Kansas basketball player KJ Adams is an exceptional talent, but he’s also making a difference with his off-the-court deeds.
Kansas Jayhawks forward KJ Adams had one of the best storylines in college basketball last season. After averaging 1 point per game on the national championship-winning KU team, he started all 36 games at center for Bill Self and won Big 12 Most Improved Player of the Year as a sophomore.
In 2022-23, Adams averaged 10.6 points, 4.3 rebounds, and 1.9 assists on 62.2 percent shooting. He’s a freak athlete at 6-foot-7 and one of the best high fliers a recent Kansas team has had. KJ is an exciting player to watch, but what he’s doing for his community is even more impressive.
KJ’s mother, Yvonne, is battling stage four metastatic bladder cancer. She had previously beaten it during his freshman season, but it returned this past year. Yvonne is only 53 years old, and all the Adams family can do is put her through treatment — there is no cure for the disease.
Yvonne was a star basketball player at Texas A&M many years ago. She was the leading scorer for the Aggies in 1989-90 and 1990-91. Both she and KJ’s father, Kevin, are wonderful people involved in the KU community. They go to as many games as possible to watch their son play.
With his terrific play on the court, one could never tell what he was going through back home. There’s never a moment when KJ isn’t upbeat and smiling with his teammates.
Back in February, Adams told The Athletic (subscription required): “Sometimes I wake up, I’m like, damn man, I don’t want to do this. I know it’s gonna be a hard practice. But like, just seeing what my mom is going through, and how positive she tries to stay through it, it’s amazing. It helps my drive.”
No one could blame him if he stayed quiet about the whole situation. Yet despite his mental struggles, KJ Adams is giving back to families who endure similar hardships.
At the 15th annual Rock Chalk Roundball Classic this weekend, Adams pledged $2,000 of his own NIL earnings to five families in the Lawrence area. Each of these families has a parent fighting cancer.
Moments like these are what make sports so great.
During the event, KJ spoke with reporters from The Kansas City Star (subscription required): “It hit in my heart a little bit because my mom is kind of going through the same stuff the kids are going through. Just to give back – and now that we have the stuff to give back – it’s always good to do that. It helps me a lot when I do that.”
It wasn’t a gesture that KJ needed to go through with. He did it out of the kindness of his heart. Adams mentioned that he saw children going through the same things that he is, and he wanted to give back to those less fortunate than him. KJ is an exemplary student-athlete and represents everything that Kansas University stands for.
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