Growing up in San Diego with his mom, Sharon, and uncle, Raymond Edwards, playing in the NBA was his dream. By high school, he was a four-star recruit, his explosive athleticism and surprising strength drawing the eye of college coaches, including New Mexico’s Steve Alford and UCLA’s Ben Howland. Knowing the Bruins had a reputation for graduating players to the next level, Powell chose to stay in California. He assumed he’d be given a starring role and play for a season—two, at most—before moving to the NBA, but he struggled to carve out a meaningful role under the defensive-minded Howland, averaging a little more than five points in 20 minutes per game. “I had higher expectations for myself going into my first year, but the team needed something different from me, so that’s what I did. That’s a quality I’ve always had,” Powell says. “I knew if I continued to work, to believe in myself and put the time in that what I see in myself, other people would see, too.”

After Powell’s sophomore season, the Bruins fired Howland and replaced him with Alford, the former Hoosiers star who played four NBA seasons. Powell’s offensive game flourished, and he became one of the NCAA’s top two-way players. On campus his fellow students called him “SportsCenter” for his highlight-reel dunks. By his senior season Powell had become UCLA’s go-to star, a vocal leader who took his team to the Sweet 16.

When Raptors scouts called Alford during that season to ask about Powell, he told them the same thing he’d told every other team. “The message was simple,” Alford recalls. “You’re getting a great person, an elite athlete, someone at the guard position who is powerful and explosive, very strong, above average ball-handling ability, who can hit shots and is a lockdown defender. You weren’t going to have any problems with Norman.”

Powell worked out for 17 teams before the draft. He remembers his performance for the Raptors as the best of them all. He was matched up one-on-one against Rashad Vaughn, who would later go 17th overall. “I was just manhandling him,” Powell recalls, “getting buckets every time and not giving easy looks—just crazy-aggressive on defense.” After the workout, Dwane Casey complimented Powell on his intensity and demeanor. “I just walked away feeling like I killed it,” Powell says.

It had taken three years longer than he thought, but Powell was finally NBA-bound and expected to be chosen in the mid-to-late first round. His mother rented out a San Diego sports bar for family and friends to watch the draft. When his name wasn’t called in the first round, Powell was shocked. When the first few picks of the second round passed, he had to leave the room. “At one point, I really thought I just wasn’t going to get drafted,” he says. He was eventually selected 46th.