TAMPA, Fla. — Johni Broome went from an afterthought recruit at Tampa Catholic High School to becoming a National Player of the Year candidate with the top-ranked Auburn Tigers.
His journey began at Plant City High School. He played sparingly off the bench and decided to transfer after his sophomore season to Tampa Catholic.
“He kind of dropped on our doorstep,” Tampa Catholic head coach Don Dziagwa said. "He, as a 6’9” kid, that was really interested in coming to Tampa Catholic. We think he’s going to transfer. Of course, you hear of someone that is 6’9”—I didn’t know how good he was, I didn’t hear of anything about him at Plant City. He dropped on our doorstep, and we loved him from the get-go.”
Broome played two seasons at Tampa Catholic. He led the Crusaders in the back-to-back state final-four appearances in 2019 and 2020. The hard work seemed to pay off when he was named Hillsborough County Player of the Year.
But, the big-time coaches never came calling.
“He ends up going to Morehead State,” Dziagwa said. “They did a great job recruiting him. There were a lot of other schools that came in, and they said, ‘I don’t know if he can play at our level.’”
In two seasons at Morehead State, Broome was named first-team All-Ohio Valley Conference twice. Then he leveled up transferring to Auburn University for his junior season.
“What I think has helped Johni is that it’s given him a chip on his shoulder,” Dziagwa said. “All these schools didn’t recruit me, I’m sure now they look back and say, ‘Why did we not recruit that 6’9” guy?’”
Now in his season year, Broome leads Auburn in scoring, rebounds, assists, and blocks per game.
“I think the Johni Broome story could hit home for a lot of young players who want to be good, and they’re not touted as being superstars in eighth grade or ninth grade, but they just keep working,” Dziagwa said.
Auburn will face Michigan in the Sweet 16 of the NCAA Men’s Basketball Tournament on Friday night.
