Dylan Harper, the 19-year-old Fil-Am guard from Rutgers, made history as one of the highest-drafted players of Filipino descent. Selected No. 2 overall in the 2025 NBA Draft, he poses with his jersey after being picked by the San Antonio Spurs.
(Photo credit : @dylharpp/Instagram account)
Harper, selected No. 2 overall by the San Antonio Spurs in the 2025 NBA Draft, now shares a rare distinction with Phoenix Suns guard Jalen Green: the highest-drafted Filipino American in league history. But that title, for Harper, is not a statistic. It’s a legacy.
“I just want to represent where I come from,” Harper said during his post-draft press conference. “My mom’s side of the family—they’ve put so much into me.”
That side is led by Maria Pizarro Harper, the woman whose name trended just minutes after her son’s. She didn’t make a speech or flash a sign. She just stood there—elegant, grounded, and unmistakably proud. In her son’s success, many saw her handprints: the discipline, the fire, the foundation.

Maria was born in Bataan, Philippines, and moved to New Jersey when she was seven. A former Division I guard at the University of New Orleans in the 1990s, she played with tenacity and coached with precision. Long before national scouts discovered Dylan, she was putting him through drills on concrete courts at dawn. She coached both of her sons—Dylan and Ron Jr.—at Don Bosco Prep in New Jersey. She was the first coach Dylan ever listened to. Arguably, the toughest one.
“She knows the game,” Harper said in an earlier interview. “And she doesn’t sugarcoat anything.”

That approach worked. Dylan’s path to the pros was not hyped with mixtape culture or viral dunks. It was carved with patience, power, and pedigree. His father, Ron Harper Sr., owns five NBA championship rings—three with the Chicago Bulls (1996–1998) under coach Phil Jackson alongside Michael Jordan, and two with the Los Angeles Lakers (2000–2001), also under Jackson, during the team’s dominant run led by Kobe Bryant and Shaquille O’Neal. His brother, Ron Jr., now with the Detroit Pistons, recently broke the Motor City Cruise record for most threes in a game. The game runs in the family—but Dylan, quietly, is becoming its most compelling chapter.
Maria Harper didn’t intend to go viral—but she did. As Dylan was interviewed live on ESPN moments after being drafted, the cameras caught Maria standing behind him, composed and radiant in a black dress. Her poise, confidence, and visible pride instantly captured viewers’ attention.
Social media lit up. One user wrote, “Respectfully, Dylan Harper’s mom is the star of the NBA Draft.” Others called her “a smoke show,” and “the real MVP of the night.” Maria, for her part, stayed quiet, letting the moment belong to her son. But in the hours that followed, clips of her appearance were shared across platforms, and her role as Dylan’s first coach was widely celebrated.
Later in an ESPNW interview, Maria described the moment as “surreal,” adding, “The NBA is a very exclusive club. I’m just so proud of him.”
In the Philippines, basketball isn’t just played—it’s lived. In gymnasiums, schoolyards, and on rain-soaked driveways, it’s the cultural heartbeat of the nation. From makeshift hoops in far-flung rural towns to sold-out arenas in Metro Manila, the game pulses through Filipino life like second nature.
Harper’s rise felt personal for many. After all, it’s not often that someone with Filipino bloodline walks across the NBA draft stage as one of the first two names called. It wasn’t just a career milestone—it was a mirror held up to millions of fans who finally saw someone they could point to and say, that’s ours.
He now joins a tight fraternity of Fil-Am NBA standouts: Jordan Clarkson, the Utah Jazz guard and former Sixth Man of the Year who suited up for Gilas Pilipinas; Jalen Green, the explosive Phoenix Suns guard who went No. 2 in 2021; Jared McCain, the sharpshooting rookie for the Philadelphia 76ers who proudly acknowledged his Filipino roots after being drafted in 2024; and Raymond Townsend, the original trailblazer who made history in 1978 as the first Filipino American to play in the NBA.
In San Antonio, Harper steps into a team in transformation. With 7’4″ French phenom Victor Wembanyama already on the roster—and Rookie of the Year Stephon Castle joining him—the Spurs are quietly assembling one of the most exciting young cores in the league. The addition of All-Star guard De’Aaron Fox only raises the stakes.“Man, I feel great. I feel good. I almost cried,” Harper admitted. “I felt every emotion in that moment. I’m just excited to get started with the organization.”
There’s still a summer league to grind through, veterans to impress, a system to learn. But none of that dulls the brilliance of this milestone. Harper has already become something more than a draft pick.