Langston Galloway releases second signature shoe, lgTWO, speaks on Kyrie Irving support

Langston Galloway has bulldogged his way through a career in professional basketball because of his hard work and determination. In 2021, he made his signature work ethic into his personal brand, Ethics, a sneaker and apparel company.

On Wednesday, Galloway, 31, released his second signature shoe, the lgTWO. It's a low-cut sneaker that features a cloudy lavender colorway inspired by the NBA veteran's Sagittarius zodiac sign and the company's desire to be inclusive.

"It's not just myself, it's everybody that exudes your work ethic every single day," he told USA TODAY Sports. "Waking up, how you get ready to go to work, what time you get up, your ethos, your ethically arrogance of how you carry yourself.

"So it's like everything that you do in your life and how you're raised, everything kind of all points back to one specific thing. And I think that's why Ethics is so important to us and that's why it's so important to so many people that we come in contact with. Because it's not just about creating the shoe but it's like the story behind the shoe, who that person is. When you're with our brand, we want you to have your own legacy and be able to create your own legacy because that’s what it’s all about."

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Galloway lives his brand. He went undrafted in 2014. But his steadfast nature brought him to a 10-day contract with the New York Knicks that he turned into a two-year, $1.1 million deal to propel himself into a full-fledged NBA career.

Galloway's wife, Sabrina, is his business partner in Ethics. They are involved at the ground level, from ideation of design to shipping out packages. Sabrina is a former student athlete and shares Galloway's mission to bring ownership to the sneaker space. Besides the gender neutral colorway, the sneaker, which retails at $120, is offered in sizes as small as men's 5/women's 6.5 and goes up to men's 16/women's 17.5.

"It's not just a male basketball shoe, but this is a female moreso component of the shoe because both me and my wife are basketball players," Galloway, who finished his second G League season with the College Park Skyhawks last month, said. "When she was growing up playing in high school, I mean, that was all she knew. So that's what I'm really excited about."

Langston Galloway on creating his own signature shoe

A signature shoe is a mark of greatness for an athlete. Michael Jordan started his Jordan empire with the Nike Air Jordan 1 in 1985. Sheryl Swoopes became the first woman's basketball player to have a signature shoe with the Nike Air Swoopes in 1995. Today, LeBron James, Stephen Curry, Kevin Durant, Ja Morant and Breanna Stewart all have been rewarded for their prowess on and off the court with a namesake sneaker.

Galloway has taken his legacy into his own hands by releasing two signature sneakers under Ethics.

The lgONE was released in 2022 and gave Galloway a sense of how to prepare for the second drop. That sneaker was a mid-cut silhouette and came in a variety of colorways — including "Superhero Gumbo" with red, yellow and blue inspired by the Galloways' five-year-old son's love for superheroes and "Homecoming," which features blue and yellow as a tribute to Louisiana's Southern University and A&M College and all HBCUs.

The sneakers are also vegan. Galloway committed to a plant-based diet six years ago after having some health problems. He noticed the many benefits, including less inflammation, quicker recovery after injury and increased energy. It's another way his signature sneakers are uniquely him, but also invite others to stand out.

"When it comes to how we wanted to create a product, number one, how do we create something that's sustainable within the marketplace?" he said. "Because we can be like everybody else and just blend right in. Or we can kinda go in our own route. So that's what we wanted to do was go on our own path and really showcase. Say, 'Hey, look, we can create something that it changes the dimension and the direction of how sneakers are being built.'"

Ethics hosted a wear testing in New York on Sunday through the Sunday Washed Club. Both men and women athletes were in attendance and got to test out the lgTWO. Among them was Tray Edwards, a member of the basketball community who is a copywriter for Wieden + Kennedy and an NBA analyst for The Athletic. He was also one of the masterminds of the viral NBA Bubble Life and WNBA Bubble Life accounts.

"I came in curious, as a guard, I like to know if I can make certain cuts," Edwards said to USA TODAY Sports. "... It's a very good shoe."

He applauds Galloway for taking ownership in the sneaker space, which can be very competitive and hard to break ground against giants like Nike, adidas and Under Armour.

"Everybody wants to wear the cool thing," Edwards said. "That's the currency, the social currency of it."

Galloway said from the feedback he's received, people have told him the grip and the sturdiness of the shoe are highlights. People also appreciate the low cut option of the lgTWO.

Langston Galloway speaks on Kyrie Irving's support of Ethics

The lgTWO had another significant pre-launch promotion, including Galloway giving his Skyhawks teammates each a pair of sneakers and Kyrie Irving wearing a pair of the shoes in March during warmups ahead of a Dallas Mavericks game.

“I wanted to show him some love,” Irving told ESPN's Tim MacMahon of supporting his former Brooklyn Nets teammate.

Irving's longtime deal with Nike, which included his own signature sneaker line, ended after a controversy surrounding a film with antisemitic messages. A representative for Irving said at the time that the termination of his contract was "mutually decided."

Fans have been anticipating where, if anywhere, Irving will land for his next sneaker contract. Galloway was grateful to see the support of Ethics from the sneaker free agent.

"I really appreciate him supporting the brand," Galloway, who also shares the same trainer as the eight-time NBA All-Star, said. "That's what you want as a brand founder is to have a viral moment and that was our first viral moment. I know there's more to come.

"But just to see another athlete that cherishes sneakers, he has his own line that he was running and now to be able to show some love to a businessman, an entrepreneur, a pioneer in the space, I really appreciate all that support. Because our brand is all about for the players and by the players."

While noting that Irving "supported Langston when he didn't have to," Edwards isn't surprised at the camaraderie surrounding Ethics.

"Langston's likable," he said. "He's a great person, a great teammate."

Langston Galloway's community involvement

In the 2022-23 G League season, Galloway averaged 16.2 points, 3.3 rebounds, and 2.2 assists for the Skyhawks. His impact was felt off the court as he won the G League Community Assist Award earlier this month. Besides participating in team efforts during the holidays and speaking with local youth basketball teams, he and Sabrina have run the Langston Galloway Foundation since 2018 when he was on the Detroit Pistons. The organization's projects in his hometown of Baton Rouge, Louisiana,  include a pre-game meal program for students, a youth basketball camp, which will be in its eighth year this season, and annually refurbishing a court in a local park.

"We continue to build that just chain of all the schools we continue to tap into and help these kids going forward," he said. "Sabrina and I, we both are student athletes and that's number one in our hearts. It's like hey, how do we bring up as many kids as we can? Because as we grew up and got out of Baton Rouge, we weren't the only ones to help us get out. We had to do it within the community. So that's all we doing, just trying to reach back and grab as many kids as we can and bring them along."

Galloway, a known sneakerhead, started Ethics because he wanted to take ownership of his footwear — he is flatfooted and always struggled to find shoes that worked well for him. Growing up, the Jordan XIII He Got Game was his favorite sneaker, and the only Jordan shoe he owned. The inspiration is evident in the structure of the lgONE.

But he's building a brand that's distinctly his own. He even sold off many of the pieces in his prized collection to fully commit to himself.

"My dad and mom always instilled in me and said, 'Hey, look, you gotta dive all the way in,'" he said. "'You've gotta put your best foot forward. You've got to sacrifice what you want to come out of life. You've got to be dedicated to your craft and put the time and effort and the love and the blood, sweat and tears into it.

"'And, then also, too, you gotta have fun.'"

This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: Langston Galloway speaks on Kyrie Irving, launching Ethics shoe brand