LaPhonso Ellis

From Hoopedia

LaPhonso Darnell Ellis (born May 5, 1970 in East St. Louis, Illinois) is an American former professional basketball player. He was an outstanding high school basketball player at East St. Louis Lincoln High School, where he led the Lincoln Tigers to two straight Illinois Class AA boys' championships in 1987 and 1988. Although many thought he would attend Illinois some questionable recruiting tactics came into play by Notre Dame. LaPhonso ended up attending the University of Notre Dame. This later turned out to be a poor decision. Ellis' Notre Dame squad only qualified for the NCAA tournament his freshman year. Laphonso would have been the missing piece for a final four squad of University of Illinois since they were only missing a solid post presence.

Ellis was one of four captains of the 1991-92 Notre Dame team. Throughout his career, he scored 1,505 career points, and averaged 15.5 points per game to earn school rankings of 12th and 22nd, respectively. He recorded 200 career blocks, a school record. He ranks third on the school’s career rebounding list with 1,075, and eighth on the career rebounding average list, with 11.1 rpg. He led the '91-92 team in scoring (17.7 ppg), rebounding (11.7 rpg), field goal percentage (.631) and blocked shots (2.6 bpg). He paced Notre Dame in blocked shots in each of his four seasons, the only player in school history to do so. Despite admitted academic difficulties, Ellis graduated from Notre Dame on time with a degree in accounting from the undergraduate college of business. He was the fifth overall selection in the 1992 NBA Draft, picked by the Denver Nuggets, and was named to the 1992 All-Rookie first team. He subsequently played in Atlanta, Minnesota and Miami, where he retired after the 2003 season.