Since the day he was born, Otega Oweh was manufactured off of mentality and grit.

Hailing from Newark, New Jersey, just shy of 700 miles from Lexington, Otega grew up playing baseball, football and basketball in the street with his two older brothers, Odafe, who is a linebacker for the Baltimore Ravens, and Irekefe Kaylen, who is a defensive back for the Monmouth Hawks at the NCAA Division-I level. 

While being the youngest, Otega had to show that he could hang around with the older guys and compete, proving that he wasn’t just the little brother trying to be included.

“He would just watch what I would do, or what Kaylen would do and just try to emulate everything to be better,” Odafe said.

Athletically, everything came naturally to Otega, but like most Division-I athletes, there has to be a specific internal wiring that separates them from the rest. The ability to never take days off and always have the will to improve.

When that young, it’s hard for an athlete to find themself. It can be even harder to fit in and do extraordinary things, but for Otega, it was the opposite; the thought of being average scared him.

“He (Otega) has that drive just to go back, to get better, to do something different, to try something new,” his mother, Tania, said. “You know, that’s it, because there’s a drive.”

While Otega mastered that and continues to display it, he shines a light onto his early days and late nights on the streets with his brothers, crediting those moments as the reason he’s so hard-nosed and gritty on the court. 

“That definitely gave me that kind of chip on my shoulder, just trying to be crazy,” Otega said. “You don’t want to be last. Always fighting and always trying to be defensive.”

As time moved along, Otega began to ditch the other sports he would play with his brothers and ultimately chose to zone his focus onto basketball, playing pickup, AAU and ultimately, any chance that he could.

Then, when the AAU season breezed in, Otega’s coach approached his mother, elaborating the vision he had for her son and explained to her that he was a different breed. Even at a young age, he was there to win. 

“His AAU coach approached me one day and said, ‘This dude reminds me of myself. He’s so like that, he’s got the dog in him,’” Tania said. 

The arsenal of skills that Otega added to his inventory over the years of nonstop work equipped him with the tools to dominate at the high school level while playing for Blair Academy, a co-ed educational boarding school in Blairstown, New Jersey.

While in the Blair Academy threads, Otega made headlines, dropping double-digit points in every game except for two during the 2021-22 season. Despite the stellar nature of his performance, it wasn’t a surprise to those who know what Otega is all about. 

In the off-season, Blair Academy Head Coach Joe Mantegna required all of his players to make at least 10,000 individual shots during the teams workouts before the official start of fall practices and, once the off-season workouts concluded, Mantegna and his staff tallied up the number of shots each player made. To no one’s surprise, Otega sank 30,000 of them with room on the calendar to spare.

Even with the large gap between what the coaching staff expected and what Otega did, Mantegna wasn’t shocked. He had realized he was different from the moment the two locked eyes. 

“He was a guy that would come in and do extra work after he just scored 28 in a game,” Mantegna said. “He was just a relentless worker.”

The never-fading will to win rewarded Otega a four-star ranking as he was labeled the No. 2 best player in the state of New Jersey courtesy of 247Sports. From there, it didn’t take long before he received his first Division-I offer from Nebraska.

Otega reflected on getting that phone call and how his motivation elevated to new heights in a time when most would get complacent and satisfied. 

“I always believed but, obviously, when you’re younger, you want to take that high major offer,” he said. “You want to play at one of the power-five schools and I got that. That was really just what set the trend for me, just wanting to go upwards.”

As Otega finished up high school, he got an overwhelming amount of offers, but ultimately decided to take his talent to Norman, Oklahoma, to be an Oklahoma Sooner, where he spent two seasons playing in the Big-12 Conference. 

With the Sooners, Otega averaged 4.8 points his freshman season while starting in nine games. He played in 28 the following year and did what he does best; he overcame the difficult adjustment, averaging 11.4 points and starting in every game.

From there, Otega wanted something different and the path that he traveled growing up with his family led him to Mark Pope and the city streets of Lexington.

“I actually liked BYU, the great offense they played and stuff like that, so when Pope left to come to Kentucky, it was kind of like a no brainer,” Otega said. “Just being able to be around great players, it’s an NBA style offense.”

Coming into the new season with more left to prove, Otega is channeling that mindset that got him this far and is looking forward to this season more than ever.

“He’s just scratching the surface of who he’s really going to be, you guys have just seen the surface,” Odafe said. “I believe that he’s really going to have a breakout season.”

The will to win mentality that sprouted at such a young age and made Otega into the star he is isn’t just a part of who he used to be, but it’s who he is and forever will be. More importantly for Kentucky fans, it’s who he promises to be this basketball season.

“The teams that make it in March — and do well — don’t get complacent,” Oweh said. “They just always want to keep getting better.”