For most athletes, their pressures are self appointed simply based on the desire to succeed and have the ideal journey to professional careers. For Davion Robinson, it’s been unorthodox and far from ideal already early onto his college basketball career. The University of Antelope Valley freshman is from Las Vegas, NV with a very notable, Seattle-rooted family. He graduated Silverado High School last year and is already one of the most notable alumni.

Within his family tree he’s had many college football/basketball players, high schools stand outs, a few even made it professional in their respective sports. 

Robinson highlights his great grandfather as the “OG” of athletes in the family. His late great grandfather, Wilson Gulley played professional football and is in the Hall of Fame. Robinson reflects and remembers his great grandfather as one of his few father figures that stressed discipline, mannerism and how to carry himself being he grew up in a “single parent home with a mother who did everything she could and somehow then some”.

Robinson also has family members like Nate Robinson (cousin) who had an extensive professional career and still has the dunk contest win record under his belt. He also has extended family such as NBA legend Doug Christie (Sacramento Kings) who grew up with his uncle and father; Robinson connected with Christie Jr. years ago from our research and their family ties made their bond stronger.

So, when coming from such ties as this, what hate or doubt could he possibly have to overcome?

Robinson refers to his first collegiate season as a “trial year”. He mentioned he was sidelined a lot due to tears in his meniscus that he had to recover from. His injury brought “self doubt” about how he’d “perform when fully back into the swing of the game” he says. Not too mention, “coming from a family with such status in the city, you feel the pressure of carrying a family legacy that is almost generational at this point” Robinson stated. Prior to his injury he had a couple scoreless games with bad highlights that he remembers vividly to cause “the worst few weeks” of his life. He went from being and feeling hyped all preseason to not wanting to step outside of his dorm because “he wasn’t living up to his expectations and his teammates, peers and others on campus made it very clear to him he wasn’t as well”. But through this, he forced himself to “only be mentally locked” into what pertained to his success such as staying in the gym, finding ways to get better, give incomparable effort and be ready when his time came. Robinson credits his mental strength to how he was raised to not focus on outside opinions but do what makes him satisfied with his livelihood. Robinson did downplay his struggles this season and their significance as he mentions multiple times “there are people who have gone through worse”. He also mentions thinking about his Great-Aunt Betty, Great-Grandparents, Grandparents and Mom who have all gone through health issues and still sacrificed a lot for the better path of him and his siblings and other family members. Robinson stated “I simply owe it to them, whether I’m sick or hurt because they did exactly that for 18 years for me and never made excuses or gave up”.

Robinson’s freshman season went from negative, injury prone to ending on a high note. His last game of the season is where he performed very well. We stopped by to check him out and he was in better shape than he was when we first saw him. Though he needed work as far as IQ and remembering plays (it seemed like), Robinson had played well on defense garnering a block on the defensive end, scoring on the offensive end and rebounding and causing jump balls in his team’s favor on both sides of the ball. His first few possessions we saw him attack an opponent in attempt to make a great crossover move and playing more poised than how he opened the season. Though the Developmental UAV Pioneers took a tough loss in the last game of the season, we saw improvement and a beginning spark in what will be a great journey with much upside for Davion Robinson.

We’ve sent many to check Robinson out on and off the court anonymously and since his last game, him and a few teammates have consistently hit the weight room. When asking Robinson about his off season plans he responded by saying “I’m not in off season, I plan to improve the shape I’m in day by day by staying in the weight room heavily, work my core heavily, condition heavily and work on aspects of my game while making necessary changes so come August I don’t have a repeat of this past year”. We over here at MSNBC are very much excited to see the growth in Robinson’s career and plan to follow it well. He also credited Phase 1 Sports as the facility he will be training at this summer to continue developing his game and credited his “ma dukes” (Mother), “granny and papa” (Grandparents) and other family members as those who help push him to be the best version of himself. He stated that growing up in a single-parent household, he spent a lot of time with his grandparents and that his uncle and aunt became like siblings for him. He mentions how most of his life he was a “granny’s boy” and is “honestly just trying to find a way to make her proud and take care of those who took care of me all of my life”. His family visibly instilled religious values, honorable characteristics and a strong personality in him. While Robinson is seeking success, he has humbly built a name for himself to garner our attention and more is to come. 

To check more out on Robinson, go to his official Instagram which is @chosen1drob.

https://www.instagram.com/chosen1drob/