eight of his players to California, initially to Long Beach.
Eventually, "I pulled Don back in because this is definitely our calling," Webster said.
Manning-Fuimaono is explicit on that matter: "Jordan Webster is my best friend, like a brother. He started coaching in Louisiana and was telling me that I needed to get back into coaching. But I was working, doing good. However, a friend at Delta High asked me to help him with coaching. I did and it got my passion back."
Say goodby to that sabbatical.
Continuing, he explained, "I also had a younger cousin at Natomas [High] and he and his friends asked me to work with them. Them, I had the opportunity to coach the Play Hard Play Smart 16U team for Brian Hamilton."
Now, he's all in with Ground-Up.
"It's about family first, working together to create a network of people because kids weren't being prepared to get to the higher level until it was too late," Manning-Fuimaono stated. "We make sure the kids are on the right track academically so they have options. 23 kids who have come through the program are currently playing at the collegiate level, including Dajuan Smith (UCSB) Dwayne Benjamin (Oregon) and Jalen Coates (Montana Tech)."
"Ground-Up is focused on basketball and life," according to Webster. "We create a family. It's very rewarding."
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After his college playing days, Shaun Manning, Manning-Fuimaono's uncle, was helping out kids with basketball skills training and began assisting Paulk at Lincoln High in 1996. Of Paulk, Manning said, "he was so humble, all he cared about was everyone else's success. He deeply touched the lives of so many and I try to emulate the things he taught us."
"I've been in basketball all my life, either playing or coaching and I've tried to learn everything there is about the game." That and the human condition.
Manning said, "There is a simple way to be successful with what we do: love, patience and caring but there is no standard formula. You sit down with kid and explore who ther are and what do they need. It's a focus on their lives, looking back but moving forward. We house the majority of our kids, they live with us and we spend 24 hours a day with them. We also teach them to cook and clean. You don't have to be greatest basketball player because you're family to us. We're not perfect but we have a passion to keep them out of certain situations. People create labels for kids, like special ed, and when that happens there is a good chance a kid will eventually be incarcerated."
He continued, "we're successful because we get invested and we'll be part of the rest of their lives. Most importantly, we never allow the athletic part to exceed the personal and academic."
Jordan Webster is explicit in his endorsement of Manning: "Shaun is like my father."
Family creating more family, related by blood or not, created by need and big hearts.
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