“You should join our basketball team,” his friend would say.

Hachimura did not have any interest. Basketball was too hard, he’d say, and like many other boys growing up in Japan, he had dreams of excelling on the baseball diamond. But after two weeks of the daily request, his priorities changed. He didn’t care about which sport he wanted to play. Hachimura just wanted his friend to leave him alone.

“I didn’t really want to play basketball, but he was so annoying,” Hachimura says. “I agreed to go one time.”

When he got there, he met the basketball coach, who had a message of his own, one a little less annoying and a little more enticing.

“The first time I met my coach, he told me I could go to the NBA,” Hachimura says. “I was kind of stupid so I believed him.”

It sounded stupid because it seemed nearly impossible. No Japanese-born player had ever been selected in the NBA draft, and Yuta Tabuse’s four-game stint with the Phoenix Suns in 2004 was the only time a Japanese native even got a taste of NBA action.

But Hachimura, the son of a Beninese father and a Japanese mother, is blazing a new trail. Now a 6-8 junior at Gonzaga, he is a projected NBA lottery pick in every 2019 mock draft you can find. He’s already the first man from his country to play in the NCAA tournament and the fifth to ever play Division I men’s basketball. As of March 11, he’s averaging a team-high 20.6 points per game and has the No. 1 ranked Bulldogs (29-2) among a handful of teams with very realistic hopes of a national title. 

“Not many people have ever done what he’s trying to do,” says Gonzaga assistant Tommy Lloyd, who recruited Hachimura. “This is probably the first player from Asia we ever looked at.”

While Hachimura didn’t start playing basketball until he was 13 years old, it didn’t take him long to get on Gonzaga’s radar. At the 2014 U-17 World Championships in Dubai, he led all players in scoring average (22.6 ppg), which was enough to get the Bulldogs’ interest. A year later, they secured his commitment. 

Above anything else, there was one reason why he wanted to go to college in the United States.

“One of my goals was to be in the NBA,” Hachimura says. “I knew if I didn’t speak English, I really couldn’t play in the NBA. I thought it was a good idea to go to college first.”

While Hachimura was a rising star in his own country, he knew relatively no English while he was in high school. He would often fake it or just avoid talking when others spoke English around him. This became a problem at Gonzaga, as he needed to reach certain collegiate and NCAA standards to play. 

“That was No. 1 in everything he did,” Lloyd says. “He had to improve his language skills.”

Hachimura eventually met the standards he needed to, but there was still a long way to go. In 2016, months prior to his enrollment, Hachimura told reporters that he understood 80 percent of English and could speak about 40 percent. Zach Collins, his Gonzaga teammate during Hachimura’s freshman year, remembers him being very quiet when they first met, and it was a few weeks before the two could have a conversation.

“He could understand you, but it was just him getting the words out that was more of a struggle,” says Collins, now a member of the Portland Trail Blazers.

As a freshman, Hachimura used every resource he could. When he wasn’t at the athletic facility, he was at Gonzaga’s English Learning Center. And in practice, he leaned heavily on Gonzaga’s team video coordinator Ken Nakagawa, whose parents were both Japanese, to help him understand what the coaches were saying.

“One of the first things he told me was that he didn’t want to speak in Japanese at all,” Nakagawa says. “He wanted everything to be English. I would just dumb it down to elementary school level.”

It wasn’t an overnight success. As a freshman in 2016-17, Gonzaga made the Final Four, but Hachimura played less than five minutes per game. 

“It was harder than what I expected,” Hachimura says. “The culture is totally different. The language is different. I started feeling comfortable when I could communicate with my teammates and coaches.”

That level of comfort wasn’t fully achieved until after his first season. With the language barrier a little broken down, Hachimura could devote more of his time to improving his on-court skills. First and foremost, that meant getting physical. 

At 6-8 and 230 pounds, Hachimura had the frame to wreak havoc, but he wasn’t used to playing that style in Japan. The Gonzaga coaches got on him for it, and midway through his sophomore season, in a road loss to San Diego State, things finally clicked.

“It was the first time he used his body and tools to take advantage of his advantages,” Lloyd says.

From that game forward, Hachimura led the Bulldogs in scoring. And in his junior year, he has looked even better, opening the campaign with a career-high 33 points in a win against Idaho State and dropping 25 or more on four other occasions.

“He was a better shooter and more skilled than we thought,” Idaho State coach Bill Evans says. “He’s going to make a lot of money some day.”

While a hefty professional contract seems like a formality at this point, it’s the untapped basketball market of Japan that makes Hachimura one of the most intriguing NBA prospects in a long time. Although Hachimura is only half-Japanese, something he believes will hamper his marketability back home, he’s the basketball star of a country with a growing interest in the game.

Nakagawa says there is a big gap between basketball and Japan’s more popular sports like baseball and soccer, but that gap may be diminishing. The B.League, founded after a merger between two former Japanese leagues in 2015, has increased the scope of professional basketball in the country. 

And then there’s Hachimura’s already growing popularity. His success on the national team made him a celebrity among Japan’s basketball community, and that has only increased since he left for Gonzaga, as a handful of his games are re-aired on Japanese television.

The timing could not be more perfect, as Tokyo is set to host the 2020 Olympics. While that will bring many NBA stars to Japan, Hachimura figures to be front and center as the face of the national team.

“The general public has no idea who he is or what kind of significance he has to the game,” Nakagawa says. “I think 2020 will be another landmark opportunity to make basketball popular in Japan, and I think Rui will have a big part in that for sure.”

—

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David Casillo is a contributor to SLAM. Follow him on Twitter @dcasillo. 

Photos via Getty.

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Click here for our 2018-19 Women’s College Basketball Top 10.

10.  Syracuse Orange

While Syracuse is typically ravaged by early exits, this time the Orange return every major contributor from last year’s Elite 8 team. Tyus Battle, Oshae Brissett and that vexing zone defense should be enough to have Jim Boeheim’s crew pushing for the ACC crown and a Final Four berth.

9.  Michigan State Spartans

The Spartans lost two lottery picks but return the elite inside-out duo of point guard Cassius Winston and big man Nick Ward. They give Tom Izzo the Big Ten’s best team and one that should clear the NCAA Tournament first weekend hurdle that has tripped them up the last three seasons.

8.  Villanova Wildcats

The reigning national champions lost four players to the NBA draft but have the talent for a quick reload. Starters Eric Paschall and Phil Booth are back, while freshmen Jahvon Quinerly and Cole Swider enter the mix. Jay Wright’s team is eyeing a third national title in four seasons.

7.  North Carolina Tar Heels

Senior Luke Maye and freshman Nasir Little give the Tar Heels an edge in the frontcourt, especially with Sterling Manley ready to take the next step. The ACC is deep this season, but if the backcourt can support the interior, UNC can wear the league crown.

6.  Gonzaga Bulldogs

The trio of Killian Tillie, Rui Hachimura and transfer Brandon Clarke give the Zags more depth and experience in the frontcourt than any team in the country. It’s no question that their returning talent is among the nation’s best, but will a weak conference schedule doom them in March?

5.  Nevada Wolfpack

After nearly making last year’s Final Four, the Wolfpack may even be stronger in 2018-19. Caleb and Cody Martin are back, as is double-double threat Jordan Caroline. The depth should be better too, as Nevada adds five transfers who averaged double-figures in scoring and McDonald’s All-American Jordan Brown.

4.  Virginia Cavaliers

Yes, they lost as a No. 1 seed, but they also return the key pieces that earned them that top seed. Kyle Guy and Ty Jerome control the backcourt, while sophomore De’Andre Hunter is the next Cavalier destined for the NBA. Virginia’s experience and stifling defense make them the ACC favorite.

3.  Duke Blue Devils

The Blue Devils have a brand new starting five, which includes freshmen RJ Barrett, Zion Williamson, Cam Reddish and Tre Jones. With Joey Baker, those five make up as talented a recruiting class as you’ll ever see, but winning league and tournament games has proven to be difficult for teams without experience.

2.  Kentucky Wildcats

John Calipari has his kind of team, as there’s experience in PJ Washington, Quade Green and transfer Reid Travis to go along with impact freshmen led by Keldon Johnson and EJ Montgomery. The SEC is tough, but it shouldn’t slow up a group that is a legit national title threat.

1.  Kansas Jayhawks

Bill Self has Kansas looking stacked, as the Jayhawks add in the transfer duo of brothers Dedric and KJ Lawson from Memphis to team up with 7-footer Udoka Azubuike and five-star freshman guard Quentin Grimes. It’s a better group than last year’s Final Four team and one that can cut down the nets.

—

David Casillo is a contributor to SLAM. Follow him on Twitter @dcasillo. 

Photos via Getty.

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Click here for our 2018-19 Men’s College Basketball Top 10.

10.  Tennessee Lady Vols

There’s a young core in Knoxville, and the group is looking to build off of last year’s second round NCAA exit. Rennia Davis should take the next step in her development and become the go-to scorer this team needs. Freshman Zarielle Green will give the Lady Vols a much needed boost.

9.  Stanford Cardinal

The PAC-12 won’t be easy to navigate, but Stanford has the depth necessary to survive a grueling slate. Alanna Smith and Kiana Williams make up a formidable inside-out duo that will cause defenses mismatches. An improvement from last year’s Sweet 16 appearance is within reach.

8.  Oregon State Beavers

After an Elite Eight trip last season, the Beavers return most of their team and are poised for another deep March run. Mikayla Pivec and Maryland transfer Destiny Slocum lead a talented backcourt that was part of the most efficient three-point shooting team in the nation last year.

7.  Maryland Terrapins

The likely Big Ten favorite, Maryland returns almost all its scoring from last season. Kaila Charles is probably the best of the group, but the most important player is Blair Watson, who broke out last season but suffered a torn ACL in January. If healthy, the Terrapins are Final Four threats.

6.  Mississippi State Bulldogs

The core that led the Bulldogs to back-to-back NCAA title games is gone, but the fall off in talent will not be far. Teaira McCowan leads the group of returning players and could end the season as the nation’s best. She had four games with 20 points and 20 rebounds last season.

5.  Louisville Cardinals

The Cardinals lose star Myisha Hines-Allen from last season’s Final Four squad but should pick up where they left off with Asia Durr leading the way. Every other key contributor is back from last year’s group, meaning Louisville fans can probably count on another deep March run.

4.  Connecticut Huskies

Despite losing three of their best players from last season, UConn shouldn’t miss a beat. Napheesa Collier, Crystal Dangerfield and Katie Lou Samuelson are all back, and the team adds star freshmen Christyn Williams and Olivia Nelson-Ododa. As usual, the Huskies will have significant say in who wins it all.

3.  Oregon Ducks

Now is the time for Oregon, which returns almost everyone from a group that reached its second-straight Elite 8 last season. Sabrina Ionescu is the Ducks’ best player and perhaps the nation’s top player, too. Interior standout Ruthy Hebard and Notre Dame transfer Erin Boley should give Ionescu the support she needs.

2.  Baylor Lady Bears

Despite an abrupt end to last season, it’s hard to bet against perennial contender Baylor. Kalani Brown and Lauren Cox are back and should control the frontcourt against nearly any opponent. It’s been seven seasons since Baylor’s last Final Four, and this group could end the drought.

1.  Notre Dame Fighting Irish

It will be hard to top the magic of last season’s national title, but Notre Dame has the pieces in place to at least match it. All of last year’s key contributors return, including Arike Ogunbowale, and the Fighting Irish should get back Brianna Turner and Mikayla Vaughn from ACL tears.

—

David Casillo is a contributor to SLAM. Follow him on Twitter @dcasillo. 

Photos via Getty.

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Thanks to a monster recruiting haul that includes likely pros Marvin Bagley III, Trevon Duval, Wendell Carter, Gary Trent Jr, and Jordan Tucker, mixed in with vets like Grayson Allen, Duke comes in at No. 1 and is looking to win its second title in four seasons.

With the return of Miles Bridges and the addition of freshman big man Jaren Jackson Jr, Tom Izzo and the Michigan State Spartans should be able to match up with any team in the country and could make a Final Four run.

Thanks to the firing of Louisville coach Rick Pitino, the Cardinals dropped from No. 5 in our original print rankings to No. 8.

Roll through the gallery above to see how we ranked the rest of the top 10 teams in the country.

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“I wasn’t really expecting that because in the scrimmages I thought I played pretty well,” Motley says. “They just had a different plan for me.”

The plan was for Motley to add muscle. Despite being 6-10, he weighed just 205 pounds. The coaching staff deemed he wasn’t ready for college basketball.

Motley, though, had dealt with roadblocks before. While he’s now an imposing junior who is Baylor’s best player (17.3 points and 9.9 rebounds per game heading into the NCAA Tournament) and a projected first-round pick, there was a time when he didn’t feel like he would ever turn into much.

“I wasn’t always good at basketball,” Motley says. “It was just something I really wanted.”

Not a highly touted prospect out of high school, Motley was overshadowed by twins and future pros Aaron and Andrew Harrison on his AAU team in Houston and admits he didn’t feel like he had a future in basketball until his senior year. But rather than becoming discouraged, Motley was committed to getting better. When he wasn’t playing, he was working out. When there wasn’t practice or a game, he would be shooting in the gym from 3-11 p.m.

Getting him to those workouts, practices and AAU games was his mother, Willie. Now a retired schoolteacher, Willie was also by her son’s side when his appendix burst during his junior year of high school. His motivation has always been to repay her for all she’s done for him.

“I would like to use the game of basketball to give back to her,” Motley says.

She was with him, too, when he had to navigate through that tough first year at Baylor, during which he added 30 pounds of muscle. His team having earned a No. 3 seed in the East Regional of the NCAA tournament and Motley the catalyst for what could be a deep Baylor run, he’s now grateful he didn’t play as a freshman.

“I don’t think I’d be where I am today without that redshirt year,” he says.

—

Photos via Getty Images

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Roosevelt Barnes waited anxiously at the airport. It was 2011, and his life was in flux. Barnes was just recently divorced, his kids were grown and he was about to be a father again—to a 6-2, 360-pound son. But despite Biggie’s size, he couldn’t be found.

It was all set up just a few weeks prior. Carl Swanigan Jr, a former AAU player of Barnes’, called to ask if he would take care of his 14-year-old brother Caleb—aka Biggie. By that point, Caleb, his mother and his siblings had bounced around from Indiana to Utah, living in homeless shelters, all while their father, Carl Sr, was addicted to crack cocaine and in and out of jail.

Carl Jr was himself once a basketball standout and Ole Miss commit but dropped out of high school and later lost his right eye in a shooting. He knew his brother needed a change, and he hoped Barnes could help.

“I told him if he comes out here, I have to adopt him,” Barnes remembers. “I’m going to raise him like my own child.”

Barnes, though, still didn’t know what to expect. Outside of a brief phone conversation, he hadn’t seen or heard from Caleb since he was 6 years old. And when the plane landed, he couldn’t spot his hard-to-miss new family member, who was collecting his own thoughts.

“The biggest thing I remember was being afraid about my future,” Caleb says. “I wasn’t really sure what was going to happen.”

Then Biggie emerged. He wasn’t the Caleb Swanigan that the country knows now. He wasn’t the Purdue sophomore big man and double-double machine who might just be one of college basketball’s best players. He was a heavy eighth-grader with his head down, wearing khaki pants, a blue shirt and even a tie.

“Wow, he has on a tie,” Barnes thought.

“He decided to put that on because he wanted to make a good first impression,” Carl Jr explains.

That was it for Barnes. He had found a new purpose. He thought to himself, “OK, Biggie. You got me.”

Barnes took his new son to their home in Fort Wayne, IN, set him up in his room and laid down the ground rules—keep your room clean, get good grades and go to church. To the last point, he made sure Biggie knew who Caleb was in the Bible.

“Everybody talks about Moses, but Caleb actually made it to the Promised Land,” says Barnes. “I was telling him that he was special from the very beginning. Your mother and father never planned on having you. You’re here for a reason. Whatever that reason is, you have to fulfill that destiny.”

With those rules in place, the two could focus on the task at hand—getting Biggie in shape and making him a basketball player. The latter was the easy part, with one exception. Biggie loved basketball so much that he couldn’t focus on much else. So during his eighth grade season, his grades slipped. With his squad undefeated, Barnes pulled him off the team.

“He hated it, but the way he responded was that he never got bad grades again,” Barnes said.

Losing weight was the tough part. Barnes stripped his house of junk food, set a new diet for his son and had to stay on top of him at all times, which proved to be an impossible task. As a sports agent, he was on the road a lot. That’s when the relapses would happen. When Barnes returned, he’d find pizza boxes in the attic and candy wrappers under the bed.

“I knew I needed to lose weight because I was very self-aware,” Biggie admits. “I just didn’t know how to.”

It wasn’t until 2013 when things changed. That’s when Caleb’s biological father died. Carl Sr was 50 years old, nearly 500 pounds and suffered from diabetes. Shortly after his death, Biggie had a message for Barnes.

“One day we were talking and he said he never wanted to be fat again for the rest of his life,” Barnes recalls.

Now strictly following Barnes’ diet and workout regimen, Biggie’s game and body transformed. He led his high school to its first-ever state title, won Indiana’s Mr. Basketball and became a McDonald’s All-American. Completely transformed, he now stands at 6-9 and just 250 pounds, leading the Midwest Regional’s No. 4-seeded Boilermakers—who will face No. 13 seed Vermont at 7:27 p.m. on Thursday in the opening round of the 2017 NCAA Tournament—with 18.5 ppg and 12.6 rpg and putting his name in contention for POY.

When it was time to choose a college, Biggie eventually opted for nearby Purdue over schools like Michigan State (where he initially committed) and Duke. It was a chance for stability—and it’s also where his adoptive father played hoops.

“With all the living conditions and situations [Caleb’s] been through, they should be coming in to give Roosevelt Barnes a medal,” says Purdue head coach Matt Painter.

But Barnes says this is where people always get the story wrong. His relationship with Biggie isn’t about one person saving another. It’s about two people saving each other.

“I gave him a focus and something outside of work,” Biggie says. “He was going through a divorce right when I came and it helped him transition back into being single. Our relationship became his most important thing.”

That’s why Barnes’ proudest moment wasn’t when Biggie committed to his alma mater. It’s when Biggie, who almost always calls him “Ro,” called him “Dad.”

“I don’t think he meant for me to hear it, but I heard him say it,” Barnes says. “It made me know that he felt that way about me.”

—

Photos via Getty Images

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But as difficult as it may seem, forgetting about all of that is exactly what Villanova is trying to do. It’s the only way, the Wildcats believe, they can do it again.

“In order to win a second one, you can’t really think about the first one,” Jenkins says. “We’re pretty much starting from ground zero, and we have to build it back up.”

Those who don’t know Jay Wright well might mistake him for George Clooney. His finely tailored game day suits, salt-and-pepper hair and tan skin have earned him the nickname GQ Jay. “You walk into his office and he’s dressed nice and has his legs crossed,” says Villanova senior Josh Hart. “He looks smooth.” Wright swears he’s most comfortable in track pants and a polo shirt, but his “respect for the game” forces him to wear a suit.

On Villanova’s campus, there’s no mistaking Wright. He’s been the head coach for the last 15 seasons, but his history with the school dates back to 1987, when Massimino says he hired him as an assistant because “the clock didn’t mean anything to him—he worked from early morning to late at night.” Wright’s a local celebrity, born 40 minutes from Villanova, and can often be seen driving around campus in a golf cart with his sunglasses on, waving at the students who shout his name.

Those who do know Wright well talk about how much he cares. As much as his time is in demand, he gives students and alumni his full attention when he interacts with them. “He’s a fantastic ambassador for Villanova on every front,” says Villanova athletic director Mark Jackson (not that one). He cares deeply about the school, and that’s why he was so shook when the Big East Conference realigned in 2013, shuffling schools like Syracuse and UConn out, and leaving Villanova in uncharted waters.

“I was crushed,” Wright says. “Even in the first year of the Big East, it just didn’t feel right to me. It’s like a long marriage—you don’t just forget about it. It was still deep in my soul the first year.”

Much of Villanova’s identity comes from its basketball program. It’s a private Catholic school less than 15 miles west of Philadelphia that has an enrollment about one-third the size of basketball powers North Carolina and Kansas. It doesn’t have an FBS football team and gained most of its national recognition when it won its first title in 1985. “I come across people who always tell me where they were in 1985 when we won,” says Ed Pinckney, the star of that ’85 team.

Wright and Villanova have become the models of success in the new 10-team, non-football Big East. They’ve won the regular-season title in each of the league’s first three seasons since the realignment and brought the new-look conference its first NCAA men’s basketball title. Meanwhile, Wright has been voted Coach of the Year every year of the new league. “Jay, given the kind of guy he is, how long he’s been in the conference, and what he just accomplished, is like the dean among [the Big East coaches],” says Big East commissioner Val Ackerman.

While he’s enjoyed the last few months, Wright has officially flipped the page to the 2016-17 season. It’s shaping up to be another good one, as Villanova returns three starters and six rotation players. The Wildcats figure to be one of a handful of pre-season national title favorites, but the odds are still against them. Only two teams have won back-to-back titles since 1973—Duke in ’91 and ’92 and Florida in ’06-07.

“We used the analogy of climbing the mountaintop,” says Donnie Jones, a Florida assistant on those teams. “The path was going to be different. The second year was going to be like climbing Mount Everest.”

Villanova is the first title team since Florida to return its top two scorers (Hart and Jenkins), which makes the Wildcats the biggest threat in a decade to repeat as champs. But Florida brought back all five starters—not three like Villanova, and didn’t have to place young players and freshmen in new roles. So while Wright reached out to coaches like Mike Krzyzewski, John Calipari and Bill Self for advice on life after a title, he avoided consulting longtime friend and former Florida coach Billy Donovan about how to prepare for the season ahead.

“I don’t want to compare our team to that team,” Wright says. “I purposely did not ask him about that because I don’t want that to be our thought process. I want it to be a result of being the best team that we can be, and that’s something we’ve focused on.”

A new team starts with new leaders. While Villanova’s two leading scorers return, last season’s two senior leaders, Ryan Arcidiacono and Daniel Ochefu, have graduated. Both were instrumental in last year’s NCAA Tournament run, but Archie’s voice in particular will be missed—the guard was a team captain since his freshman year. Wright said the first summer meeting without those players was “eerie,” but he’s looking to Hart, Jenkins and senior Darryl Reynolds to fill the void.

Of those three, Jenkins—he of the hero three-pointer to beat UNC in the 2016 title game—will likely have the toughest time forgetting about last season. Jenkins, who when he was a kid used to say all he wanted to be in life was a good person, has become an overnight celebrity. Wright says the extra attention worries him. Jenkins was already the team’s most active player on social media (something Wright asked about when they recruited him), and the senior forward says, “celebrities now know who I am.” So, Wright’s advice to Jenkins, whom he calls the team’s most natural leader? “It’s going to be a part of you for life, but don’t make it the greatest part of your basketball career. Do other great things.”

Jenkins is a typical Villanova success story—an under-recruited player who has evolved into a star. The 6-6 senior was 280 pounds when he showed up on campus. He’s down to 240 now. As a junior last season, the man they call “Big Smoove” because of his size and style of play more than doubled his scoring average from the previous year (6.3 to 13.6 ppg) and hit 100 three-pointers. He’s evolved into one of college basketball’s best and most fearless long-range shooters, which is something he credits his mom, Felicia, a former college basketball coach herself, with developing.

“She didn’t allow me to shoot deep shots until I was strong enough and didn’t have to wind up or push the ball,” Jenkins says. “That transitioned into always having a good base. When you have a good base you can shoot from anywhere.”

The other guy expected to do much of the heavy lifting is Hart. The 6-5 wing is the team’s top returning scorer (15.5 ppg) and rebounder (6.8 rpg) and was one of the last players in the country to remove his name from NBA Draft consideration. He’s a potential first-round pick that some are pegging to be this year’s Buddy Hield. “I would love to call Buddy right now and see what he ate last year to make that happen,” Hart says.

Off the court, he’s a funny dude who plays pranks on his teammates and seems to laugh his way through conversations. On the court, Hart plays with plenty of his last name, as he’s “the hardest playing guy on the floor,” according to Jenkins. And forgetting last season shouldn’t be too difficult for Hart, who already had to forget how much he hated Villanova growing up.

“I was a Georgetown guy,” Hart admits. “I didn’t know too much about Villanova, but I didn’t like them at all. It’s a little bit of a difference now.”

While Hart and Jenkins will get most of the hype, it’s sophomore Jalen Brunson who could be the key to his team’s success. A former McDonald’s All-American and the son of ex-NBA journeyman Rick Brunson, the Illinois native is set to become the next great Villanova guard. He’s also one of the reasons that this Villanova team is different than last year’s. Although he started as a freshman, Brunson was the team’s fifth option on offense (9.6 ppg). Now he’s one of the Wildcats’ go-to guys.

“He sacrificed a lot to fit his game into everyone else’s,” Wright says. “This year we need him to be a little more dynamic and a leader on the floor, and that comes a little more natural to him.”

Jenkins, Hart and Brunson give Villanova some consistency in the starting lineup, but that only tells part of the story. The Wildcats’ depth is the main reason the team enters 2016-17 with such high expectations. Reynolds is a senior leader who is tough to move off the low block. Junior Phil Booth had a team-high 20 points in the NCAA title game. Sophomore Mikal Bridges is the team’s top on-ball defender and a developing scorer. Newcomer Eric Paschall (a transfer from Fordham) is projected to have an instant impact. Redshirt freshmen Tim Delaney and Donte DiVincenzo are capable role players if opportunity arises. Even without five-star freshman Omari Spellman (academic redshirt), the ‘Cats are deep.

The pieces are in place for this team. A different team, but one with the same goals and the same process as last season. Nova has a chance to win it all again, and talk of a repeat will follow the program all season. But the Wildcats won’t be starting any of that conversation. Last year, and all the joys that came with it, is over for Villanova.

“We’re not playing like defending National Champions,” Wright says. “We have to build this team to be the best team it can be by the end of the year, and we have to be satisfied with what that is.”

—

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With his father, the boy spent many home games in the locker room, grabbing pictures with Mateen Cleaves and Morris Peterson, falling in love with basketball.

During that 2000 title game, the boy was practicing on a kids’ hoop in the back of the room, peeking in here and there to get a glimpse of his idols. And when the Spartans won that game, his mom drove him and his brother through the streets of East Lansing to be part of the celebration.

Now the boy is a man, and he has one last chance for a championship drive on campus. Then he’ll leave the only life he’s known. This March, it’s all or nothing for Denzel Valentine.

Denzel’s father, Carlton, was a four-year letter winner with Michigan State from ’85-88. He met his wife Kathy at the school, and they put down roots, raising their sons Drew and Denzel in Lansing, MI.

With the family so close to campus, the two Valentine boys tagged along with their father to practices and games and quickly fell in love with basketball and the Spartans.

“Anyone from my area pretty much wants to come here,” Valentine says. “I grew up wearing Mateen Cleaves jerseys and Morris Peterson jerseys. I’ve always been a Spartan.”

Now Valentine’s in his final days as a Spartan. He’s a likely All-American, averaging 19.0 ppg, 7.9 rpg and 6.9 apg. He also might lead the Big Ten in visits home per week.

“I take time once or twice a week to do something with my family,” Valentine says.

Growing up in the shadow of campus, it didn’t take long to notice that the Valentine boys had a knack for the game and Denzel was super competitive—about it and everything else. He didn’t just hate losing on-court. Whenever he lost a game of Monopoly, he flipped the board over.

“My dad has tons and tons of trophies that we had at my old house,” Denzel says. “Subconsciously when you see those, you just want to be a winner.”

An admitted sore loser at times, Valentine didn’t have to deal with much of it on the court because of how talented he was. Both he and his brother, who later played at Oakland University and is now an assistant coach there, started racking up wins from an early age with their father coaching most of the games.

It was at Sexton High in Lansing that Carlton Valentine did most of his coaching. He’s spent nearly a decade there during two separate stints. That time included the entire high school careers of both his sons.

“Any father with a chance to coach his kids at that level is getting an unbelievable experience,” Carlton says.

There was only one year of overlap for the two Valentines, and it almost didn’t happen. While Drew was a senior, Denzel was entering his freshman year, and after some summer struggles their father confided in Drew that he wasn’t quite sure if Denzel was ready for varsity.

Once Drew, who later coached his brother as a grad assistant at MSU, told his younger brother, that was all Denzel’s competitive spirit needed, with one last camp approaching.

“That whole team camp he was just straight killing,” Drew says.

From that point there was no looking back. Denzel committed to Michigan State before his junior year and ended his high school career with back-to-back state titles.

With his parents in the stands, Valentine’s Spartans career has been a memorable one thus far. Valentine’s team has been to three Sweet 16s and one Final Four in his first three seasons. Individually, he’s raised his points, rebounds and assists per game in every season.

There’s only one thing left that he wants to accomplish.

“I’m just trying to finish out strong,” Valentine says. “The goal at the beginning of the season was to win a National Championship.”

While the end of his college career could be memorable, it will also be bittersweet. As a consensus first-rounder this June, it’s likely he’ll need to be the first in his family to move away. It’s a change he can only describe as “weird” and not having him a car ride away is something his brother says will be “very different.”

It’s no surprise, though, that it’s his parents who seem to have the biggest adjustment ahead, since Carlton taught him the game, Kathy drove him to tournaments, and both of them brought MSU into his life.

Now there is just one more NCAA Tournament ahead of them.

“It’s tough, but we’ll manage,” Carlton says. “We’re cherishing the time we have. This next journey and adventure will be exactly that.”

—

Image via Getty

The post Blessings appeared first on SLAM.

Long before he was a standout at Oklahoma, Buddy Hield had one goal—get to the television first. “We only had one TV in the house and every time basketball came on, I tried to get the TV first,” he says. “I wanted to watch basketball and everyone else wanted to watch cartoons.”

Hield grew up in The Bahamas, so basketball wasn’t as accessible as it is in the States. He needed to wake up early on weekends just to be able to watch college basketball games. But while Hield grew up in a different place than most young basketball fans, his favorite player was as typical as it gets.

“I started watching Kobe Bryant, and he inspired me a lot,” Hield says. “I liked his toughness. He also made tough shots. He made me believe.”

Now Hield is one of the best players in college basketball. The 6-4 guard is the reigning Big 12 POY after averaging 17.4 points per game as a junior, and he returns to school as one of the favorites to take home the Wooden Award for the nation’s top player.

It’s a nation he wasn’t a part of until he moved to Kansas in 2010 to play at Wichita (KS) Sunrise Christian. He called the opportunity a blessing and made sure he worked hard enough to take advantage of it. Although The Bahamas and the Midwest seem worlds apart, the transition has been a seamless one—mainly because of his personality. The talkative nature of The Bahamas has endeared Hield to his classmates at Oklahoma. They’ve given him the nickname “Buddy Love.”

“I like to get to know people,” Hield said. “I’m always smiling, laughing and having fun.”

Hield has brought that personality to the US, and he wants to bring basketball back to The Bahamas. He says it’s not really organized now, and hopes to change that. “When I go back, I try to motivate them,” he said. “It’s not easy. It’s a process. We’re still working on the skill set and every year we’re getting better.”

The post It’s Better appeared first on SLAM.

“That’s who I would cheer for,” Paige says. “When I figured out Vince Carter went there, I became a huge fan.”

Marcus Paige is from Marion, IA. Of course, having fans spread far from Chapel Hill isn’t out of the ordinary for the Tar Heels. With five National Titles, 18 Final Four appearances and the greatest basketball player ever as an alum, North Carolina’s appeal spreads long past Tobacco Road.

But recently, the program hit a slump. Its current Final Four drought (five seasons) is the longest since the team went from ’82-’91 without an appearance. Furthermore, UNC hasn’t been to the Sweet 16 since 2012, which doesn’t sound like a long time but is the second longest drought for the school since ’80.

“Back in 2012 when we were the No. 1 team in the country, it was probably the last time people felt we had a legitimate shot at contending,” Paige says. “That was a couple of years ago and at North Carolina, it’s expected every year.”

And then, of course, in October a report commissioned by the University of North Carolina revealed that school academic advisers pushed athletes into sham classes from 1993-2011.

When you add all of that up, the 2014-15 season is one of the most important in recent memory for the Tar Heels. “Having a big year for us will help the university in a lot of ways,” Paige says. “With everything that’s happened the last couple of years, it’s important for us to get out on the court and be successful.”

The key is Paige. Entering his junior season, Paige is coming off a year in which he averaged 17.5 ppg and 4.2 apg. He was voted a pre-season All-American and is considered a contender for National Player of the Year this season.

“He does everything you can ask a guard to do,” says North Carolina coach Roy Williams. “He is an outstanding shooter who makes big shots late in games, he runs our offense, is unselfish and likes to get people the ball in places where they like to score. Big-game situations don’t bother him and he can play tenacious defense for the entire length of the shot clock.”

Paige comes from a basketball family. Both his parents played at small colleges in Iowa and coached high school basketball. His sister, Morgan, played basketball at Wisconsin.

From a very early age, Paige was around hoops and honing his point guard skills. “I remember going to my mom’s practices after school and bouncing the ball,” Paige says. “I wasn’t big enough to shoot, but I watched.”

After playing with older kids in his younger years, Paige took his game to the next level when he hit high school. His junior year, he led Linn-Mar to an undefeated season and state title.

All the while, he was catching the attention of his dream school, which in 2010 had gotten Iowa phenom Harrison Barnes to commit to UNC.

Paige was next in line for a storied history of Tar Heel point guards that includes Raymond Felton, Ty Lawson, Ed Cota, Kenny Smith and Phil Ford.

“He has all the intangibles,” Felton says. “He can really shoot it. He can pass. He’s tough. He’s a natural born leader. He’s going to lead this team so many ways—not just with his scoring.”

While he didn’t have a freshman campaign like recent top college PGs Derrick Rose and John Wall, Paige averaged a steady 8.2 points and 4.6 assists in his first season at Chapel Hill. His breakthrough came the next year, when his scoring more than doubled.

“He could be the best point guard in college this year,” Felton says. “I think he can play in the League without a doubt.”

As a sophomore, Paige and Co. were eliminated in the third round of the NCAA Tournament by Iowa State. That tournament eventually concluded with UConn point guard Shabazz Napier carrying his team on his back to a National Title.

When Paige watched Napier take the Huskies to the promised land, he saw the model for what he could accomplish this season.

“I definitely see it because we play similar positions and do similar things,” says Paige, a 6-1 southpaw. “I think this year my team won’t have to rely on me the same way that they did, but in terms of leadership, I can do the same things these guys did to get their teams to that level.”

If you go to Paige’s dorm room, you’ll see reminders of North Carolina’s greatness. There are posters of Carter, Michael Jordan and Sam Perkins hanging from his walls. As Paige enters his junior season, he doesn’t want North Carolina’s basketball success to be just memories on a wall. He wants to put the focus back on the court and re-establish the Tar Heels as a perennial title contender—the kind of program a kid from Iowa would root for growing up nearly a thousand miles away.

“At the end of this season,” says Paige, “hopefully everyone is talking about how we had guys step up and make it a special year despite what was going on off the court leading up to the year, and how we brought back the tradition of North Carolina being a powerhouse.”

David Cassilo is a SLAM contributor and the boys basketball writer at cleveland.com. Follow him on Twitter @dcassilo.

The post Run The Jewels appeared first on SLAM.

Originally published in SLAM 175

by David Cassilo / images by Jesse Burke

Tommy Amaker had a vision for Harvard, and it ended with a dynasty.

It didn’t matter that the school had no league titles, no NCAA Tournament wins and no players in the NBA. This was Harvard, and the impossible could be done.

“Harvard is a magical name that presents the feelings and the thoughts that your dreams are possible,” Amaker says. “That’s a powerful concept to wrap your arms around.”

His vision was simple: become relevant; become a winner; become a contender; become a champion; and then become a dynasty.

“That word ‘vision’ I’m attracted to and I’m moved by it,” Amaker says. “The feeling that you can see something before it actually happens.”

There was no doubt in Amaker’s mind. His vision was going to come true.

The Ivy League’s first bball season began in 1955. In a drought that was talked about in some circles like the Chicago Cubs’ World Series futility, it took until 2012 for Harvard to win the league title.

Playing in the Ivy League is unlike any other college basketball experience. It’s the lone conference without a post-season tournament. Furthermore, its schedule requires teams to play most conference games back-to-back on Friday and Saturday.

With the conference usually sending just one team to the Tournament, the regular season serves as a 14-game postseason. “You have to get up for every single game,” says former Harvard guard Jeremy Lin. “Every game you have to treat like a playoff game.”

Penn and Princeton, historically speaking, win most of those games. The two schools have combined to win 51 regular-season titles. Their success meant if you were an elite student and wanted to play basketball, those were the schools you went to.

“Those players’ first thoughts are that they are going to go to the school with the reputation of going to the NCAA Tournament,” says Peter Roby, head coach at Harvard for six seasons.

So Harvard found itself in an unfamiliar position—with a problem it couldn’t solve. High academic standards plus no athletic scholarships plus no Ivy League success equaled a struggling basketball program. Because the losses piled up, there wasn’t much student interest and the university made little commitment to improve facilities. Harvard was a place for winners, and they experienced athletic success in sports like football, hockey and crew. There was little reason to waste resources on basketball.

It wasn’t until 2006 that the basketball program caught its first break in a long time. A change in the school’s financial aid policy meant it would be easier to recruit. All students who came from a household that made less than $180,000 per year would receive a partial scholarship. Under $60,000 meant no payment at all. But even with that change, Harvard still needed a leader to get the job done. A year later, it found its man.

“A lot of people point to the admissions,” says former Harvard guard Carmen Scarpa. “I don’t agree with that. It all started with Tommy Amaker.”

Amaker is a mild-mannered coach who hates talking about himself because he wants his players to get all of the credit. He was first drawn to coaching because he wanted to teach, like his mother. Amaker played for Mike Krzyzewski at Duke from 1983-87 and left the school as the all-time leader in assists. He returned to the school a year later as an assistant and later was the head coach at Seton Hall and Michigan.

When he was fired from Michigan in ’07, one of the first programs that gave him a call was Harvard, and Amaker was immediately intrigued. “The Harvard name is such a powerful one,” Amaker says. “The institution is recognized as the premier name in higher education across the globe.”

The two sides met for an interview that was anything but typical. Amaker seemed to be the one doing the interviewing, as he asked about the school’s commitment to the basketball program. Harvard was serious about finally making the team a winner, but the administration wanted a coach who would be there for the long haul. So Scarpa, who was part of the search committee, placed a call to an old friend—Coach K.

“He told me that Tommy marches to the beat of his own drum, and that he could see him staying there for a while,” Scarpa says.

After Amaker accepted the job, he immediately went to work to change the culture of Harvard basketball. No detail was overlooked.   

“The first thing he said was, ‘I’m not sure if this is OK with you, but we’re going to switch from New Balance to Nike,’” Lin remembers.

Everyone was committed to making Harvard a winner. The coaching staff spent plenty of nights sleeping in the players’ lounge. The equipment, locker room and even the meals experienced an upgrade. And what Amaker could do unlike any other Harvard coach before him was recruit. He went head to head with basketball’s traditional powers for some of the top recruits in the country.

So how did he sell Harvard, one of the least successful college basketball programs of all time, to recruits? In the most Harvard way possible.

“We’re going to present this to prospects and families as an undervalued stock,” Amaker says. “We talked about it in the business terms. It’s the ground floor of an incredible startup concept.”

Players responded and began to Kickstart the campaign. In 2013, the Crimson welcomed to campus Zena Edosomwan out of Los Angeles, the first Scout.com Top-100 recruit ever to go to an Ivy League school. “It was the opportunity of a lifetime,” says Edosomwan, who had starred at high-performing Harvard-Westlake. “Even our own valedictorian didn’t get into Harvard.”

But it also takes a tad of luck to build a program, and for Amaker, luck came and went by the name of Jeremy Lin.

A sophomore when Amaker got the job at Harvard, Lin eventually became that player that the Crimson could point to and say, “You can be an NBA star if you come to Harvard.” 

“We were very fortunate to inherit Jeremy Lin,” Amaker says. “He certainly became the catalyst for improving our program. He helped this program develop a name and a brand.”

In 2010, Lin became the first Harvard player since the ’53-54 season to play in the NBA. The school was relevant; however, it wasn’t until his week of Linsanity in February 2012 that he became the program’s legend.

“We were traveling on a bus, so people were on their phones looking at live updates,” says Crimson junior Wesley Saunders. “We were going crazy seeing Jeremy’s numbers.”

Just a few weeks later, the Harvard program took another step toward Amaker’s vision. The Crimson secured its first outright Ivy League basketball title in program history and was headed to the Tournament for the first time since 1946.

No longer were Princeton and Penn impossible hurdles. The accomplishment was one that everyone in the program—past and present—reveled in.

“That team carried a lot for all the former players that had played there,” says Tom Thibodeau, a Harvard assistant from ’85-89. “It was a dream come true for all of them.”

Harvard had established itself as a legitimate Ivy League contender, but to take the next step of Amaker’s vision, it needed to establish itself as a national contender. In college basketball, there’s only one way to do that—NCAA Tournament wins. In 2012, Harvard lost its NCAA Tournament game to another strong academic school—Vanderbilt. In the offseason, the program had a misstep when co-captains Kyle Casey and Brandyn Curry temporarily withdrew from the school because of a cheating scandal.

For what seemed like the first time since Amaker’s arrival at Harvard, he hit some roadblocks. “That’s when the story gets compelling and very interesting,” Amaker says. “When you have a few twists and turns, and you still find your way where the daylight is.”

Even with the adversity, the Crimson didn’t have to wait 66 years to get back to the tournament. Harvard won the Ivy League again and met New Mexico in the Tourney. This time around, Harvard rewrote its basketball history again. The 14-seed Crimson knocked off the 3-seed from the Mountain West, 68-62.

“We’re the oldest school in the country, so we’ve had a lot of time to do things,” Amaker says. “That was one of the few things we haven’t done.”

Two nights later, the team lost to Arizona, but when Harvard returned to campus, things seemed to have changed for good. “There was a different feel when people started coming back,” says Crimson guard Siyani Chambers. “We had more notoriety.”

Now Harvard basketball was a winner, and the school was fully behind it. Prior to the ’13-14 season, Harvard had its first Midnight Madness.

But Amaker’s vision doesn’t end with one NCAA Tournament win. This is a program that is trying to sustain success, and the end game is, of course, a dynasty.

This year’s team is as good as any the school has seen. Harvard returns its top-three leading scorers, including Chambers, who was Ivy League Rookie of the Year. The Crimson add Edosomwan into a mix and welcome back to the program Casey and Curry after their absence last season.

As we went to press, Harvard had just used a balanced offense to roll to the Great Alaska Shootout title and boasted a 9-1 record, with a barometer game against UConn on deck in early January. “I think they are going to be really, really good this season,” Lin says. “Every year they have been building and building. This year is supposed to be the best of them all.”

Harvard is a deep post-season run away from taking that next step and becoming more than just an Ivy League school that won one NCAA Tournament game. It believes it can be the next Butler or Virginia Commonwealth, two mid-major powers, or even the next Duke. But it also believes that it can be something completely different than anyone else, and that is the goal.

“We’ve got our identity and our standards,” Casey says. “We’re trying to become the first Harvard.”

The post The Startup appeared first on SLAM.

by David Cassilo / @dcassilo

College basketball’s best player this season could be a walk-on.

That’s the fate Creighton’s Doug McDermott chose after he gave up his scholarship so that sixth-year senior and close friend Grant Gibbs could have a spot on the team.

McDermott was traveling with Team USA in the World University Games when he heard that the NCAA allowed Gibbs, who has suffered through knee injuries in college, another year of eligibility.

“I was in an airport super exhausted,” McDermott says, “but when I heard that news, I was ready to go.”

The three-time All-American could just be college basketball’s greatest walk-on ever. Last season, McDermott averaged 23.1 points per game for the Bluejays—the second best in Division I.

This season he’ll get to test his chops in the Big East, and although Creighton is making its debut in the storied league, McDermott is likely to become its pre-season player of the year.

“I was kind of under the radar the last two years,” McDermott says. “It will be a big adjustment.”

Helping him make that adjustment will be his father Greg, who is also the head coach at Creighton. As the son of a coach, Doug has been learning the game since his first breath.

“I’ve pretty much had a ball in my hands ever since I was born,” Doug says.

And while his dad can seem like he’s on top of him more than other players (Greg essentially made the choice to take Doug off scholarship), the leading scorer in Creighton basketball history recognizes how special these four years are.

“The best part probably isn’t right now,” Doug says. “It will be 10 years down the road to look back and say I did it.”

The post Jaywalk appeared first on SLAM.

How’s it going, everyone? I’m in Chicago for the McDonald’s All-American games. Last time I was here was two seasons ago when most of the country was first introduced to a local kid named Anthony Davis. The other boys on the floor weren’t too bad either, as the game featured Michael Kidd-Gilchrist, Cody Zeller, Michael Carter-Williams and Bradley Beal. If this year’s crop is even half as talented as that one, we’re going to have one heck of a show at the United Center.

Just like two years ago, the focus is on a local kid—Jabari Parker. The Simeon product just shared our SLAM 167 cover with Andrew Wiggins, a couple of players who have seen their hype grow to Lebron James levels. Watching Parker, who is on the West team, and Wiggins, who is on the East team, go head-to-head should be the highlight of the evening.

But those aren’t the only two players to keep your eye on. Joining Parker on the West squad will be Aaron Gordon, who just committed to Arizona this week, and the Harrison twins, Aaron and Andrew, who will be lacing it up for Kentucky next season. Meanwhile, the Harrisons’ future teammate, Julius Randle, might steal the show from Wiggins on the East team.

Before the boys got started, it was the girls’ turn to take the floor. After trailing briefly at 2-0, the West team took the lead and never got it back, finishing with an easy 92-64 victory.  Mercedes Russell showed why she’s the nation’s top recruit by finishing with 16 points and 12 rebounds for the West. Meanwhile, her future teammate at Tennessee, Jordan Reynolds, had 10 points and 11 rebounds.

Boys game is coming up in about 30 minutes, so keep it locked here for tip.

Okay…I’m back at my seat. I just got some great pictures of the players getting ready to come up, including some amazing shots of Jabari Parker. Check it out on my Twitter: @dcassilo.

East starting lineup: Kasey Hill, Wayne Selden Jr., Andrew Wiggins, Julius Randle, Dakari Johnson

West starting lineup: Aaron Harrison, Andrew Harrison, Bobby Portis Jr., Jabari Parker, Aaron Gordon

9:38 p.m.: Well we have our first highlight reel play of the night as Aaron Harrison throws down an alley-oop from his brother, Andrew. Next trip down, Andrew gets a bucket of his own. There’s two reasons Kentucky might have the best class since the Fab Five.

9:42 p.m.: West holds an 11-6 lead right now. If you’re looking for Wiggins and Parker, they are both wearing No. 22. Wiggins has 2 points and Parker is scoreless so far.

9:44 p.m.: Aaron Gordon is having a heck of week so far. He announced he was attending Arizona, and he’s had a couple of thunderous slam dunks. Looking like an early pick to steal the MVP from Parker or Wiggins…17-8 West.

9:48 p.m.: After the TV timeout, both Parker and Wiggins take a seat, so use this time to get to know the rest of these great players.

9:53 p.m.: Second TV timeout, and the West leads 20-13. One player that has really impressed so far is Anthony Barber. The NC State-bound point guard is a great with the ball in his hands, and he’s had plenty of moves that have excited the crowd.

9:58 p.m.: It doesn’t seem like Wiggins has done a lot, but he quietly has six points and two steals. Meanwhile, he’s locking down defensively on Parker.

10:00 p.m.: A three-pointer from Wayne Selden Jr. ties the game at 22. It’s pretty clear that we’re in for a much better game than the girls’ game was.

10:01 p.m.: Parker gets his first basket of the night, but he also fouls Wiggins. It’s his second foul of the night. Has anyone ever fouled out of this game?

10:05 p.m.: A couple of observations as the West hold a 34-30 lead. 1) It’s extremely difficult to see the uniform numbers on these new jerseys. 2) Unlike recent years, there isn’t a player in this class that has the same skill set as Anthony Davis and Nerlens Noel.

10:10 p.m.: Inbounds alley-oop to Jarell Martin is the early candidate for play of the night. Gordon and his 12 points, leading the way for MVP.

10:15 p.m.: It cannot be understated how good Kentucky will be next season. Every player they have in this game has done something impressive tonight, and it’s hard for me to pick who I like the most. Don’t forget Alex Poythress and Kyle Wiltjer are still around.

10:21 p.m.: Gordon might finish with the most points in this game, but Wiggins has been the best player so far. He’s incredibly patient and good things happen whenever he’s around the ball. Just threw down a two-handed jam, but his East squad trails 55-42.

10:23 p.m.: Right before half, Randle has a pretty reverse alley-oop. With all of this Parker and Wiggins talk, he’s been the forgotten man this season. As we hit halftime, the West leads 56-44. Gordon leads all scorers with 14 points, while Wiggins has 12 points for the East. Be back in 15 minutes for the second half.

10:42 p.m.: OK, we’re back and ready for the second half!

10:48 p.m.: In addition to Barber, another guy who has impressed is Martin. He has some great athleticism, and he is yet another solid building block at LSU.

10:55 p.m.: Another fastbreak huge slam for Gordon. If Gordon winds up winning MVP, it will be very reminiscent of when I was here in 2011, and James Michael McAdoo got the honor. West leads 74-54.

10:58 p.m.: Our chances of a good game here seem to be fleeting, as the West is up 20 points. As hope we get a lot of highlight worthy plays over the last 10 minutes to salvage this.

10:59 p.m.: As I type that, the East cuts the lead to 13 points. Parker has 10 points and 6 rebounds, and there will be some pressure to give him MVP if the West hangs on, but he’s an abysmal 4-for-13 from the field.

11:09 p.m.: A dunk by Keith Frazier cuts the West lead down to 11 points, which is the closest it’s been in quite some time. Perhaps we can still have a game here.

11:13 p.m.: Parker does a Q+A on the big screen during a TV timeout, and the crowd goes nuts. They love this kid. By the way, 15,818 people here tonight.

11:17 p.m.: A fastbreak layup for Demetrius Jackson cuts the West lead to six points, then a dunk by Dakari Johnson makes its 94-90. We have a game!

11:18 p.m.: The West responds with back-to-back baskets and is up 98-90. Gordon is now up to 20 points and five rebounds. He’s MVP unless the East steals this one.

11:26 p.m.: They didn’t result in anything, but Gordon just had a couple of pretty passes. He can do everything well for a man his size.

11:28 p.m.: Gordon just capped off a monster night with a devastating slam dunk. He’s at 24 points and 8 rebounds and checks out of the game. Ladies and gentleman, your MVP.

11:29 p.m.: West leads by 9 points here with less than a minute to go. I’m going to head down so I can get there in time for interviews. This was a fun night. Hope you had a good time!

The post McDonald’s Game Live Blog appeared first on SLAM.

by David Cassilo / @dcassilo

Last summer, prior to his senior season, Mason Plumlee did not spend all day, every day in the gym. Instead, he took an internship. For four-to-five hours a day, Plumlee was learning about the world of finance as an intern with Barclays in Chicago.

“The goal of the internship was to make sure I’m not on the next 30 for 30: Broke,” Plumlee says, referring to a recent ESPN documentary about athletes who lose their money.

It was all part of his plan to maximize the effort in his workouts by spending less time in the gym.

“I would go hard in a shorter amount of time,” Plumlee says. “I got in, I lifted, I played, I did an individual workout.”

It doesn’t take a financial analyst to see Plumlee’s less-is-more workout schedule is paying huge dividends. Through Duke’s 22-3 start, Plumlee is averaging 17.6 ppg, 10.4 rpg and 1.6 bpg while looking like a strong candidate for ACC POY. Meanwhile, his stock has risen up Wooden Award rankings and NBA Draft boards, but that’s not much of a surprise to those who know him best.

“He wanted to be one of the best players in college basketball,” says his older brother, Miles. “He had very specific goals, and that’s one of them.”

Mason comes from a basketball family that hails from Warsaw, IN. Miles graduated Duke and is on the Indiana Pacers, while his younger brother, Marshall, is teammates with Mason.

Over Christmas, the Plumlee family had the rare treat of all gathering together at Miles’ place. As you would expect with three Duke attendees, the Christmas festivities included more than just eggnog and holiday movies.

“The go-to game is Blokus, which is a puzzle strategy game,” Mason says. “It’s pretty competitive.”

Back in Durham, the biggest piece of the puzzle in Duke’s title run is Mason. Although he won a Championship as a freshman, he wants a greater impact than the three minutes he played that night.

“It happened my freshman year, and I wasn’t necessarily in the role I wanted to be in,” he says. “I still have that goal.”

The post Bank Shot appeared first on SLAM.

as told to David Cassilo / @dcassilo

The Big East was brought upon by [founder] Dave Gavitt and [commissioner] Mike Tranghese. To me, Dave Gavitt was the finest athletic administrator in the country at that particular juncture.

We had great camaraderie amongst the coaches, and we had the opportunity to compete against each other and still have many, many fond memories about the various games that took place. I still see and talk with John Thompson. Bill Raftery is a dear friend. Gary Williams is a dear friend. Lou Carnesecca, I still talk to. We’re all very much still in tune with each other. We used to yell and scream at each other but still had the respect for each other, which I think was great. To still have a relationship amongst each other is a wonderful thing.

It was competitive. We would play two No. 1 teams—one on a Saturday and one on a Monday. That to me was very special.

Having Madison Square Garden as the venue for the Big East Tournament was tremendous. We were in one place, New York City, which is supposedly where it was all at. It was a wonderful thing. After the games we would celebrate, either in our rooms or go down to Little Italy and have a big dish of pasta.

To have three teams in the 1985 Final Four, it was a tremendous amount of pride, not only with the three of us, but with the entire group of coaches. That’s what made it so special. There could have been four because Boston College lost in the Elite Eight to Memphis.

In the last 10 seconds of the title game [pictured above], I told the kids as long as we didn’t foul, we were going to win because it would take two or three seconds to bring the ball up and another two or three seconds to shoot the ball. Back then the clock didn’t stop. Unfortunately after the basket, one of the Georgetown players punched the ball up in the stands. But we persevered, got the ball in bounds and just held it.

I’m coaching at Northwood (FL) now, but I’m still very close to Jay Wright at Villanova, and we went there and played. When Gary Williams was at Maryland, he gave us the opportunity to play there. We’ve been to other venues in the Big East, and it’s been great.

I’m obviously disappointed about the Big East now, but it’s called changing times. Things happen, and I don’t know why. I’m not directly involved, but obviously the presidents understand what is best for their institutions.

I think it’s great that they got the seven schools involved in this new conference. I think there’s nothing better. The competition still rises. It’s wonderful that they got that opportunity.

Quite frankly, we were in direct competition with the ACC, but the Big East was just a great league. I love the league, and it’s unfortunate that it had to disband, but hopefully the new and old leagues prosper.

The post The Big End appeared first on SLAM.

Jabari Parker chose Duke, but that’s not the story

The story is how he did it, and why that makes him one of the most interesting players to come out of high school in a long time.

First and foremost, let it be known that Parker had his heart set on Michigan State, not Duke, for a very long time.

“I wanted to go there since my sophomore year,” he said.

Now consider that while he praised Duke for its education and history of success, he also indirectly and directly threw some jabs in its direction.

Parker singled out Florida’s Billy Donovan and Rashon Burno as his two favorite coaches during recruiting.

And his least favorite recruiting visit? That was his trip to Duke.

“To tell you the truth, that was probably the worst on-campus visit I had because I didn’t do what I wanted to do, and that’s being a kid,” Parker said. “I know being in college is all business, and that’s what they wanted to show me.”

The reason that Parker did choose Duke seemed to have less than to do with anything the Blue Devils did and more with Branden Dawson being on Michigan State’s roster.

“It was the main reason why I didn’t pick them today,” Parker said. “I didn’t want to mess up his thing. He’s been there two years, so me coming in there would be disrespectful to him and the program. I just want him to do well. He’s a local kid from Gary, Ind.”

While those statements appear as selfless as an athlete can get and an oddity in this era, it also places a huge target on Dawson’s back from Spartans fans, as he has been singled out as the reason why Michigan State did not land the elite prospect.

That’s a lot of pressure for a sophomore averaging 10.1 points and 5.9 rebounds per game after suffering a torn ACL last season.

The entire setting of the announcement was a tad different too. The normal elements were there, as it featured a packed gym, ESPNU and five hats of schools he was considering.

But let’s stick with those hats for a second because one was missing. There was Duke, Michigan State, Florida, Stanford and BYU. But a top-five player without a Kentucky hat sitting at the table? That’s blasphemy in this era.

When asked why Kentucky wasn’t in the mix, his father, Sonny, stressed comfort.

“He has to feel comfortable with the type of program and school overall,” he said.

At about 3:15 p.m. local time, the gym at Simeon hushed and Parker emerged. Dressed sharply, he had on a blue and white striped shirt and skinny maroon tie.

He got through the ESPNU interview as comfortably as a high school kid could. He had to be instructed where to look and tried to think quickly on his feet for each question. He announced it was Duke by taking a Blue Devils shirt out of a backpack and showing it to the camera.

But when the formal portion was over, Parker loosened up and said whatever was on his mind. It was a quality he doesn’t seem to be losing anytime soon.

One of the first things he mentioned was his distaste for press conferences like these.

“Everybody knows I hate this,” Parker said. “It wasn’t a choice for me. A lot of people wanted to know, and it would be selfish for me not to.”

He said he chose Duke over Michigan State and Florida about two hours before the press conference and told his godfather, who lives in California. His parents didn’t even know until he said it in the gym.

At least that’s what he told the gym, considering there was a “behind the scenes look” at why he chose Duke on Sports Illustrated’s website just minutes after the announcement.

Also unclear is how long he will be at Duke. The Chicago product and his father said he would get a degree and could possibly be more than a one-and-done.

“I may play in college for two or three years,” Parker said. “I want the college experience.

Parker, a Mormon, also said he had not decided yet if he would at some point take a year off for his mission.

So to recap, today or maybe not today Parker chose the school he took his worst visit to because it didn’t have Dawson and announced it a press conference he didn’t want to have. And in two years, he might be at Duke, the NBA or on a Mormon mission.

Ladies and gentleman, Jabari Parker.

The post Jabari Parker’s Duke Decision appeared first on SLAM.

by David Cassilo / @dcassilo

When Cody Zeller was 2 years old, he was a bit of a macropodaphobic—he was scared of kangaroos.

It all started with a Zeller family trip to a zoo in Illinois. A day of innocent exploration for young Cody took a traumatizing turn when he found himself face-to-face with a wallaby that was the same height as him. He did not like this. He did not like it one bit.

“I had nightmares about it for a while,” Cody, who turns 20 in October, says today.

But he didn’t let his fears stop with wallabies. He decided he didn’t like kangaroos too much either. When he got home, he saw phantom kangaroos everywhere. He told his parents there were kangaroos hiding under the table, around the corner and in his closet. He could not sleep.

“He probably just said it to stay up late,” says his mom, Lorri Zeller.

These days you won’t find many wallabies, kangaroos or even people close to Zeller’s 6-11 height, and you’d have to search even harder to find one that plays basketball the way he does.

“He’s the best big we saw all year,” says New Mexico State head coach Marvin Menzies, who lost to Zeller and Indiana in the second round of the 2012 NCAA Tournament.

Every day, Zeller wakes up to Travis Tritt’s decade-old song, “It’s A Great Day To Be Alive” because for him, well, it is.

In the span of a freshman year, he has helped turn around the Indiana Hoosiers, developed into a potential No. 1 pick in the 2013 NBA Draft and become the final piece of the puzzle that makes the Zeller family the Mannings of basketball centers.

Really, each day is a great day to be alive when you’re Cody Zeller.

The early great days started in Washington, IN, a town about 60 miles to the southwest of Zeller’s new home in Bloomington.

Washington, like many other Indiana towns, is crazy for basketball. It has a relatively sparse population of 11,500, but its high school gym can hold more than 7,000.

“Basketball has always been important to our community and to our whole area,” says Washington mayor Joe Wellman. “The Zellers solidified that interest.”

Every Zeller is an athlete. His mother played Division III basketball at Coe College, and his father, Steve, was a walk-on football player at Iowa State.

The oldest son is 25-year-old Luke, who plays in the D-League for the Austin Toros. The most talkative of the three Zeller boys, Luke has a magnanimous personality, and is the ringleader of the fam.

Then there’s Tyler, a 22-year-old former North Carolina Tar Heel, who was just drafted in the NBA Lottery. The most reserved of the three, he’s also the tallest at an even seven feet.

And the youngest is Cody. He’s a blend between his two older brothers’ personalities, and he developed a prankster mentality to keep up with Luke and Tyler.

The three Zeller boys won four state titles, three Mr. Basketball honors in Indiana and all received scholarships to play Division I basketball. They also all finished in the top-three of their high school class.

So is this the perfect athletic family?

“People ask, ‘Did your kids ever fight?’” Lorri says. “Of course they did.”

Once when Tyler was about 11 years old, he rode his bike into the back of the Zeller’s car and broke a tail light. His parents asked him how it happened and Tyler told them he didn’t know. It didn’t take long for Cody to cry out, “Tyler did it!”

“I’m sure Tyler tattled on me once before so I had to repay him,” Cody says.

There was tattling and a fight here and there, but above all, this was a basketball family, and his brothers taught Cody the sport.

“I could play against them whenever I wanted to,” Cody says. “They would show me different stuff that they had learned.”

Watching his two older bros go through the recruiting process also taught him a thing or two about the college game. He wanted to keep things simple when it was his turn. That meant no long, boring trips through Missouri, Kansas and Iowa like his brothers had done.

“I really don’t want to do that,” Cody told his mom. “I like football so let’s go to some football games this fall.”

Despite trips to gridiron games at Michigan and Ohio State, Zeller narrowed his choices down to three schools known for their basketball—North Carolina, Butler and Indiana.

The Hoosiers were a very bad team at the time. They won just 10 games the year before. Head coach Tom Crean’s job was possibly on the line. Indiana needed Cody.

In November 2010, just before his senior season, Cody was ready to decide. He chose his high school gym as the venue.

The third Zeller college decision received the most hoopla. There were four or five media members covering Luke’s choice and close to 10 covering Tyler’s, according to Todd Lancaster, sports editor for The Washington Times-Herald.

“When Cody did it, there were like 25 camera crews and 80 credentialed people there,” Lancaster says.

Indiana was the choice. Fans copped his jersey before he even played a game in Bloomington.

“People in Washington had them made pretty quickly even when I was in high school,” Cody says.

By the time Zeller began college, he was an Indiana folk hero. As a member of his AAU team, the Indiana Elite, he destroyed Kentucky-bound Anthony Davis.

“We played them and won by 25 points,” says Indiana Elite head coach Mark Adams. “I thought Cody was the best person on the floor then.”

But most importantly to the Indiana faithful, he was a hometown boy who wanted to stick around.

After the turmoil caused by former head coach Kelvin Sampson’s NCAA violations and the early departure of Eric Gordon, the Hoosier faithful deemed Zeller their savior—an Indiana native who understood the program, didn’t care about the recent past and was happy to be there.

“He just enjoys where he’s at and who’s with him,” Luke says. “He lives carpe diem.”

Despite five NCAA Championship banners collecting mites in the rafters, the Hoosiers won a combined total of 28 games in the three seasons prior to Zeller’s arrival.

In their first season with him, they won 27. “It just feels like the energy is coming back to Bloomington,” says Joby Wright, a rapper from Bloomington, IN, who made a song called “The Big Handsome Anthem” about Zeller.

From rap songs to jerseys to posters, Hoosiers fans adore Zeller not just because they can identify with him, but also because he can identify with them.

”When kids approach Cody, he says, ‘I see me when I look at them, and I want to spend time with them,’” Luke says.

Zeller averaged 15.5 ppg and 6.4 rpg and led the Hosiers to their first Sweet 16 since 2002. Along the way they started 12-0, and knocked off No. 1 Kentucky and No. 2 Ohio State at Assembly Hall.

“In college, he might not have dominated every game, but in every game he impacted it and made us a better team,” says Austin Etherington, a teammate of Zeller’s.

At 83 inches tall, Zeller is without question a center. But while his brothers are most comfortable close to the basket, Cody’s ability to alter his attack is what helped bring wins to Bloomington.

“He plays like he’s about four inches shorter in terms of his versatility,” Menzies says.

He can run the floor and drive as well as a guard and extend his shooting range. As a post player, he can establish position on the blocks and finish at a high rate. Last season he shot 62.3 percent from the field.

Zeller is also a coach’s dream—a player who learns quickly and does what he’s told.

“You looked him in the eye, and you told him what you needed,” Adams says. “You never said it twice, you never had to repeat it and you never had to remind him.”

Put it all together, and you’ve got a player that many scouts are projecting as the possible No. 1 pick in the 2013 Draft.

“Now that he has the chance to be the No. 1 pick, it makes him work ever harder,” Etherington says. “It’s something that he is looking forward to.”

Zeller wants to be a complete player. He says he is working on his perimeter game and improving his rebounding, passing and post moves.

For Zeller, seeing his name at the top of a mock draft isn’t enough.

“It doesn’t mean anything right now,” he says. “If it’s still that way this time next year, maybe it will be different.”

Zeller might not know where he will be in a year, but he’ll always have a home in Washington. But despite being what the Kardashians are to Los Angeles, no one really bothers the Zellers in their hometown.

“They don’t feel smothered in Washington,” Lancaster says. “A lot of people can’t wait to get out. I have a feeling that in a lot of ways they can’t wait to get back.”

He and his two brothers try to return to town as often as they can, but as Lorri says, “The five of us are together twice a year if we’re lucky.”

The last time they all got together was Christmas, 2011. With the late start to the NBA season, Luke was there. Tyler and Cody were on winter break from school. Steve and Lorri had off, too.

“We’re definitely a close family,” Cody says. “We make the most of it when we’re around each other.”

Even with three NBA-quality centers at the dinner table, Christmas is no different than anyone else’s. There is food, and there is laughter. There are things to be thankful for, and there is family.

“We hardly ever talk about basketball,” Tyler says. “We’re just normal kids and a normal family.”

There are no NBA scouts, no college coaches and no Hoosiers fans running around with a No. 40 on their jersey.

It’s just the Zellers. Well, and maybe a kangaroo hiding beneath the dinner table.

The post Home With The Hoosiers appeared first on SLAM.

by David Cassilo / @dcassilo

The basketball world got its first look at Michigan State on Tuesday night as the Spartans defeated Northwood, 85-57, in an exhibition game.

In a rarity for preseason college basketball, the matchup pitted two NCAA title-winning coaches, Tom Izzo and Rollie Massimino, against each other.

Despite the wide margin, Izzo believes his team needs to improve in many areas.

“It’s not going to just come over night,” Izzo said. “The leadership is going to take some time. It’s going to be a work in progress, but I like some pieces.”

Against Northwood, the Spartans showed off their two biggest strengths—depth and defense. Five of Izzo’s players reached double-figures in scoring, and Michigan State held Northwood to 30 percent shooting.

For Michigan State, the biggest storyline coming in is how they will replace Draymond Green. The former Spartan was a leader and elite offensive and defensive player.

At the team’s media day, Izzo suggested that many players would need to fill Green’s shoes.

The first five of those players on Tuesday were Derrick Nix, Keith Appling, Adreian Payne, Branden Dawson and Gary Harris, who made up the team’s starting lineup.

The lineup is pretty much how the Spartan faithful expected, with the exception of Harris. As a true freshman, Harris enters the season with a lot of hype after winning Mr. Basketball in Indiana.

His defensive skills are far beyond that of most freshmen and are likely what got Harris into the starting lineup. But on Tuesday, his offensive game shone bright. He finished with 14 points.

“He just fit,” Izzo said. “Unlike a lot of our other guys, he did what he could do. As a freshman, he guarded very well.”

Defense should not be a problem for the Spartans. With Nix and Payne, both at least 6-9, down low, post defense is one of the team’s strengths. Harris, Appling and Dawson give Izzo three tough-mined perimeter players as well.

Offense is a different story. Green was by far the team’s most consistent scorer last season, and as Michigan State enters the season, it’s unclear who the team’s go-to scorer will be.

Branden Dawson auditioned for that role from the opening tip against Northwood. He scored the first 6 points, including a dunk to open the game. That particular play was noteworthy because Dawson is coming off of ACL surgery.

While Dawson averaged just 8.4 points per game last season as a freshman, he had a stretch in the middle of Big Ten play when he hit double figures in scoring for five straight games. His 16 points led all scorers on Tuesday.

“He helped us to that big lead because he made some plays,” Izzo said.

One thing that Izzo said his team would do this season perhaps more than ever was run, and on Tuesday, that’s just what they did. The Spartans had 29 points on the fast break in the victory.

The Spartans will get another tune-up when they play St. Cloud State on Friday.

The post Michigan State Displays Depth and Defense Against Northwood appeared first on SLAM.

The San Antonio Spurs are like Seinfeld reruns. No matter how many times you’ve seen them and know exactly what’s coming, they still get you.

And just like Seinfeld, you have the All-Star cast of four: Gregg Popovich, Tony Parker, Manu Ginobili and, of course, Tim Duncan.

On Seinfeld, Elaine, George and Kramer have their moments, but without Jerry, there’s no show. On the Spurs, it’s no different.

Give all the praise you’d like to the other three, but Duncan has been the primary reason for success since the day he was drafted by San Antonio.

Since taking him No. 1 in 1997, the Spurs have made the Playoffs every season.

In a lot of ways, Duncan and Seinfeld are similar. They are clean-cut, consistent, rarely flashy and true to themselves.

Seinfeld obsesses over Superman to this day. Duncan still enjoys a good game of Dungeons and Dragons.

Talk to either, and you would never know both have made hundreds of millions in their career and are considered by some as the best ever at what they do.

In fact, it’s hard to understate just how great Duncan has been. A two-time MVP and four-time NBA champion, Duncan has averaged over 20 points and 10 rebounds per game since entering the League.

Remarkably, his offense actually improved last season. His scoring average went up by two points.

And in an era when superstars hold their own teams hostage every year by bolting small markets for bigger ones, the lack of drama that followed Duncan’s free agency this offseason is refreshing.

“No … I’m not going anywhere,” Duncan told Yahoo! Sports last May. “You can print that wherever you want to. I’m here and I’m a Spur for life.”

His head coach wasn’t stressing about it either.

“I don’t see him not having a future with the franchise,” Popovich told the San Antonio Express-News in June.

After an offseason about nothing, Duncan will be back with the Spurs on a three-year deal that will likely be his last.

So if you never seen the Big Fundamental before or want to see him one last time, get your Spurs tickets soon because unlike Seinfeld, Duncan won’t be in reruns for the next 20 years.

With lackluster NBA Finals against the New York Knicks, New Jersey Nets, Detroit Pistons and Cleveland Cavaliers, you won’t be seeing many of his greatest moments on NBA TV either so you better see the power forward in person.

Depending on who you talk to, Duncan is the greatest of all time at his position. Outside of LeBron James, you can’t say that about any other active player.

But it doesn’t end there. Duncan might be the greatest player to spend his whole career with one franchise. He might be the best No. 1 pick of all time. The superlatives and accolades go on and on.

But to sum it all up in Seinfeld fashion, the Spurs chose Duncan first overall in 1997, and yada, yada, yada, now he’s one of the best to ever play the game.

[poll id=”447″]

Notes
• Rankings are based solely on projected ’12-13 performance.
• Contributors to this list include: Jake Appleman, Maurice Bobb, Rodger Bohn, Brendan Bowers, Franklyn Calle, David Cassilo, Bryan Crawford, Adam Figman, Eldon Khorshidi, Eddie Maisonet III, Ryne Nelson, Ben Osborne, Allen Powell II, Sam Rubenstein, Jonathan Santiago, Abe Schwadron, Leo Sepkowitz, Dave Spahn, Ben Taylor, Tzvi Twersky, Peter Walsh, Tracy Weissenberg, Yaron Weitzman, DeMarco Williams and Dave Zirin.
• Want more of the SLAMonline Top 50? Check out the archive.

The post Top 50: Tim Duncan, no. 39 appeared first on SLAM.

by David Cassilo / @dcassilo

Syracuse and Georgetown are tied at 61 in overtime, and the Orange has called a timeout with 49 seconds left. As the team stands in a huddle, every one of the nearly 28,000 orange-clad individuals, from the student section to the alumni, are on their feet. Syracuse is a city where you go to school and stay forever.

In the middle of that huddle is a man who went there and stayed the longest—Jim Boeheim. A former player who graduated in 1966, he took over as Syracuse’s head coach in 1976 and has yet to leave.

The play he’s drawing up is relatively simple. It’s called the “double curl.” It has the point guard start with the ball at the top of the key. Two players stack up on the right block while one player stands on the left block and another on the left wing.

From there the point guard has three options to get Syracuse a victory and give Boeheim his 880th win, which will pass North Carolina’s Dean Smith for third all-time in Division I.

Boeheim is the son of a mortician, and if you had to describe him, you would say he looks like the son of a mortician.

He saunters on the sideline like he’s out for a stroll, squints often through his glasses and looks annoyed at times by how loud the music in the Carrier Dome is. If they made a movie about him, Larry David could be cast in the starring role.

Once a yeller and screamer who threw a chair during a press conference at the 1983 Big East Tournament, Boeheim would much rather choose sarcasm now. One of his go-to moves when addressing a player he’s unhappy with is to shrug his shoulders, face his palms out and give a quick, “What are you doing?”

He knows exactly how things should operate on offense and defense, and when you get it wrong, he’ll sit you.

Despite what appears to be a generation gap as wide as the Grand Canyon, his players speak fondly of Boeheim. They appreciate his honesty and say there’s a good sense of humor hiding in there.

“It seems like the other guys are a little bit scared of him and afraid of him,” says Fab Melo, the team’s starting center [Who the NCAA recently ruled ineligible for the Tournament—Ed.]. “I’m not at all. I have a lot of fun with him.”

When not in the game or a press conference, that personality comes out. During practice he’ll try to distract Melo during free throws by chirping in his ear. Often you’ll hear a boyish laugh that can’t possibly come from Boeheim, but it does.

Besides having the third most wins ever, a victory tonight will give him the most for any man in DI who coached at just one school.

“From 1976 to 2012, we all played for  the same coach,” says Louis Orr, who played for and coached with Boeheim. “That’s a blessing.”

It’s rare to go to a game when a former player, like Derrick Coleman or Billy Owens, isn’t there. Current players Scoop Jardine, Dion Waiters and Brandon Triche all have relatives who played for Boeheim. Including walk-ons, there are 18 players on the team. At the end of every practice, the team huddles and says, “Family.”

Still, for most of his career, Boeheim was known as a loser who could never win the big one. Then a Carmelo Anthony-led team defeated Kansas in the 2003 title game.

“He was a little more anxious and fidgety than usual before that one,” says Hakim Warrick, a forward on that team.

Now, he has perhaps his best shot for a second one. In what could be its last season in the Big East Conference, Syracuse started the year 23-1.

Early on, it seemed as though the season was destined to be marred by the sexual abuse allegations against former assistant coach Bernie Fine, who started the year with the program. Instead, wins have kept the focus on the team.

As Boeheim designs the play to edge Georgetown and give them a 24th win, he is surrounded by the reason the team is off to such a hot start—its depth.

While most squads don’t have more than eight rotation players, the Orange go 10 deep: the starters Melo, Jardine, Triche, Rakeem Christmas and Kris Joseph, and the reserves Waiters, Michael Carter-Williams, CJ Fair, Baye Keita and James Southerland.

Less than eight minutes into the game against Georgetown, Boeheim has used all 10.

Syracuse has multiple players who can do everything. Melo and Keita are defensive-minded low-post players. Jardine and Triche are floor generals with the ability to make the big shot. Carter-Williams and Christmas are freshmen oozing with athleticism. Waiters, Fair and Southerland are versatile swingmen who can score and defend from the guard or forward spot. Joseph does all of the above.

By having 10 weapons and no definitive go-to-guy, it grinds down opponents and constantly keeps them guessing as to who will shoot next.

“I’d pick anybody on the team to take the last shot,” Waiters says.

Photos courtesy of Syracuse University Athletic Communications.

The post The Program appeared first on SLAM.

by David Cassilo / @dcassilo

Jimmer Fredette is not a very good golfer. Last July, at the American Century Championship, a celebrity golf tournament near Lake Tahoe, Fredette finished dead last—in a field that included Charles Barkley.

But regardless of his score, when he’s out West, Jimmermania is still in full swing. Fans follow him with signs and swarm him for autographs. He’s the Michael Jordan of the Mountain Time Zone. Speaking of Jordan, the six-time World Champion was present at the aforementioned golf tourney. Fredette, a Jordan admirer like most basketball players, was all set to meet his idol.

MJ was surely well aware of the accomplishments of the newest Sacramento King; after all, the 6-2 guard from Brigham Young was college basketball’s must-see show last season. Fredette averaged 28.9 points per game during his senior year, on his way to being named National Player of the Year.

Never the fastest, tallest, strongest or most athletic player on the floor, the average-sized Fredette captured America’s imagination with his otherworldly range and electrifying scoring ability.

But on that July day in Lake Tahoe, most important of all was that Fredette had enough street cred to go up to Jordan and introduce himself. So what did Air Jordan say to Thin Air Fredette?

Nothing.

“I wasn’t able to talk to him because they had started the lockout,” Fredette says.

Welcome to the life of an NBA rookie during the lockout.

Before there was a lockout and before there was a golf outing and before there was Jimmermania, there was a basketball court in the backyard of the Fredette home in Glens Falls, NY.

At the time, Jimmer Fredette was far from a household name; he was still just trying to earn his household chops as a 4-year-old against his 11-year-old brother, TJ, on that court. Things did not go well.

“He would block me every time,” Jimmer says. “I would kick the fence and yell and scream to make sure he knew that I was upset.”

The younger Fredette wanted to win, needed to win. And as he got older, he altered the way he played to make sure he ended games less frequently with screams and fence kicking. As the shortest kid on the floor going against his brother and his friends, Fredette avoided rejection by sticking with long jumpers and scoop shots.

“It was almost like a mother that would lift up a car to save her child,” TJ says. “He wanted to win so bad that he would do things he shouldn’t even be able to do physically.”

But even that wasn’t enough to make up for the height and age gap at times. So one day Jimmer’s father, Al, came outside and drew a line on the court. His accompanying instructions: No one blocks Jimmer when he’s behind this line. The intention was to stop the blocked shots. The result was the unlimited range that now has him in the NBA.

“That was basically the only way I could get my shot off,” Jimmer says. “I knew I could shoot it from the outside, and I think since I was able to do that, it increased my range.”

That ability to hit a jumper made him a local sensation from an early age. When he was about 7 years old, he would show up at Glens Falls High School JV games and shoot around during halftime. “I’d see this short, pudgy little kid out on the court shooting three-pointers, and the crowd would cheer for him already,” says Tony Hammel, who would eventually become Fredette’s varsity basketball coach.

Glens Falls only has about 14,000 people, so it didn’t take long for word to get out about the “short, pudgy little kid” who can shoot. By the time he left for BYU, almost every resident had his or her own Jimmer story.

“One day I had my tennis racket and I was hitting balls against the tennis backboard in the local park when a bunch of kids came running around and Jimmer was one of them,” says Joe DeSantis, owner of Carl R’s, one of the small town’s local restaurants.

When he saw Jimmer and his friends, DeSantis remembers saying to them, “I bet none of you kids can hit a tennis ball off this backboard 20 times.”

One by one the kids tried until it was Jimmer’s turn. He choked way up on the throat of the racket and then stood really close to the backboard, tapping the ball 20 times in a row.

“I thought, That’s a talented kid,” DeSantis says.

Fredette was a phenomenon. He was the town’s hero. And even now that he’s all grown up and playing his ball out West, it’s still a Glens Falls ritual to watch their boy on the court.

“It’s almost like Super Bowl Sunday when you go to the bar and watch him play a game,” Hammel says.

In Jimmer’s senior season at Brigham Young University, Glens Falls got to host the Super Bowl. On December 8, 2010, BYU traveled to Fredette’s hometown to play Vermont.

The game was at the Glens Falls Civic Center, an arena that holds 4,806 fans. On that night, there were 6,300 people in the building. Lined up three-deep along the railing, the crowd gave Jimmer a two-minute standing ovation when his name was announced.

“It was very emotional because all of those people I grew up with and grew up loving,” Fredette says.

The hometown hero treated fans to 26 points, an 86-58 victory and a final chance to cheer on the kid who was going to make it.

“It just brings goosebumps even right now when I’m talking about it,” Hammel says.

—

Elliot Walden needed a name for his horse. The president and CEO of Winstar Farm in Kentucky, Walden was looking for a name that would suggest that his horse was a winner.

Pat Hammel, the wife of Fredette’s high school coach, worked for Bill Mott, a Hall of Fame horse trainer and one of Walden’s clients. She had an easy solution for Walden: Why not name it after Jimmer?

“She pitched the idea to me, and I thought it was a great idea,” Walden says. “His success and the way he carries himself are two characteristics we try to emulate here at Winstar, so we thought it would be a good fit.”

The horse, now a 2-year-old who will run his first race in 2012, was named Jimmer. It’s just the latest example of how the guard from upstate New York has become a national hero.

Fredette has seen it all. He says people have named babies, birds, cats, dogs and license plates after him. Despite his success at BYU, he doesn’t think that has much to do with the phenomenon.

“It’s just kind of funny to see how people have really taken interest in the name Jimmer,” says Fredette, whose birth name is James. “Even if they don’t like me as a player, they probably like the name.”

The name is unique to everyone who meets him for the first time. Even his future coach at BYU, Dave Rose, had to double check with Fredette on his name when they first met at the college’s camp for high schoolers. “He introduced himself to me as Jimmer,” Rose says. “I said, What do you want us to call you? And he says, ‘Jimmer.’”

For his first two-and-a-half seasons in Provo, UT, the name Jimmer was just a regional sensation. Thirteen games into his junior year, Fredette was averaging 19.5 ppg, strong numbers, but nothing to catch the nation’s attention.

But then Fredette and the Cougars took a December 28 trip to Tucson. By the time they returned, everything would be different.

“The night he got 49 his junior year at the McKale Center in Arizona, that discussion in the locker room with our coaches and the next day in the coaches’ meeting, everything changed,” Rose says. “We said, Let’s make sure we take advantage of this guy while we have him.”

The McKale Center opened in 1973 and the Arizona Wildcats had won a National Title and been to 28 NCAA Tournaments since, but no player had ever scored more points there in a single game than the visiting Fredette.

America, meet Jimmer.

Upon first encounter, it didn’t take long for the country to fall in love with him. Here was a player who looked like most of the gym rats at the YMCA but with a shooting touch that would make even Reggie Miller pause. Jimmer’s ability to go for 40 points almost any night from almost any spot on the court was even surprising to the man himself.

“I don’t think about it necessarily on the floor, but when I look at it afterward, I’m like, ‘Wow, why did I shoot that shot or how did I make that shot?’” Fredette says.

After that Arizona outburst came the horse names and the nightly Jimmer watch and the incessant requests for pictures and autographs—even from the rivals. “It’s amazing how many other schools in our state’s fans, I don’t know if they were cheering for Jimmer, but they did follow him,” Rose says.

But it wasn’t just the state of Utah. “Jimmer” was as common a term to college basketball fans across the country as “rebound” and “dribble.” He was getting compliments from Dirk Nowitzki and Aaron Rodgers, traveling the awards circuit across the country and coming to terms with the fact his free time was gone.

But what really connected Jimmer with his new following was how he went from small-town sensation to America’s golden boy with the smoothness of one of his jumpers.

“People just want Jimmer’s time, and it amazes me how he obliges everyone,” Rose says. “We all kind of say, ‘Hey Jimmer, we can get you out this way or go around this way.’ He’ll say, ‘No, no, no. If you give me five minutes, I’ll get through this.’”

It’s late October now, and Jimmer Fredette finally has his free time again. But he’d give it back in an instant to get on the court. The nothingness feels strange to him. He’s not used to having time to himself.

“It’s definitely different,” Fredette says. “I was on the go for so long and doing so many different things and suddenly everything stopped, and then I’m like, What do I do now?”

With a delayed start to his NBA career, all he could do is wait. He passed the time by hanging around the BYU campus, working out and spending time with his fiancé—his college girlfriend whom he proposed to in August.

But even planning a wedding can’t compare to the everyday circus that was his college career. “She keeps me updated, but I don’t really do much of the work,” Fredette says. “If she needs a hand in anything, obviously I help her out.”

And he had plenty of time to hear everything you doubters have said. How he can’t play in the NBA. How he’s a one-dimensional player who can only shoot. He heard it, and when the NBA season starts, he’s ready to garner a new following—NBA fans.

“I’ve been in a situation where I’ve been doubted my whole career, and being able to have to prove myself again is something I’m really excited about and looking forward to,” Fredette says. “Hopefully I’ll be able to play well and change a lot of people’s opinion.”

The post Moves Like Jimmer appeared first on SLAM.

portraits by Atiba Jefferson / @atibaphoto

I’ll admit it, Carolina fans. When I drove down to Chapel Hill from Washington, DC, to write the cover story, I had to make a pit stop in Durham. I had to see Cameron. I was too much of a college basketball junkie not to check it out.

I double parked the car, put the blinkers on and then walked inside the arena. I roamed the court, sat in the bleachers and ogled the trophy case.

After about 30 minutes there, I jumped back in the car and drove to Chapel Hill. I perused the campus bookstore (there are Carolina-blue Jordan slippers for babies!), lost myself in the basketball museum and then reached the Smith Center.

That building deserves its own paragraph. The numbers hanging from the rafters are a who’s who of college basketball. And being surrounded by that shade of blue—I can only assume that is similar to the blue in heaven.

You see things are different in North Carolina. College basketball is religion. Mark my words: I’m probably the last person in the state to have said heaven has Carolina-blue (or Duke-blue for those fans further north).

Lockout or no lockout, we needed to put North Carolina on the cover this year. This is the team to watch in the year to watch college basketball. There won’t be any Butler and VCU miracle runs this year. The Cinderellas are dead. The powerhouses are back.

Where are your pros for the 2011-12 season? They are playing college basketball.

Need a public enemy No. 1 like LeBron James and the Miami Heat to root for? Set your sights on Austin Rivers and Duke.

Kevin Durant and the OKC Thunder more your type? Try the young guns down in Kentucky led by Anthony Davis and Michael Kidd-Gilchrist.

How about the old school smoothness of Tim Duncan and the San Antonio Spurs? Watch Jared Sullinger work in the paint for the Ohio State Buckeyes.

And then there’s those Tar Heels. They are your Los Angeles Lakers, fully equipped with the history, the legendary coach (Roy Williams), the star (Harrison Barnes) and the all-league type player at every position.

Just two seasons removed from the NIT, the Tar Heels are back atop the NCAA as the season is set to begin. Barnes, John Henson, Kendall Marshall, Dexter Strickland and Tyler Zeller could be the most electrifying starting lineup since the Fab Five. This team is that good.

Is the national title a formality? The field is too good this year to hand anyone the trophy, but I will say this much: When I finished my initial draft for this article it came out to be 2012 words. Strange coincidence or just another reason to think they’ll be cutting the nets next March?

Watch them, and you’ll understand why college basketball is such a big deal in North Carolina. It’s only fitting that the Tar Heels are on the cover to start this season because this is the season you’ll get a chance to feel the same way about college basketball as their fans do.

Have fun.

Ed’s Note: We’re good, huh? OF COURSE we’d rather the lockout be over, but we’re also pretty proud that we plotted this cover about six weeks ago and it drops today?! Reminds you that we know what we’re doing. Besides the college game, which we cover thoroughly in this issue with the UNC cover story, pieces on Ashton Gibbs, Jared Sullinger and profiles of both the top-five freshmen to watch and a Sweet 16 of other collegians you must see play this year, the best thing basketball has had going for it during these dark days is the shoe companies. Much like adidas helped us rock with Derrick Rose last month (still coppable in most of America, so get it if you haven’t!), this month’s issue boasts great, detailed stories and interviews with Carmelo Anthony (h/t Jordan Brand) and John Wall (h/t Reebok). There’s also a Jrue Holiday feature, an Impact League feature, lengthy and informative stories on Robert Traylor and Muggsy Bogues, exciting high school players and all sorts of dope sneaker coverage. Oh, and you know Shawn Bradley’s in there, too. *Sigh.*—Ben Osborne

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The post SLAM 153: On Sale Now! appeared first on SLAM.

One of the hardest things for an athlete to come to terms with is that a team can win without him. Last season, Rudy Gay learned just that while watching his Memphis Grizzlies upset the San Antonio Spurs in the first round of the Playoffs.

Nobody is saying that the Grizzlies are a better team without Gay, but as Memphis looks to build on its historic season, it will be Gay’s job to fit in and keep the good times rolling.

Fresh off signing a five-year, $82 million contract with the Grizzlies in July, Rudy Gay looked like a strong return on investment last season, averaging career highs in every major statistical category except points per game. But an injury to the shoulder on Gay’s non-shooting arm cut his season short in February.

What seemed like a blow to any Playoff chances Memphis had turned out to be anything but. As Gay watched from the sidelines, Sam Young and Shane Battier filled in admirably and Memphis went 15-10 to finish the regular season with its young star out of the lineup.

Gay, who will be fully healthy to start next season, now must hope he doesn’t disrupt the team’s chemistry from last season’s Playoff run when he returns. If his comeback goes smoothly, Memphis should be able to take another step forward as it will be adding an All-Star-caliber player to the team that upset San Antonio.

Since taking off in his second season in the NBA, Gay has been a model of consistency. Over the last four seasons he’s averaged between 18.9 and 20.1 ppg each season and between 5.6 and 6.2 rpg.

Gay’s first return to game action since suffering his injury came on Sept. 21, when he tallied 17 points, 12 rebounds and 7 assists in an Impact Basketball game.

On October 1, he played in Chris Paul’s exhibition charity game. While the defense leaves something to be desired in these games, it was still a promising sign that Gay finished with 38 points.

Slotting in a healthy Gay to the lineup could make Memphis a legitimate contender for the Western Conference title next season. While the team is deep with Battier, Young, O.J. Mayo and Tony Allen to play the wing positions, Gay’s offensive potential is much higher than any of the other four.

While Gay’s numbers are strong, the consensus around the League is that he has barely scraped his potential. He is still just 25 years old, and one of the highest-ranked players on this list never to have made an All-Star game.

Everything points to this year being the one where he makes the team. This is the best supporting cast that Gay has ever had. Zach Randolph and Marc Gasol will take the attention off Gay, and Mike Conley Jr’s progression will only help Gay increase his scoring.

While Gay missed out on last season’s run, he can be the reason the team goes further in the 2012 NBA Playoffs. An exciting and young team, the Grizzlies are poised for success, and Gay, the longest-tenured of the starting five, can appreciate it the most after many years of meaningless basketball.

Notes
• Rankings are based solely on projected ’11-12 performance.
• Contributors to this list include: Maurice Bobb, Shannon Booher, David Cassilo, Bryan Crawford, Sandy Dover, Adam Figman, Jon Jaques, Eldon Khorshidi, Ryne Nelson, Doobie Okon, Ben Osborne, Quinn Peterson, Dave Schnur, Abe Schwadron, Dan Shapiro, Irv Soonachan, Todd Spehr, Tzvi Twersky, Yaron Weitzman, DeMarco Williams and Ben York.
• Want more of the SLAMonline Top 50? Check out the archive.

The post Top 50: Rudy Gay, no. 26 appeared first on SLAM.

Kevin Durant has been lighting up the summer circuit during the NBA lockout and today he is scheduled to join the court just miles from his birthplace when he and some of the league’s finest take part in D.C.’s Clash of Superstars. Said to join Durant will be John Wall, James Harden, Kemba Walker, DeMarcus Cousins, Michael Beasley, Jeff Green, Eric Maynor, Jarrett Jack, Greg Monroe, Corey Brewer and Samardo Samuels.

I’ll be holding it down here for live updates from the game. Tip is scheduled for 3:00 pm Eastern. See you then!

Pregame

So far we’ve had just a Walker and Cousins sighting. Game probably won’t tip at 3:00 pm, but when it does, I’ll be here.

We’re finally about to tip here. Not a full turnout, but we’re about to get started.

First quarter

9:45: Kevin Durant feeds John Wall for our first basket.

8:07: The Lakers 58th pick Ater Majok is here and has a quick four points. Our no shows include Harden, Maynor, Jack, Brewer and Samuels.

7:24: Greg Monroe hits a free for the white team’s first point. It’s 11-1 Black.

6:30: Former Hoyas Monroe and Jeff Green have the White Team charging, scoring all their team’s points. They trail 11-5.

4:07: The Black team looks superior here, getting better looks and running the floor well. Durant, Wall and Majok look great as they lead 19-16.

3:10: Jeff Green sinks two free throws to cut the lead to 19-18.

2:40: Beasley shows some serious athleticism with a high-flying dunk and White grabs a 20-19 lead.

1:20: Beasley has six of the last eight points for the White team. They lead 26-23.

0:30: The energy is picking up here as Green and Majok exchange dunks. Majok is a mystery after not playing at UConn, but he looks like he has NBA talent today.

0:00: 30-29 White Team after one quarter. I’m going to head down to take some pics to start the second. So I’ll be back in a few.

Second quarter

4:00: Back here and we’ve got 52-51 White Team. Beasley looks great for the winning squad, showing both a post and mid-range game.

2:52: Wall is still the fastest player in the gym, and after a coast-to-coast layup, his team leads 57-54.

2:45: Marcus Ginyard throws down an alley-oop to cut the lead to one. I’m pretty sure they asked him to play about 10 minutes before the game.

1:12: Beasley, who’s been doing a lot of ball-handling for his team, takes it up the court and hits his second consecutive 3-pointer. 67-66 White.

0:00: Walker misses a jumper at the buzzer, and Black leads 69-68 at the half. Durant, Beasley, Wall and Majok look the best so far in the game.

Third quarter

9:20: Beasley picks up where he left off, hitting a layup to put the White team up 70-69.

7:25: Another 3-pointer for Beasley. He hits this one over Majok, who still has some work to do on the defensive end. 75-74 White.

7:10: Durant responds with a deep, deep 3-pointer. Black leads 77-75.

5:45: Jeff Green has back-to-back dunks, the first on an alley-oop from Walker. It’s 82-81 Black Team.

5:15: Cousins shows some impressive ups, skying high to pick up a block with his team up 84-81. I’m heading down once more to get pictures. See you in the 4th quarter.

0:00: 100-99 Black Team as we get set for the fourth.

Fourth quarter

9:08: Former South Carolina Gamecock Tre Kelley is having a big second half for the Black Team. He buries a 3-pointer to push the lead to 105-101.

7:20: After blocking a shot a minute before, Wall throws down a two-handed dunk on the fast break to push the lead to 111-105.

7:00: Beasley heads to the bench with an apparent injury. He’s holding the back of his head and appears as though he might have caught an inadvertent elbow.

5:10: The Black Team is pulling away now. Cousins throw down a one-handed dunk to push the lead to 122-114.

4:38: Walker has the most impressive play of the day. He steals it from Cousins, runs coast-to-coast, slips, gets hit and then converts a 3-point play. 122-117 Black Team.

3:15: Beasley is back in the game and buries a 3-pointer to cur the Black lead to 128-124.

2:02: Alley-oop from Kelley to Cousins might have sealed it, putting the Black Team up 132-124.

0:00: Wall puts the cap on it with a windmill dunk and the Black Team wins 144-128.

Most impressive players were Wall and Beasley with Majok showing some flashes.

Thanks for joining me!

The post Clash of Superstars Live Blog appeared first on SLAM.

by David Cassilo / @dcassilo

Playing the role of defensive stopper for the Memphis Grizzlies last season, Tony Allen was one of the main reasons why his team shocked the San Antonio Spurs and the rest of the NBA world with its first round upset. Since being drafted by the Boston Celtics in 2004, Allen has transformed his game from highlight-reel dunker to defensive stalwart, earning All-Defensive Second Team honors for 2010-11.

This summer, though, he is getting on the offensive when it comes to helping underprivileged kids. This week Allen hosted the First Annual Grit & Grind Basketball Academy Camp for Youth, a free camp in the same neighborhood where he grew up in Chicago. The camp is followed by two back-to-school events on Saturday, August 6, where Allen will give away prizes and school supplies to 200 children.

On Thursday, Allen took a few minutes to talk about his camp, where he plans to play during the lockout and his team’s Playoff run last season.

SLAM: It was a crazy run for you guys in the Playoffs. What have you been doing this season ended?

Tony Allen: Just playing ball. Hooping at open gyms. Commercial leagues like the Bluff City Classic in Memphis. I might play in the Pro-Am at South Suburban. Just hooping in other cities, like Vegas.

SLAM: So are you planning on staying here while the lockout is going on or going overseas?

TA: Honestly, if the opportunity presents itself, I can’t say I’m going to shy from it, but for the most part, I worked hard to play in this American league over here. This great league called the NBA. One of the finest leagues in the world. The NBA needs guys like me. The guys who work hard. The blue-collar guys. The guys that don’t mind going to war like me. They need me.

SLAM: Seems like your content here, but have you at least gotten any offers?

TA: I haven’t even looked over there. I love this American game right here.

SLAM: Are you planning on working out with any of the Grizzlies over the summer?

TA: It’s cool you asked that because Zach just texted me and said he was trying to round the guys up and get them into one city for a good week-and-a-half or something. So I’m waiting on a call. I’m pretty sure in the next week or so we’ll try to get together as a team to find out if we’re going over the water or we’re staying here.

SLAM: So let’s talk about what you’ve been up to this week. How did you get the idea for this free camp?

TA: This is the first annual camp ever. My whole thing is promoting education. I was doing the book bag giveaways and back-to-school events every summer. This is my fifth annual back to school, but this is my first annual camp. I just want to help those underprivileged kids who didn’t get to go to Bulls camp and Derrick Rose camp, where they charge. I said we’re going to get the right people around me and do it in my neighborhood.

SLAM: How has the response been?

TA: My whole neighborhood is over here to support the little guys. It’s been a great camp. We had a full 100 kids yesterday. We feed them for lunch too.

SLAM: Any moments with the campers stick out?

TA: Yeah, these kids are really competitive. I come normally about the time the game starts kicking off. I get to coaching and let them know what they can do better. Yesterday, we were close to kicking a kid out because he had poor sportsmanship. We pulled him over to the side and let him know it’s not all about the points being scored. It ain’t about winning or losing. It’s about having fun. And if you lose, you need to shake your opponent’s hand.

SLAM: You’re one of the best defenders in the League. When a kid wants some help with defense, what do you tell him?

TA: He just always has to be square to the ball, be able to contain the ball and be ready at all times. Help-side defense too. You need to be alert. But at this early age, I don’t think they are going to grasp it right off hand. You need to get a lot of reps in. It takes a lot of experience to get this high-tech defensive IQ I got.

SLAM: When did you feel you finally figured out the defensive end?

TA: Sitting on that pine for a couple of games and a couple of series for Doc Rivers, it’ll catch on to you quick. You have to be able to defend. It’s not all about scoring. We pay our scorers to be our scorers, but somebody has to stop the other monster on the opposing team. I just do the little things that a lot of the guys in the league aren’t accustomed to doing.

SLAM: Talk about your team’s run last year. Is that something you thought was possible?

TA: I saw it in the making. I came to a team that was 10 games below .500. I helped them get over the hump because that’s what they said they needed. If you ask me, my job was well done with the help of my great teammates, Zach Randolph, Michael Conley and OJ Mayo. Great coaching staff with Lionel Hollins and his crew. Great GM. Shout out to Chris Wallace. He showed me the vision first, and I was sold off his pitch. Whoever doubted us beforehand, it’s okay. We took the underdog role and made nothing to something. The rest was history.

SLAM: How do you like living and playing in Memphis since you moved down there?

TA: What I like about Memphis is they embrace hard work. They embrace going after and getting it. That’s a blue-collar city. Let’s admit it, they aren’t big on marketing or television. A lot of people are just now catching a hold of the Memphis Grizzlies.

SLAM: And next year a lot more people will be on the look out for you guys. You ready for that target?

TA: We work at a high level. We’re talking about everything: practice, games, film sessions. We’re going over it just like the champions go over it. We’re trying to get out of that mind frame of us just being the Grizzlies that can’t win a playoff game. The Grizzlies that can’t get out of a series. We’re trying to erase that.

The post Q+A: Tony Allen appeared first on SLAM.

Despite another losing season for the Nets, optimism follows the team as it prepares for its final season in New Jersey. The primary reason for that optimism is Deron Williams, who the Nets were able to pry from Utah after giving up a hefty package centered around Devin Harris, Derrick Favors and this year’s No. 3 pick.

Williams’ arrival at the very least did two things for Avery Johnson’s squad: 1) Give the organization a chance to save face after it struck out on acquiring several available superstars, and 2) Rejuvenated the career of Brook Lopez.

As New Jersey prepares for this offseason, it has the beginnings of a solid starting five. Williams is top-3 point guard in the NBA and should be back at an All-Star level following wrist surgery. Lopez, despite his shortcomings as a rebounder, is still one of the elite centers in the NBA.

And then there’s Kris Humphries. One of the NBA’s most improved players, Humphries gave the Nets the rebounding it wasn’t getting from Lopez while bringing stability to a power forward position that has been a revolving door for a decade for New Jersey. While he is a free agent this season, early indications are the Nets will try to retain him.

But while the Nets seem to have three spots of their lineup figured out, it’s the other two that are holding them back from Playoff contention. The starting wing positions, shooting guard and small forward, were filled by a long list of players that included Anthony Morrow, Travis Outlaw, Sasha Vujacic and Damion James, all of which are better suited for bench roles.

Their lack of production is the main cause for the team’s biggest problem: an inability to score. The Nets finished 28th in scoring at 94.2 ppg just a season after being dead last at 92.4 ppg.

When it all adds up, the Nets should be targeting a wing player who has the ability to fill it up on any given night. While it’s a weak draft class overall, there should be a few players who fit that bill that will be available late in the first round.

With the 27th pick of the 2011 SLAMonline Mock Draft, the New Jersey Nets select…

Charles Jenkins from Hofstra.

This pick was almost where Josh Selby landed, but unlike the Kansas freshman, Charles Jenkins figures to be able to contribute from day one, and at the very least should provide a quality scoring option off the bench for the Nets in his first season.

If there’s one thing Jenkins can do, it is score the basketball. His scoring average rose every season with Hofstra, and he finished his senior season at 22.6 ppg. Jenkins is the all-time leading scorer in school history and trails only David Robinson in the history of the Colonial Athletic Association.

While Jenkins is a bit of a tweener at 6-3, he has the scoring ability and athleticism to play shooting guard if New Jersey believes that is his best position. The Nets had no problem going with several smaller sets last year when they often paired first Harris and then Williams in the backcourt with Jordan Farmar.

Jenkins is probably not going to evolve into an All-Star, but he can become a solid rotation player who can score, somewhat similar to Rodney Stuckey. For a team that is looking to make its biggest splashes via trades and free agency, that’s all they can ask for with the 27th pick.

The post Mock: Charles Jenkins, No. 27 appeared first on SLAM.

But back to the cover. It’s not only the first time these three great high school players have gotten exposure like this, but it’s also the first cover story by our man David Cassilo, who covers college hoops so well for us. As you’ll read below, the whole experience may have been as special for Dave as it was for these players. Enjoy the read, and then buy this issue as soon as you see it!—Ed.

by David Cassilo | Cover Shot by Kareem Black

Sometimes when you’re writing a story you almost forget how cool it is that people actually read what you write and care about it. I’ve always tried to stay humble, but you can’t really ignore the following: writing the cover story for SLAM is a really big deal.

But even as I flew down to Charlotte for the Jordan Classic to interview Austin Rivers, Anthony Davis and Michael Gilchrist, it didn’t really hit me till we were at the photo shoot.

It was there where the three players were trying to play it as cool as I was. They had their serious looks on and were trying to hide all their emotion. But then Gilchrist reminded everyone in that room what was actually going on.

“This is for the cover of SLAM!” he burst out while jumping up and down on top of Rivers and Davis. Nobody in the room could resist a smile.

You have to appreciate the moment, and while being on SLAM’s cover is a big one, there are many more to come for these three special players.

As you’ll read in the story, all three are very different from each other.

Rivers has the demeanor of a professional already, following his father Doc in and out of NBA locker rooms since he could walk. He’s a confident player who can score from wherever he chooses and should have one of the biggest impacts in basketball next year at Duke.

Davis is a Hollywood story. He was a 6-2 guard on nobody’s radar before his junior season and now he’s a 6-10 stud headed to Kentucky and widely considered the best high school player in the country. But he’s also humble, appreciative of the moment and still a kid in every way except his lengthy frame.

Gilchrist, Davis’ future teammate at Kentucky, is a quiet, thoughtful and passionate person, who in a five-minute conversation can make you wonder how some one could flip the switch so easily to become a ruthless, do-it-all, unstoppable force on the hardwood.

The entire weekend, the three players used their diverse personalities to play off of each other as if each was handpicked by the director of a big-budget movie. Those differences and interactions made things easy for me as I pieced it all together.

As a writer, I am always looking for some sort of symbolism to draw on. For this story, it didn’t take long to find the parallels between my subjects and my own life. Here were three high schoolers loaded with potential, their future ahead of them and about to embark on a special moment in their career. And here was I, just barely older than them, feeling all of those same things as I wrote about them.

This is my first cover story anywhere, and I am thankful and lucky to have the chance to write it. If my luck continues, I’m certain this won’t be the last time I’m writing about Rivers, Davis and Gilchrist.

READ THE FULL SLAM 149 COVER STORY HERE!

The post SLAM 149: On Sale Now! appeared first on SLAM.

Originally Published in SLAM 149

by David Cassilo | Portraits by Kareem Black

Click. Click. Click. Click.

In just one second, that’s how many shots the photographer’s camera can get of Austin Rivers, Anthony Davis and Michael Gilchrist as they pose together on the Thursday before the Jordan Brand Classic, the last of the national high school all-star games. It’s a necessary speed considering the subjects: the top three high school basketball players in the country, all on the fast track to the NBA.

Jump ahead to the end of their rookie season, and these photos will serve as evidence that these three players really were just high schoolers two years prior. If they follow the script of their predecessors, all three players will, in the next two years, have likely finished one year of college, been selected in the NBA Draft Lottery and just completed their first NBA season.

Back to this early April Thursday, as their childhood ticks away, the boys decide to get a jumpstart on adulthood, donning serious expressions as the photographer snaps away. It doesn’t take long, though, for Gilchrist, the youngest of the group, to remind everyone to enjoy the moment, as he jumps up and down ecstatically while acknowledging how cool the whole cover shoot experience is. Feeding off his energy, the other two loosen up and crack smiles. The photographer smiles too. He’s got his shot.

Click. Click. Click. Click.

The photographer gestures to the Duke-bound Rivers to move his hands down for the picture, and the 6-4 guard does so to perfection. As the son of ex-NBA player and current head coach Doc Rivers, photo shoots are nothing new to him. While the other players were getting changed earlier, he wisely made sure his clothes were steamed and pressed.

Looking good for the camera is a trait you’d expect to come from his father’s teachings, but could easily have come from his mother—just like his basketball skills. It was his mother, Kris, and not Doc, who coached Austin in the YMCA league when the family lived in San Antonio. “She’s the reason I’m here, to tell you the truth,” says Austin. “She gets the least credit but deserves the most.”

Aside from coaching and taking care of him at home, Austin’s mom impacted her son’s mindset, as well. A swimmer and runner at Wisconsin before meeting Doc and transferring to Marquette, Kris is perhaps the most competitive one in the family.

“When we play cards and she loses, she doesn’t talk to you for, like, two days,” Austin says. “She doesn’t like losing anything.”

That inherited trait was on full display in Austin after his team lost the McDonald’s All-American Game, and the usually media-friendly Rivers was quiet and visibly annoyed in the post-game press conference. But such instances—losing instances—were rare for him at Winter Park (FL) High. A two-time state champion with a handful of different Player of the Year awards to his credit, Rivers averaged 28.8 ppg, 6.1 rpg, 2.2 apg and 2.0 spg during his senior season.

Winning or losing, on or off the court, Rivers carries himself in a way that can only be learned by tagging along with your father and meeting the likes of Michael Jordan, Larry Bird and LeBron James. The shooting guard even went as far as to say in a March interview with The Sporting News that he wanted to “destroy” James when he reached the NBA. Call it competitiveness, cockiness, whatever. Just know Rivers has high expectations for himself at Duke in the fall. “I plan on being the biggest impact in college basketball next year,” he says.

If Rivers wasn’t born with a target on his back already, statements like that one and going to Duke, a place he calls “the most hated school in basketball,” ensure there will be one waiting for him in Durham.

He doesn’t think of it as pressure, but instead as a chance to make his own name, separate from his father’s.

“Maybe one day they’ll say, ‘Aren’t you Austin Rivers’ dad?’” he says.

As he poses every which way for the photographer, it is clear that he is comfortable in the spotlight and embraces it. The camera clicks over and over and can only conjure images of a Hollywood red carpet—
another place Rivers seems anxious to one day be.

In every sense, Rivers is grooming himself to be a professional. While it’s hard to find any other senior with his skill set, it might be harder to find one with his swagger, maturity and experience.

Rivers sneaks a peek into the photographer’s eyes like he might to his head coach while playing defense. The photographer gestures for Doc’s son to change the way he’s standing, but of course, he already knows where to be. This is all practice for the next level.

Click. Click. Click. Click.

To Rivers’ right is Davis, a player nobody wanted to take a pic of just two years ago. At that time, Davis was just a 6-2 guard with goofy-looking goggles who wasn’t even sure if he was going to be able to play at any level other than high school.

“I always thought that the NBA had no chance,” Davis says. “And Division I? That wasn’t me.”

But in what seemed as quick as the flash of the photog’s camera, Davis shot to the top of prospect lists. ESPNU ranked him its No. 1 high school senior in April.

While the Kentucky-bound Davis’ journey won’t end with this cover shoot, it did begin with a picture. When he was 3 years old, Davis, a Chicago-native, held a Michael Jordan basketball and posed for the camera.

“That was the first time I picked up a basketball, and I just stayed with it,” Davis says.

While the rest of Davis’ story is something off the silver screen, his basketball career between the day he took that picture and his junior year of high school is straight to DVD.

But then the 6-2 guard grew an inch. And another. And another. And another. And another four. And suddenly he was a 6-10 forward. “My wife kept saying, ‘Hey, something’s not right here,’” says his father, Anthony Davis Sr. “In about a month he was outgrowing everything. We had to buy clothes, replace his bed and stuff like that because he was just too long.”

Growing was one thing—Davis still had to show he could play. And at Perspectives Charter, a small school that rarely faced any of the top talent in Chicago, he would have to put up monster numbers to get noticed.

Using the guard skills he grew up learning and his newly found height and post moves, Davis averaged a double-double and blocked a ton of shots during his junior season. That will get you noticed. Soon Davis Sr. was getting 20-25 calls a day and a mailbox full of letters from schools that wanted his son. After all the craziness, Davis settled on Kentucky. Just a few months earlier, he thought the best he could do was Cleveland State.

The post Make Some Noise appeared first on SLAM.

The McDonald’s All-American game hits the Windy City tonight. Among those players on display is Chicago’s own Anthony Davis, a talented, Kentucky-bound post player. Follow the game here as Davis and the other players show the nation a glimpse of their talent.

 

The post McDonald’s Game Live Blog appeared first on SLAM.

by David Cassilo

A few years ago, on a summer day in Columbus, OH, a 16-year-old named Jared Sullinger went toe-to-toe against Greg Oden, and no one in the building ever forgot it. Like with most legends, this story is repeated with a different spin from every player in the gym. When you piece them all together, you start to find out how it went down.

Like he’d been doing since the day he began to walk, Jared had tagged along to the gym with his big brother JJ that day. Among those joining them would be future NBA players like Evan Turner, Mike Conley Jr, and, of course, Oden.

But while the gym was full of world-class talent, the game quickly became about two players—the baby-faced Jared and the ever-rugged Oden. And this was the “selected before Kevin Durant” Oden, before his body began consistently betraying him.

As the two went back and forth, it became obvious that the high schooler was getting the best of the former No. 1 overall pick, knocking down jumpers and giving Oden drop steps, jump hooks and post-ups.

“Greg definitely taught him a few things here and there, but he did really good for a 16-year-old kid,” Turner says.

At one point, Jared had hit four buckets in a row, and that was more than enough for Oden. The next time down the floor, GO called for the ball, muscled the kid out of the way and dunked it on him, hard. Some say he even slapped the glass and screamed.

“It was kind of like a reminder, saying, You are still in high school,” JJ recalls. “Basically, everyone else took it as, We see that you know Jared is getting the absolute best of you.”

—

Just two years later, Jared is doing to every frontcourt in the country what he did to Oden. Just a freshman for Ohio State, he’s a contender for National Player of the Year and is the leading scorer on the last college basketball team to lose this season.

While you might be tempted to call him the most dominating big man in the country, he’d prefer you call him a big kid. “I don’t like grown-up stuff,” Jared says, while wearing socks on his hands and sporting a handmade paper-clip earring. “I’m a child, and I’m going to have fun ’til the day I die.”

It’s that mentality that is as important to Ohio State’s success this season as what he does down in the post. In addition to being perhaps the nation’s best team, the Buckeyes are also one of the loosest, partly because Jared is constantly making sure that his teammates are having a good time.

“He’s always playing around, jumping on people and tackling people,” senior guard David Lighty says. “He’s too big for that.”

But even at 6-9 and 280 pounds, Jared doesn’t seem to be too big for anything. He tweets about missing episodes of Disney’s Phineas & Ferb, drinks Capri Sun at family parties, prides himself on being able to hide three months worth of dirty laundry and enjoys pulling pranks on his older brothers, JJ and Julian.

“When we’re all at home sitting around, he walks by me and pulls my pants down,” JJ says. “I get pissed off, but I gotta step back and think he’s only being an 18-year-old kid.”

The youngest of Barbara and James Sullinger’s three children, Jared will forever be the little kid in the eyes of the rest of his family. He’s the 3-year-old who could hit a free throw and the 5-year-old who would routinely knock down three-pointers.

Being a member of Columbus’ first family of basketball, he had a lot of help along the way. His oldest brother JJ played college ball at Ohio State and in ’06 told Head Coach Thad Matta he’d be making a big mistake if he didn’t recruit Jared. The middle child, Julian, played four years at Kent State. The two made sure to foul their younger brother almost every time he got the ball in pickup games, toughening him up for the abuse he would figure to see in his later years.

“He gets fouled pretty hard now because he’s so big, but it doesn’t seem to bother him too much simply because he’s used to it,” JJ says.

Jared’s father, a long-time coach who goes by “Satch,” has spent the last 10 seasons at Northland High School, where Jared played. An adherent to fundamentals, he’s been teaching his youngest son the proper drop step since he was 2 years old.

Then there’s Jared’s mother, Barbara, the tough-as-nails Brooklyn native who makes sure basketball talk and the dinner table remain mutually exclusive. “My mom is one person you don’t want to mess with,” Jared says. “She will knock you out without a problem.”

Along with that toughness, Jared thinks his mom gave him a few physical attributes that have led to his success as a post player. “I got a big ol’ butt from my mom,” Jared says, “and I got my long arms from her, too.”

While the butt, the arms, the drop step and the ability to take a hack had him aware that he was better than the rest of the kids his age by the time he was 5 years old, it was not until Jared was 15 that he was able to put that all together and do something he never could do before: beat JJ one-on-one. Jared knows the exact date and location that this monumental event took place—August 23, 2007, at Life Time Fitness in Columbus. (JJ contends that he was wearing flip-flops for the game. “Don’t let him lie to you,” Jared says. “He wasn’t in flip flops.”)

The whole family was there, of course, with Mom and Dad having to referee because of the brothers’ tendency to argue. It came down to the last bucket, and Jared threw up an 18-foot fade-away jumper that JJ points out “went off the glass” before it dropped through the net. After it went in, Jared took a victory lap around the court to rub it in big brother’s face.

—

On January 29, Jared terrorized Northwestern for 21 points, 8 rebounds and a game-winning free throw with three seconds left. Afterward he sat on an exercise bike for no particular reason and joked around with reporters.

“On the court, he’s a man amongst boys,” JJ says.” But off the court, he’s a gentle giant.”

Yet it doesn’t take much for that playful demeanor of Jared’s to morph into the nastiest post disposition in the country. “It’s an automatic switch that I’ve had since I was young,” Jared says. “On the court, I try to carry myself as a man and just play like a man.”

Jared conveys the same passion discussing how to be a great offensive rebounder as he does while explaining why he loves Keri Hilson’s “Pretty Girl Rock” video. He’ll boast to you as much about being able to pass out of a double team as he does about having every Jay-Z album on his iPod. He’s a senior mixed with a freshman with a dash of each Sullinger thrown in. Combined, this makes Jared the big kid on campus who will make sure there’s plenty of madness in Columbus this March.

The post Big Kid On Campus appeared first on SLAM.

You can find a job online, find a date online and find a long lost friend from elementary school online, so it was only a matter of time before you could find a basketball team online.

GetProBasketball.com is providing a medium to connect players, teams, scouts and agents, simplifying the process of beginning or continuing a pro basketball career.

“GetPro is a website that allows players to build a profile of themselves and get seen by coaches, agents and scouts worldwide at any level of basketball,” says Stephan Eyeson, the site’s founder.  “So a player from the UK or France can sign up as a player and state they what to play college ball in the states and a college basketball coach or scout can see him/her on the site and message him/her through the site. It works as simple as that.”

Eyeson, a former basketball player in the United Kingdom and Europe, noticed from his playing days that many players wanted to find a team but didn’t have the connections or even know who to talk to in the first place. With his website, everything you need is now in one place.

While the website is still in its infancy stages, it has begun to find places for players to land.

“Most players have been taken to Europe and also college and prep schools in the States,” says Eyeson.

The website aims to help every player worldwide. For example, a player in China can get exposure in the United States, and a player in the United States can get exposure in China.

The site works like many social networking sites. A player can post videos and pictures of themselves on the website and can directly respond to messages from coaches, scouts or agents.

GetPro doesn’t have affiliations to any specific leagues but does offer a chance to be seen by many different leagues.

“We have pro coaches signing up from the D-league to European pro level,” says Eyeson.

Eventually, the hope is that the website will provide a chance for any player and any league, coach or scout in the world to be able to contact each other. It is another attempt to help globalize the game of basketball.

“We are aiming to be the biggest portal for basketball players worldwide and place where players come and get seen on a bigger scale and follow their dreams much easier through using our site,” says Eyeson.

The post New Website Connects Players With Teams appeared first on SLAM.

In a conference as talented as the Big East, one of the toughest tasks is for the coaches to choose a Preaseason Player of the Year before a single game is played. Commanding that respect is an honor, and this year that honor went to Austin Freeman of Georgetown.

So far Freeman has handled the expectations well. His Hoyas are ranked ninth in the country with a 9-1 record, and he leads the team with 18.9 ppg. At a school that has so much tradition, Freeman and his teammates are off to a good start towards trying to hang another Final Four banner.

With the Big East season just a few weeks away, Freeman talked with SLAM about this year’s Hoyas, the national following Georgetown receives and learning to balance basketball with his diabetes.

SLAM: Do you feel the team is coming together the way you thought it would?

Austin Freeman: I think we are. We’re gelling really good. Our chemistry is there right now. It could be a little better, but right now we feel we’re here and ready for anything that comes our way.

SLAM: What’s the most difficult thing about trying to replace a player like Greg Monroe?

AF: We all know Greg was a really good player. He did a lot for us, especially passing. We knew when he had the ball that he was looking for us. Having him down there made things a little bit easier for everyone on the floor.

SLAM: You’re almost a rarity these days, having a successful career and staying all four years. What do you gain from having that extra experience?

AF: Just growing up. Being more mature. Going through the rigors of the season. Just knowing what you have to do to be successful.

SLAM: The Big East is arguably the best conference in America. What does it mean to you to be singled out as its Preseason Player of the Year?

AF: It’s an honor. It’s a real big honor, but I also don’t want to let it get to my head. I also know that it really matters what happens at the end of the season anyway. Right now I know it’s a big honor, but I also know that I have to be prepared for anything that comes my way. I have a target on my back.

SLAM: You’re about to head into conference play. How does the level of intensity change once you start Big East play?

AF: We have to be a little bit more focused because in the Big East everybody knows what you’re doing. We have to pay more attention to detail because we know that any little mistake could decide a game.

SLAM: What’s the toughest Big East venue to play in?

AF: All of them. Just playing Georgetown is a big game for everybody and everybody comes ready to play.

SLAM: Is there one opponent out there that you know there is going to be a little something extra going into a game against?

AF: From Pitt to Cuse to Nova to down the line in the Big East, we know that we just have to come ready to play everybody because everybody is coming out to beat you.

SLAM: Georgetown is one of those schools that has a national following. Do you see that when you go out on the road?

AF: We know that. When we went to Missouri in a hostile environment that was supposed to be a neutral site. We had people coming to support us so we know.

SLAM: Last March you were diagnosed with diabetes. Now that you have had an entire offseason to deal with that, how have you been able to balance that with basketball?

AF: I worked out. I have to take insulin shots four times a day. I still pretty much do what I want to do, but I have to manage what I want to do so I don’t go overboard with anything.

SLAM: You found out about that right before the Big East tournament. How tough was it to learn you had this at such an important time in your season?

AF: It was tough at first. Just knowing that I was still going to be able to play basketball and get on with my regular life, I was fine after that. But at the beginning it was very tough.

SLAM: Athletes such as Adam Morrison and Jay Cutler have diabetes. Have you reached out to them to talk about dealing with it?

AF: I’ve contacted them, but they haven’t gotten back to me, but I’ve talked to John Saunders, who has it, from ESPN.

The post Austin Freeman Q + A appeared first on SLAM.

by David Cassilo

Kyrie Irving has a target on his back, and to begin to understand why it’s there, you need to look no further than his feet. Irving, this year’s top freshman point guard and a size-12 shoe, would have a bit of trouble filling the shoes of last year’s top point guard, John Wall, a size 13, even in the most literal sense.

But don’t tell Irving that. Don’t tell him it will be impossible to match the level our current cover subject was playing at last year. Don’t bring up all of the pressure that comes with being a freshman point guard taking over a National Champion. And forget about mentioning how he is expected to continue the legacy of New Jersey point guards winning titles at Duke started by Bobby Hurley and Jay Williams.

Irving has heard all that, and the point guard who has already been compared to the likes of Wall and Chris Paul isn’t too concerned about getting wrapped up in it.

“I don’t really pay attention,” Irving says in his soft-spoken yet confident manner. “The question for me is, how are you going to separate yourself from everyone else?”

“Quite nicely” would be the answer so far in Irving’s basketball career. Irving’s pre-college accolades already read like the beginning of a Hall of Fame plaque: McDonald’s All-American, New Jersey state champion, New Jersey Gatorade Player of the Year, gold medal at the FIBA U-18 World Championship. Not bad at all for an 18-year-old, but with every honor, there are even greater expectations.

“If I had to choose a point guard between John Wall and Kyrie Irving, I’d choose Kyrie,” Jay Williams says. “Wall is an unbelievable athlete, but Kyrie is an extension of the coach on the floor, who dictates tempo and isn’t concerned about his own.”

The 6-2, 180-pound PG started to build expectations like those behind his house in West Orange, NJ, playing basketball with the man responsible for much of that success-his father, Drederick.

“He’s kept me focused, and he’s been there since the beginning when no one knew about me,” Irving says. “Aside from being a fan, he’s also my father.”

His father was a great player in his own right, starring for four years at Boston University, where he is a member of the school’s Hall of Fame. His professional career took him to Australia, where Kyrie was born. When Kyrie was just 4 years old, his mother Elizabeth passed away, and it’s been just he and his father since.

After his sophomore year of high school, it became apparent that Irving was something special, and he, along with his father, made the decision to transfer from Montclair (NJ) Kimberley to nearby prep powerhouse St. Patrick, a team with a perennial bull’s-eye on its back.

“It’s the best decision of my life,” Irving says. “I was at the highest level, playing against and beating the best. I developed a toughness and confidence that I didn’t really have before.”

While developing those skills, he was also becoming a Garden State legend. In his first season at St. Patrick, Irving averaged 17 points, 5 rebounds and 5 assists per game while leading his team to a state title.

At the same time, colleges were the ones really starting to target Irving, who had become the consensus top point guard in his class. His quickness and impressive handle were one thing, but the maturity and basketball IQ he showed was enough to have college coaches salivating.

Irving strongly considered Kentucky and Texas A&M, but an instant bond with Coach Mike Krzyzewski was enough for him to announce his commitment to Duke just prior to his senior season. “It felt like home on my official visit and with Coach K,” Irving says. “I’m really close to him. He said that he has a plan set out for me.”

Now the No. 1 freshman point guard in the country was going to a school viewed by many as college basketball’s Public Enemy No. 1. “We are the highlighted game on everyone’s schedule,” Hurley says. “Duke deals with that every year.”

The national spotlight would be on Irving every night to prove his worth, and that was even before people pegged him “the next John Wall.” Even before Duke won the title.

Before he could deal with that, he needed to finish his high school career as a marked man. However, his senior season and state title defense hit an unexpected bump in the road. Although Irving showed he could play with the bull’s-eye on him (his numbers jumped to 24.5 points, 5 rebounds and 6.5 assists per game), his team’s season was cut short due to unsanctioned off-season workouts, and Irving was unable to defend his title.

Although many, including his head coach Kevin Boyle, felt the team was unfairly targeted, Irving was able to do off the court what he has done so many times on it-turn a negative into a positive. “It was heartbreaking because I wanted to win another state championship,” Irving says. “But it all worked out because when I couldn’t play, I actually got to make it down to Duke vs. North Carolina, which was my first Duke game.”

After a summer spent winning the gold medal at the FIBA U-18 World Championship, Irving came to Durham to get ready for a more important first game-the first he will play in. Taking over as point guard for a defending National Champion can be daunting, but Krzyzewski has molded his team’s offense to adapt to Irving’s style of play. It is both a way to make Irving’s transition a smooth one, and a statement on what his coach already thinks of his freshman’s abilities.

“He’s a special player,” Krzyzewski said following the team’s exhibition game against St. Augustine. “I think he’s just mature, mentally and physically. He has great poise.”

Even with that maturity, one of the biggest challenges for Irving might be just getting his own teammates, who already have a chip, to follow him. While Wall may have taken the country by storm last season, it was Irving’s new teammates who cut the nets, and for his biggest goal, Irving needs to look no further than his own starting lineup.

“They already have a title, and I want my own,” Irving says.

And if he does that, those asking if Irving is the next John Wall or Bobby Hurley or Jay Williams might instead be asking, “Who’s the next Kyrie?”

The post Thank Me Later appeared first on SLAM.

Before there was Yao Ming, Dirk Nowitzki and Manu Ginobili, there was Vlade Divac and Drazen Petrovic.

Those two teammates from the Yugoslavian national team paved the way for international players to play in the NBA.

In the upcoming ESPN 30 For 30 documentary entitled Once Brothers, Drazen and Divac’s basketball success, close relationship and the eventual tragic death of Petrovic are all on full display.

Told through the eyes of Divac, the main focus is the relationship between himself and Petrovic. We follow the two players from the rise of their careers in Yugoslavia, to their early success in the NBA, to the war within their home country that tears them apart and to finally, the tragic death of Petrovic.

Mainly, this is Divac’s story about how he deals with all of these things, most particularly the division that comes between him (a Serbian) and all of the Croatians that were once his teammates on the Yugoslavian national team.

Accounts of these events are also provided by Toni Kukoc and Dino Radja, two Croatian born players who found success in the NBA and eventually were forced to end a friendship with Divac because of their homelands.

However, why this one of the best films so far in ESPN’s series is the many different stories it tells within the one documentary.

What makes this a must-see for any NBA fan is that within the main story is the story of how an international player adjusts to the NBA. Divac and his former Yugoslavian teammates express all of the obstacles that are in the way for a foreign-born player, including style of play, language and the lack of belief by others that they could actually cut it in the NBA.

Furthermore, the miraculous and tragic story of Petrovic’s journey is told. If you are unaware of just how good he was and could have been, this documentary is essential. Petrovic was on his way to becoming an NBA star and the impact his death had on both those who knew him and everyone within his home country shows how important he was at the time of his horrific car accident.

The film is also full of former NBA stars who add a lot of insight to the stories of Divac and Petrovic, whether it be glowing accounts of Petrovic from former teammates Clyde Drexler, Kenny Anderson and Derrick Coleman or a highly entertaining sitdown between Divac and Magic Johnson.

Finally, from this documentary you are left with a sense of the type of person Divac is. A fun-loving, big-hearted character who was (and is) a perfect figure to be the face of international basketball.

While Divac might have been accused of a few flops during his NBA career, the documentary Once Brothers is definitely not one of them.

—–

The docu airs on ESPN on October 12.

The post Movie Review: Once Brothers appeared first on SLAM.