How Thunder Fellows is growing next generation of 'Black Wall Street leaders'

TULSA — There’s a running joke inside the Thunder Fellows program, which operates from a sleek, glass-paned office in the heart of Tulsa’s historic Greenwood District. 

One day, maybe 10 or 20 years from now, people are going to wonder why there are so many up-and-coming NBA general managers from Tulsa. What exactly is going on?

Cedric Ikpo smiles. 

“That would be wonderful, right?” he says.

As executive director of the Thunder Fellows program, Ikpo is the steward of a special group that includes 26 Black ninth and 10th graders representing 11 high schools in and around Tulsa.

The 15 boys and 11 girls are athletes and musicians, robotics enthusiasts and aspiring YouTubers. 

“Our cohort is an eclectic group,” Ikpo said. “I think one thing we learned in the tumultuous 2020 is that groups in general, they’re not monoliths, especially the Black community. Our program is a wonderful representation of that.” 

Together, the students are enrolled in a 30-week after-school program that’s focused on introducing them to data and analytics, and how an expertise in those fields can open career opportunities in the sports, entertainment and technology industries. 

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The program kicked off three weeks ago, but the students have already met with industry leaders who might one day be hiring them. 

“We are reseeding,” Ikpo said. “We are trying to develop and grow the next generation of Black Wall Street leaders who can then pay it forward and look to reinvest and do something to rebuild and revitalize Black Tulsa.” 

Thunder players toured the Greenwood District and met with Ikpo at the Thunder Fellows office before a preseason game Thursday night in Tulsa. 

Players sat at desks while Ikpo explained the program and the legacy it will leave. 

“Anything like this,” Thunder star Shai Gilgeous-Alexander said, “is a step in the right direction.” 

During pregame warmups at BOK Center, Thunder coach Mark Daigneault, Gilgeous-Alexander and teammates Darius Bazley and Luguentz Dort visited with the kids in the program. 

They signed basketballs, posed for pictures and shared laughs. 

“It’s cool to know you have that impact on people,” Gilgeous-Alexander said. “It’s a privilege that we all have being in the NBA. Kids look up to us and wanna be what we are. It’s also a responsibility.” 

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'What to do?' 

There’s a painting hanging in Ikpo’s office. It’s of the 1921 Booker T. Washington boys basketball team, and in the middle, holding a ball, is Dick Rowland. 

It was Rowland, a young Black man, who allegedly made contact with Sarah Page, a young white woman, in an elevator in downtown Tulsa 100 years ago. Much is disputed, but as the story goes, Page screamed and Rowland fled the scene. 

That elevator encounter led to the 1921 Tulsa Race Massacre. A white mob attacked Black residents and destroyed homes and businesses in a prosperous area known as Black Wall Street. Some estimates put the death toll around 300. 

It’s no coincidence that the Thunder Fellows program is based in Tulsa’s Greenwood District, but the launch of the program wasn’t timed for the centennial anniversary of the race massacre. 

Thunder general manager Sam Presti and his childhood friend, Mike Johnson, came up with the idea last summer after the murder of George Floyd in Minnesota. 

Presti and Johnson, who works in marketing for Creative Artists Agency (CAA), have known each other since they were eight. They played youth football together in Massachusetts. Presti was a tight end. Johnson was the quarterback. 

Presti is white and Johnson is Black, but as kids they weren’t shaped by learned biases. As adults, the still-close friends are comfortable having discussions about race, and the systemic injustices facing the Black community. 

After Floyd was killed by a white police officer, Presti texted Johnson and asked, “What to do?” 

Professional sports teams like the Thunder and large corporations like CAA were releasing statements condemning racism and calling for change, but Johnson had an idea for actionable progress. 

His idea became the Thunder Fellows program, and it would be located in Tulsa’s Black Wall Street. The Thunder and CAA would partner to create opportunities for Black students in sports, entertainment and technology. 

One month before the program was announced, Presti opened a press conference with a response to the Floyd killing, and how the organization planned to combat systemic racism. 

“I have a lot of hope that as an organization we’re going to be able to take more long-term steps in this area,” Presti said in June 2020. “We have to be thoughtful about it, but I would ask everyone to hold us accountable in this area and to what I’m saying, because I believe we’re going to be able to make scalable change going forward.” 

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'Trailblazing program' 

More than a year later, Ikpo sees Thunder Fellows as a pioneering program that’s taken its first steps toward the change Presti promised. 

Ikpo was born and raised in Houston, went to the University of Evansville in Indiana, and then he moved back to Houston to intern with the Rockets and work part-time with the Texans. 

He later moved to San Antonio, and spent six and a half years with the Spurs in their community relations department. 

“I actually had a quarter-life crisis, left the Spurs and thought I was leaving sports for good,” Ikpo said. “Not because I didn’t like sports, but because I felt it was my calling to be involved in the community like 10 toes down, to really integrate myself.” 

Ikpo taught fourth-grade math in San Antonio, and then the league office came calling. He spent four and a half years working for the NBA’s social responsibility and social justice program. 

Then a former coworker told him about an opening for something called Thunder Fellows. Ikpo is now 10 toes down in Tulsa. 

He’s one of three full-time employees at Thunder Fellows, which is a separate nonprofit entity from the Thunder. Ikpo and his team, LaKena Whitley and Ricky Graham, do a lot of the teaching. They also bring in outside voices, most of whom are Black leaders in various industries. 

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“It is a trailblazing program in a lot of ways,” Ikpo said. “I think teams in the league are doing wonderful things, but the unique thing about this program is its sustainability.”  

The classroom space has the look of an upstart tech company — natural light and exposed columns and ceilings with abstract art on the walls from local artists. 

There’s a Google Hangout room, and two walls of the building double as dry-erase boards. Desks can be moved around, and the space is completely interactive. 

The 26 kids are divided into a Monday/Wednesday group and a Tuesday/Thursday group. Friday is a flex day for anyone who might have missed class. 

Classes run from 5:30 to 7:30 p.m. There’s a Thunder Fellows shuttle to pick up kids who don’t have transportation, and dinner is provided every night. 

Because the program just started three weeks ago, the fellows are learning the principles of data and analytics, and how they can be used in the real world. Soon, they’ll be learning Python — a computer coding language that’s applicable in all sorts of fields. 

“When they leave the program, not only are they going to be proficient in data analytics and Python coding language,” Ikpo said, “but also they’ll have a rolodex of industry leaders who know them directly that they can reach out to once they’re work eligible.” 

Around 50 kids applied for the program, a number that’s expected to grow. Some have direct ancestry to relatives who lived in Tulsa during the race massacre. 

Ikpo, Presti and Johnson interviewed every applicant on Zoom. 

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“We wanted to make sure that we were inclusive in our approach and that we weren’t just going after the best and brightest,” Ikpo said. “We looked at kids who could benefit the most from a program like this.” 

A few applied because of the “Thunder” name attached to the program. 

Several of the kids want to play professional basketball. Or, as a backup plan, they want to work on the operations or business side of an NBA team. 

Some are aspiring general managers, testing their chops on the video game NBA 2K. 

“Some of them were talking with Sam in this interview process and it was beautiful,” Ikpo said. 

“What’d you do over the weekend?” kids were asked. 

“It’s like, ‘Oh, yeah, I used all the draft picks from the Thunder and I flipped those for a medium player and then I pulled some of those to get a star player.’” 

Ikpo laughed, imagining Presti taking notes.