Julianna Walker turned Annie Wright Schools into a championship contender

Get the latest Syracuse news delivered right to your inbox.
Subscribe to our sports newsletter here.

L

ess than one second remained in the Washington state playoff consolation game between Annie Wright Schools and King’s High School, who had just tied the game at the end of regulation. Annie Wright’s coaches huddled together to draw up a winning play, but they started to argue, former associate head coach Dante Jackson said. Some of the coaches were ready to simply inbound the ball and go to overtime.

“I felt like, hold up, we got … what I believed to be the best player in the state,” Jackson said. “We need to at least try.”

Eventually, they drew up a play that had another teammate roll the ball to Julianna Walker, getting her as close as possible to the basket. Walker would do the rest.

Once Walker picked up the ball, she took two steps and flicked her wrist, firing from behind the half-court line. Her father, Lonnie Walker, said he knew once she grabbed the ball that she’d sink the shot. And she did, drilling the half-court shot to give Annie Wright its best playoff run in school history.

Coaches and teammates were used to Walker routinely scoring 50 or more points. Walker, now a freshman at Syracuse, would sometimes be such a dynamic offensive threat that she’d only play the first half before those games turned into blowouts. She finished her high school career with the third-most points in Washington state history and was the first athlete from her high school to be named the Gatorade State Player of the Year.

Maya Goosmann | Digital Design Director

“She’s always been kind of the best one on the team,” Lonnie, who coached Walker in AAU and at Annie Wright, said. “Everything she’s done hasn’t been too much of a surprise. It’s been what we expected.”

When Walker was around 3 years old, Lonnie assembled a six-foot hoop in the corner of the living room that she kept shooting on. Against her mother’s wishes to stop shooting and dribbling in the house, Lonnie said Walker would stand in the corner “at least for an hour” dribbling and shooting. “We would just be watching TV, and you could hear the little ball bouncing in the background,” Lonnie said.

When Lonnie signed Walker up for basketball that year, she could dribble better than the 5-year-olds, he said. By the time she reached eighth grade, all the high schools around Tacoma, Washington, wanted her to play for them, according to Lonnie, but it was Annie Wright’s academics and proximity to home that ultimately led her there.

Jackson said the all-girls private boarding school — which had been around for over 100 years — had “zero history” athletically, but he and other coaches wanted Walker to create her legacy and “leave her footprint somewhere that would be strictly her(s).” 

Whether it was her ball-handling skills that she mastered against pressing teams in AAU for the Northwest Greyhounds or her quick-trigger shot on 3-pointers, Walker finished as one of Washington state’s leaders in assists, steals and scoring during her high school career.

“I saw her go from a volume shooter trying to do everything on her own to making others better,” Jackson said.

Syracuse was one of the first schools to offer Walker a scholarship. At an Adidas tournament in Atlanta, Lonnie estimated Walker had hit nine 3-pointers and dropped 40 points in one game. Shortly after, Walker’s AAU coach received a call from then-SU head coach Quentin Hillsman. “Why didn’t you tell me you had this player? Why didn’t you tell me this was one of your girls?” Hillsman said.

When other schools offered Walker scholarships, they’d send their assistant coaches. Meanwhile, Hillsman kept talking with her directly. He trusted her and wanted her first, Lonnie said.

“Probably 90% of the reason why we went to Syracuse was because of Coach Q and his belief in her at that early age,” Lonnie said.

Hillsman resigned just as Walker moved to Syracuse to begin her first season, one that would eventually end with her playing just 90 minutes and coming off the bench for the first time in at least five years.

Annie Wright head coach Chris Spivey still thinks Walker is “capable” of performing at the next level. What happened at Annie Wright was expected, and her former coaches and father think she could repeat that success if given a consistent opportunity to play for the Orange. Acting head coach Vonn Read was placed in a difficult position regarding Walker. Read had never seen her play, and Lonnie said he’s still “learning her.”

But at Annie Wright, Walker set a level that Jackson said the team will be trying to live up to “forever.” After leading the school to four straight state tournaments, including two regional bids, Jackson said “she came as advertised.” From the time Walker entered the school in sixth grade, the plan was for the basketball gym to be named after her, Jackson said. He added that the school wanted to retire her number just one year after her graduation.

“The legacy she left at this school … we (are) still trying to live up to that standard that she set,” Jackson said.