There have been many athletes in the St. Louis area who have been thriving at the various private schools around the area. Many have gone on to achieve success at the collegiate and professional levels after leaving the St. Louis area.
Most prominent among the private school products who are hitting it big in the professional ranks are basketball players Bradley Beal, Jayson Tatum and Napheesa Collier.
Beal and Tatum were McDonald’s All-Americans and National Player of the Year award winners from Chaminade College Prep. Both are now stars in the National Basketball Association. Beal is a star guard for the Washington Wizards while Tatum is one of the league’s top young up and coming stars with the Boston Celtics.
Collier was also a McDonald’s All-American after a stellar prep career at Incarnate Word Academy. After a stellar collegiate career at Connecticut, she is now a young star in the WNBA with the Minnesota Lynx. She was the Rookie of the Year in the WNBA in 2019.
There are several other great student-athletes who are currently making their mark in the private schools around the St. Louis area. He is a look at some of those top athletes.
Luther Burden III (Cardinal Ritter): Luther is one of the area’s most talented two-sport athletes as a football and basketball standout for the Lions. His main sport is football, where he is rated as one of the top wide receivers in the country in the Class of 2022. He has been recruited from coast to coast with offers from schools such as Alabama, Ohio State, Georgia, Oklahoma and Missouri. As a freshman, he led the Lions to a berth in the Class 3 state championship game. On the basketball court, he is a fearless shooting guard who plays great defense. He was a big part of the Lions’ run to the Class 3 state championship last season.
Johnny Gates (John Burroughs): One of the area’s top soccer players, Gates has been a top scoring threat for the Bombers since he entered the program as a freshman four years ago. Entering his senior season, Gates has scored 49 goals and registered 40 assists in his career. As a sophomore, he scored 16 goals and nine assists in leading the Bombers to a state championship. As a junior in 2020, Gates had 25 goals, 18 assists and seven game winning goals in leading Burroughs to a 22-2-1 record and a third-place finish in the state tournament. Gates has already given a commitment to Loyola of Chicago on a soccer scholarship.
Sydney Juszczyk (Trinity Catholic): The talented senior girls’ track and field standout has reached the status as the top high school javelin thrower in the country. She has dominated the event since entering the high school ranks as she won back to back state championships in 2018 and 2019. As a freshman, she threw the javelin 142 feet 3 inches at the state meet and followed up with a throw of 152 feet 1 inch as a sophomore for the state title. In July, she won the javelin event at the Hammerman All-Throwers League Meet in Aurora, IL with a throw of 164 feet 7 inches, which was the top mark in the country. She was also a big part in the Titans winning the Class 3 state championship as a team in 2019.
Christopher Little (CBC): An outstanding senior baseball player who is one of the top young pitching prospects in the country. Little entered his senior year as the No. 5 prospect in the Class of 2021 by the baseball scouting service, Perfect Game. He committed to a powerhouse Vanderbilt program when he was a freshman. He will be skipping his senior year of competition at CBC to graduate early and enroll at Vanderbilt in the spring. The talented right hander is a top-level prospect who is expected to be one of the top players drafted into the Major League Baseball ranks when he becomes eligible for the Draft.
Tarris Reed, Jr. (Chaminade): The junior basketball standout is currently the top prospect in his class in the state of Missouri. As a sophomore, the 6’8” power forward led the Red Devils in scoring and rebounding as they advanced to the Final Four of the Class 4 state tournament. Reed has already attracted scholarship offers from several Division I schools nationally, which include Florida, Missouri, Saint Louis U., Kansas State, Michigan State and many others.
Saniah Tyler (Incarnate Word Academy): A tremendous girls basketball player who is the latest in the line of great players in the powerhouse Red Knights program that has produced state championships and top talent. She is an elite point guard who led the Red Knights to a Final Four berth in the Class 4 state tournament a year ago. She has rated the top Class of 2021 prospect in the state of Missouri and she has several scholarship offers from several top Division I programs around the country.
Journee White (MICDS): The junior girls’ tennis standout has been a fixture at the top of the Rams’ lineup at No. 1 singles since she entered the program as a freshman. As a sophomore last year, White was a district champion and a qualifier for the state tournament in doubles competition. She followed that up by winning a championship at No. 1 singles at last week’s district tournament.
Mekhi Wingo (DeSmet): An outstanding football player who is one of the top defensive line prospects in the Midwest region. The 6’1” 285-pound Wingo was a dominant force for the Spartans’ defense as he registered 15 quarterback sacks and a total of 97 tackles. He has been one of the building blocks of a DeSmet team that went from the bottom of the ranks in the St. Louis area to a Class 6 state championship last year. Wingo was also named the St. Louis American Large Schools Defensive Player of the Year after his tremendous junior campaign. He will be headed to the University of Missouri next fall.