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Her older brother’s high school team was in the locker room, which meant it was little Tatum Brown’s time to have fun on the vacant basketball court. She dribbled behind her back, made short jump shots and lay-ups with both hands. She wasn’t purposely showing off, but she was putting on a show.

Brown was in the second grade.

“I remember it so vividly,” said Brown’s sister, Paisley. “I tell people that (story) all the time. I didn’t even realize she could play basketball. I turned to mom (Towanda) and said, ‘Tatum can play basketball?’ and she said, ‘Yeah, she always does that.’

“From that day, the rest is history.”

And from that day, Tatum Brown has never stopped putting on a basketball show.

“I’ve been playing ever since,” she said.

Through elementary and middle school. In high school as a four-year starter and one-time state champion. And as the freshman point guard for Jacksonville University this season.

Always dribbling. Always running. Always making something happen. And almost always winning.

Brown has been a key factor in JU improving its record from 14-17 to 24-8. The Dolphins play their first-round NCAA Tournament game at LSU on Friday, March 20 (6 p.m., ESPN).

The 15th-seeded Dolphins are in the tournament for the second time in program history and the first time since 2016.

The highest-ranked recruit in JU history (No. 91 nationally out of Grayson High School in Loganville, Ga.), Brown leads JU in minutes (30.3) and is second in scoring (10.0). She has started all 32 games and was Atlantic Sun Conference Freshman of the Year.

“Phenomenal,” JU leading scorer Priscilla Williams said.

Said Dolphins coach Special Jennings: “She does exactly what I need her to do. She’s uniquely talented and very skilled.”

Georgia high school star

Brown is the youngest of four kids. Paisley is 20 years older and brothers Blake and Tyler are 14 and three years older, respectively. Tatum, who became an aunt at age 12, didn’t have the traditional sister relationship with Paisley.

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“It was more like mother-daughter,” Paisley said during a phone interview. “I was a lot harder and stricter on her and had high expectations for her because I was old enough to be her mom.”

Now?

“It has transitioned to a fun, sister-like relationship,” Paisley said. “A completely different dynamic.”

Tatum brought a different dynamic to any team she played while growing up in Loganville, about 40 miles east of downtown Atlanta. She led and scored. She led and distributed. She led and had consistent success.

Tim Slater was the coach at Lanier High School in Sugar Hill, Ga., when he was hired by Grayson before Brown’s freshman season (2021-22). He was already aware of Brown from watching her play AAU basketball.

 “Part of the reason I took the job was because Tatum was (joining the program),” Slater said during a phone interview. “I knew the kind of kid she was and the kind of player she was and I thought, ‘We could do something special.’ And we did.”

The Rams went 105-17 in Brown’s four seasons, won a state championship in her junior year and was the runner-up in her senior year. Last season, she was the Class 6A state player of the year.

“She was one of our hardest workers and always encouraging her teammates to come along with her,” Slater said. “She is a kid who I had no doubt would be successful.”

But turned off by her height (5-foot-6), the major college programs didn’t show any interest. She was tabbed as a four-star prospect by 247 Sports and the 16th-ranked point guard nationally.

Before committing to JU, Brown said only Murray State and Coastal Carolina expressed serious interest.

“People looked at Tatum’s frame and didn’t look at her heart, they looked at her height and not her IQ and will to win,” Slater said. “The kid is a (dang) winner and a natural-born point guard.”

Committed to JU without visit

Jennings’ first in-person look of Brown was at a Grayson High practice in August 2024. She was instantly impressed.

“How quickly she got her shot up, how she picked her spots, her ability to get other people involved — all of those things stood out to me right away about her,” Jennings said.

After Brown met Jennings, it was off to YouTube to search for clips of Jennings from her playing career at Xavier.

“(Jennings) liked me the first time she saw me and I looked up her highlights and I liked what I saw,” Brown said.

Said Jennings: “I didn’t know she did that.”

Brown committed to JU without visiting campus.

“I didn’t need to take a visit here to know what I liked and this was the best fit,” she said. “It just felt like home before I got here and when I saw the campus, it felt even better. It definitely felt like a leap of faith, but I knew what I was getting myself into.”

What Brown knew she was signing up for is hard coaching and she understood being in a shell vocally wasn’t an option.

“She didn’t have a choice; the hardest position to play for me is point guard,” Jennings said. “It’s the most demanding job and you can’t not communicate in that position. It’s a requirement.”

Paisley was thrilled to see Tatum become more vocal.

“She’s the complete opposite of me and my mom because we’re loud, boisterous and opinionated,” Paisley said. “To see her come out of her shell and see her get excited and show that joy more and more in college is such a good thing to see.”

Tatum scored 20 points in her JU debut, a win over Charleston Southern, and in addition to leading in minutes and ranking second in scoring, she is first in steals (74), tied for first in assists (73) and second in rebounds (5.3).

Does Brown remind Jennings of herself as a Xavier freshman in 2007-08 when she started the final 17 games?

“A lot of me in her,” Jennings said. “Skill-wise as freshmen, comparable. Her jump shot is just better than when I was a freshman. Her IQ reminds me of myself. I have enjoyed coaching her. She has gotten tremendously better.”

Slater has watched every JU game on his computer this season and consistently thinks about what the bigger programs missed by not recruiting Brown. Their inactivity was JU’s gain.

“I’m seeing her do things I saw her do for four years (at Grayson),” Slater said. “I told every college that missed on her, ‘Somebody is going to take her and she’s going to be really good for them.’ I’m sure there a lot of schools at home wishing they were playing, but Special Jennings had the knowledge to recruit Tatum and put her on the floor.”

Contact O’Halloran at rohalloran@gannett.com

This article originally appeared on Florida Times-Union: JU freshman guard Tatum Brown leads Dolphins into NCAA Tournament