He went through times where he was clumsy and awkward. We had to tell him to be tall, walk tall, be proud of it."
Chooses Georgetown
His high school team won three state championships during Ewing's career and he was the first high school player ever invited to play in the U.S. Olympic basketball trials in 1980. Ewing had the talent to be the best high school center in the country, but had problems with his studies, mainly because the English language spoken in the United States is different in many ways from English spoken in Jamaica. When colleges started to recruit Ewing to play for their schools they were told that he would need special educational attention and tutoring, assistance that helped him improve his reading and speaking skills. Ewing finally decided to attend Georgetown University in Washington, D.C., where he played for one of the few African American major college coaches, John Thompson. Thompson had first seen him play when Ewing was a sophomore and knew, even then, that he would be a star.
First Final Four
During his first year at Georgetown, the Hoyas finished with a 30-7 record and won the championship of the Big East Conference tournament.
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