MADISON, Wisc. — Daniel Freitag was in the midst of his freshman year of high school when he decided that he needed a personal shooting machine to improve his basketball performance. It was the kind many gym rats likely have seen before, with a net surrounding the hoop that funnels the ball into an apparatus and fires passes in different directions. There was just one problem: It cost roughly $4,000.
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No matter. Freitag had a plan, as he demonstrated throughout his high school career. And he knew exactly how to execute it.
Freitag began buying and reselling clothing such as athletic wear and Jordan shoes, researching prices and gaining the knowledge necessary to turn a profit. As his mom, Jamie, recalled, even if he could mark something up $20, it was worth his time because of the goal he had in mind. He created an Instagram account to market the gear and, for several months, steadily built his fund. Until one day, during his sophomore year, he had saved enough money in his bank account to punch in his debit card numbers and order the shooting machine.
The idea that a 15-year-old could possess that type of long-term vision and stick with it might seem foreign to many people. But those who know Freitag say that’s simply Daniel being Daniel.
“He can literally write up goals on a Monday and have 20 new things added to the list, and he will have accomplished every one of them by Friday,” Jamie said. “He has daily goals, and he doesn’t go to bed until they’re done. People say, ‘What if there’s a day he doesn’t do it?’ Well, then he doesn’t go to bed yet.”
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Freitag is set to arrive at Wisconsin next month as the highest-rated point guard Greg Gard has signed in his nine seasons as coach. Freitag is coming off a senior season in which he was one of five finalists for the Minnesota Mr. Basketball Award, averaged 26 points with seven assists and seven rebounds and led Breck High School to a Class 2A state championship. He has a unique opportunity to immediately contribute at Wisconsin following the stunning departure of three-year starting point guard Chucky Hepburn, who transferred this offseason to Louisville.
Expectations for Freitag are no doubt astronomically high. He intends to continue separating himself with his ability and through a level of drive and determination that he believes his peers can’t match.
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“The people who are in my workouts with me, we talk all the time about how it really is crazy that no one else knows what we know just because they haven’t been at that workout,” Freitag said. “I don’t want to give out numbers, but shots and shots where I’m not missing a single one or hundreds of swishes in a row where it’s just like doing things that make everyone in that workout confident that the NBA is possible.”
— Daniel Freitag (@DanielFreitag_) April 4, 2024
Freitag’s maturity, foresight and time-management skills have stood out during his journey. He spent his first three years of high school attending Jefferson High School and excelling in football and basketball. During football season, he often reached out to basketball coach Jeff Evens so Evens could open the gym for him at 6:30 a.m. before school began at 7:50 a.m. That way, Freitag could train — because he didn’t have time in the afternoons due to his football obligations.
Freitag averaged 10.2 points per game on varsity as a freshman and then exploded for 26.3 points per game as a sophomore to become a national recruit. Jamie said it was during those years when Freitag began to tinker with and formulate his plans for success. He sent Instagram direct messages to older basketball players from the Minneapolis area he admired asking them to critique aspects of his game. If he heard back, he would immediately drive to the gym and practice their pointers.
He began monitoring his water and food intake daily, drinking two protein shakes and tracking how many total grams of protein he had consumed in his meals. He performed three workouts per day, one for weight training and two for basketball. Recently, he started journaling and writing daily gratitude affirmations. He reads one chapter each day of a motivation-style book and takes notes. He also listens to motivational podcasts.
“He’s driven,” Evens said. “And I think that’s kind of a common denominator with a lot of successful athletes. They’ve got an extra gear that they realize that when they’re not out there working, someone else is, and that’s their competition. He just wants to be the best he can be, and you only get this opportunity but once in your life. I think he’s taken full advantage of everything that’s been offered his way.”
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Freitag consistently has done things to elevate his game in his own way. He is a rare elite-level player who doesn’t have a personal trainer. Instead, he relies on workouts he devised with Hayden Holland and Samir Jones, two of his good friends and former basketball teammates at Jefferson. Holland and Jones help Freitag run through his workouts, serving as rebounders, passers and trash talkers to motivate him.
Jones is two years older than Freitag and was a starter on the Jefferson varsity team as a senior when Freitag was a sophomore. He said Freitag would watch every game and send him clips on areas to improve. Jones learned it wasn’t meant to be insulting but rather a way to help lift the play of the entire team.
“I had to humble myself because he was a 16-year-old trying to teach an 18-year-old how to play basketball,” Jones said. “But it was the good and the right way. You remember when LeBron James got drafted, and they were like, ‘Oh, we’re not going to listen to him.’ But he knew what he was talking about. I feel like Daniel kind of has that same effect on players and even coaches around him.”
Freitag was an outstanding two-sport athlete who earned scholarship offers from Wisconsin in basketball and football. He earned Metro West conference player of the year honors in football as a junior when he caught 37 passes for 501 yards and five touchdowns and carried the ball 54 times for 505 yards with five more scores. But Freitag’s passion was basketball. He committed to Wisconsin over Baylor, Minnesota, Notre Dame and Virginia based largely on the relationships he developed with Gard and assistant coach Joe Krabbenhoft during his recruitment. Wisconsin was the first school to offer Freitag a scholarship after he attended an advanced camp on campus in June 2021.
“He does a great job at making things feel genuine, making the recruiting process not even feel like a recruiting process,” Freitag said of Gard. “It just feels like, ‘Hey, I work for the Badgers. But let’s develop a relationship, like Greg Gard and Daniel Freitag, not University of Wisconsin.’ He does a great job at that. He knows exactly how much to reach out, how little, kind of when to really put his foot on the gas and really recruit and when to kind of lay off and let me have my own time. He’s stayed consistent. He noticed me first. There were a lot of things I liked.”
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There were plenty of things Wisconsin liked about the 6-foot-3 Freitag. He developed into a three-level scorer who could draw fouls at the rim with his quickness and strength and convert at the free-throw line. He could break defenders down off the dribble and use his vision to find open teammates. He enjoyed the challenge of defending and averaged 2.5 steals per game as a senior. Jamie said Freitag is so competitive that, after a schoolmate at Breck beat him in ping pong, Freitag bought an $800 ping pong table the next day for his house.
At the time of his Wisconsin commitment last summer, Freitag represented an exciting part of the future of the program. But when Hepburn publicly announced on April 18 that he would enter the portal, it changed the potential trajectory for Freitag, who acknowledged that decision “opens up huge doors for myself.”
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Wisconsin has three point guards on its roster for next season in Kamari McGee, Central Arkansas transfer Camren Hunter and Freitag. McGee played 8.3 minutes per game as Hepburn’s backup last season. Hunter was a first-team All-Atlantic Sun performer who can score at the rim but whose outside shot and assists-to-turnovers ratio leave something to be desired. Freitag underwent offseason ankle surgery but is expected to be ready this summer.
“I kind of see myself coming in, and if I can have it my way, I’ll show why I can be even the No. 1 option,” Freitag said.
Freitag said his discussions with Gard in the aftermath of Hepburn’s decision haven’t changed because Gard consistently has been supportive of the role Freitag could have for the Badgers.
“I know promising guys starting spots is something that a lot of coaches have told me they don’t do,” Freitag said. “But I think for some time now, even before Chucky was leaving, he said a million times over that he’s bringing me in to play, not to watch. Every time I’ve ever said, even accidentally saying, ‘Learning behind Chucky,’ he’s stopped me in my tracks and has said, ‘Learning beside Chucky.’”
Arriving as one of the most highly touted players in Gard’s tenure could create a sense of pressure to live up to expectations. But that’s not how Freitag views it. Instead, he pointed out that his recruiting ranking had dropped in the past year.
When Freitag committed to Wisconsin, he was rated in the 247Sports Composite as the No. 8 point guard in the country. Now, he is ranked No. 11. He also is rated as the No. 121 player nationally in the 2024 recruiting class.
Freitag has lofty ambitions for himself at Wisconsin and for his future. And he has a vision he is eager to execute.
“In my head, I’m a top-15 player in the country,” Freitag said. “So me being top 150, it’s something that fuels me almost. I think if I was a top-five player in the grade on these rankings, maybe that’d be some pressure. But being top 150, it’s almost disrespect. And I’m all for showing it next year, proving them wrong. Throw me 120 players, put them in front of me, you can see with your own eyes.”
(Photo: Courtesy of Howard Pulley Hoops)
