Growing up near East Lansing, Michigan, Anthony Ianni knew he was different from other kids. Through fifth grade, he had an aide with him in class. In middle school, he’d go to a resource classroom. "So I was like, 'OK, you know, I have a learning disability — I’m just going to put it that way. And I don’t know what it is, but I have a type of learning disability, just plain and simple,' " Anthony says. Anthony’s differences affected him beyond the classroom. Anthony loved the Michigan State sports teams — his dad worked in the athletic department — but attending games was rough. "Just, like, the crowd noises and the horns from the scoreboard — you know, it was really too much for me early on," Anthony says.

"Looking back on it, I wasn’t the guy who was making people laugh. I was the guy that people were laughing at." Anthony Ianni

Anthony also had a hard time understanding jokes and sarcasm. He took everything literally. "So, for example, if somebody had told the 5-year-old me that 'It's raining cats and dogs outside,' well, a majority of the population knows that it’s pouring down rain. Where the 5-year-old me would have ran out the door, you know, going outside and hoping that a cat or a dog will literally fall into my arms." Anthony wanted to fit in at school. "I wanted to be the cool guy," he says. "I wanted to be the guy that made people laugh." And Anthony thought the best way to do that was to re-create what he saw on TV. "Curly was my favorite of The Three Stooges," Anthony says, "and so, for example, Curly did a sound effect where he goes 'nyuk, nyuk, nyuk,' and I did that all the time in the hallways. I mean, I did the hand gestures that The Three Stooges did all the time. "And people who weren’t my friends, who got a glimpse of it in the hallways, encouraged me to go on and on and on. And, you know, looking back on it, I wasn’t the guy who was making people laugh. I was the guy that people were laughing at." Bullies targeted Anthony. He says it didn’t help that he was bigger and taller than pretty much everyone at school. "When I started off in sixth grade I was 6-feet tall with a size 13 shoe," he says. "And, you know, people called me so many names, like the 'Jolly Green Giant' or, you know, the Giant Peach from 'James and the Giant Peach.' I had people call me that one time, and it's, like, you know, people kept egging on and on and on and on about it. And it drove me crazy to the point where I was on the floor crying and just telling people to stop." 'Son, We Have To Tell You A Little Story' After Anthony finished middle school, he learned something that helped this all make a bit more sense. "Going into my freshman year of high school, my parents sat me down in the living room and said — my dad looked at me and said, 'Son, we have to tell you a little story,' " Anthony recalls. "So they told me the story about my diagnosis.” At 4 years old, Anthony had been diagnosed with Pervasive Development Disorder, which Anthony describes as "a higher-functioning form of autism." "Along the same lines as Asperger’s syndrome," he says. Anthony also learned that doctors and experts had told his parents not to expect much from him. "They told my parents that I was barely going to graduate from high school, never go to college, never be an athlete — and, eventually, one day I was going to end up in a group institution with other individuals like myself," Anthony says. Anthony says his first reaction was, "Who would say that about a little kid?" But soon he started thinking something else: "Let’s go shut people up," he remembers thinking. "Let’s go prove these doctors and experts wrong. Let’s show them why you are not going to be in a group institution. And so I kind of had this checklist in my head, you know, after my parents sat me down. And the checklist was: graduate from high school, get a full-ride scholarship somewhere and then graduate from college. "And so, like, nothing else mattered to me in high school but those things. That's why, like, I didn't worry about, you know, having a girlfriend in high school. Granted, did I have crushes in high school? Absolutely. But I was so focused on just proving the world wrong." As a freshman at Okemos High School near East Lansing, Anthony was 6-foot-6. And he loved basketball. Anthony's parents had both worked for the Ohio University athletic department, so when Anthony was a toddler he'd go to practices and shoot on a lowered hoop. (Courtesy Anthony Ianni) And, at games, he learned to watch the clock count down toward zero. "As it got to three seconds left on the clock, I would put my hands over my ears to block out any noise," he says. "And then when the horn went off, I would kind of slowly just take my hands off my ears. And, if it was too much for me, I put my hands back on my ears. And so every game I went to, I kept doing that, and eventually got to the point where my hands were just so far away from my ears. I was just like, 'All right. Whatever. I'm used to this now.' " Anthony says he went to every Michigan State home game. Ticking Off The Checklist By the end of his senior year of high school, Anthony had earned a scholarship to play at Div. II Grand Valley State University. Anthony was ticking off that checklist he’d made for himself. After two seasons at Grand Valley State, in 2009, Anthony decided to transfer to his hometown school and the team he’d grown up rooting for: Michigan State. Anthony didn’t know of any one else with autism who had played Division I basketball. And this wasn’t just any Division I team. Michigan State was expected to be one of the best in the country. Anthony kept his autism diagnosis mostly a secret. The Michigan State coaches and a teammate knew, but he didn't tell the rest of the players. "I didn't know how they were going treat me," he says. "Because, in the past, I told people about my diagnosis and what it was. And, you know, a lot of those people who I thought were my friends at the time, they started treating me differently. They started treating me differently, like I wasn't a normal person. Or I didn't know how to act. They treated me like a little kid after that. And so that's why I didn't tell anybody." But keeping his autism diagnosis a secret in the Michigan State locker room was going to be difficult, especially considering the personality of the man who was quickly becoming the centerpiece of the Spartans team. Meeting the 'King of Trash Talk' Draymond Green quickly became a leader on the Michigan State team. (Jonathan Daniel/Getty Images) Draymond Green has never been afraid to speak up. "He was the locker room leader, right from his freshman year," says Michigan State Associate Head Strength and Conditioning Coach and Director of Sports Science Mike Vorkapich — or, more simply, "Coach Vork." "I don't even know if people know my first name on this campus," Coach Vork says. Anyways, back to Draymond Green. "When I say 'right from his freshman year,' not right when he got to campus, but as the season progressed," Coach Vork explains. "You know, we lost, and he kind of piped off in the locker room in a good, positive way — just saying, 'Hey, we’re right there. We're going to get back to this point. ... We’re going to get back to the Final Four next year.' "And you don’t hear freshman say that. It was like he took the reins. And that became his team then."

"You've got to have thick skin when you're Draymond's teammate." Mike Vorkapich