Keep on Truckin'
June 03, 2009 11:03 PM | General
June 4, 2009
MORGANTOWN, W.Va. - Talk about getting thrown into a skillet full of hot grease. Truck Bryant's freshman basketball season at West Virginia wasn't supposed to be like this.
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| Freshman Truck Bryant is one of 17 players invited to USA Basketball's U-19 team trials in Colorado Springs later this month.
WVU Photographic Services/M.G. Ellis photo |
He was supposed to wait patiently behind junior point guard Joe Mazzulla, biding his time until he was better equipped to take on the A.J. Prices and the Jonny Flynns of the Big East.
At least that was the plan.
But six games into the season, Mazzulla's left shoulder met the floor at Tad Smith Coliseum and the floor won. Mazzulla tried to give his shoulder another try three days later against Davidson in New York City before waving the white flag. The West Virginia offense was now Truck's to run … for better or for worse.
Bryant may have left his fancy cross-over in Brooklyn, but that didn't keep him from bringing his New York City swagger to Morgantown. The older players, knowing what the Big East is all about, figured the best way for Truck to figure things out was to throw him overboard and let him learn how to swim on his own. Sometimes he kept his head above water. Other times he didn't.
"It was definitely hard," Bryant admitted recently. "Everyone is faster and stronger. It's like 20 times different than high school. You think it's doable and then you come here and you see how hard it really is and you see where your game is at."
Bryant did well to start the year against the Elons, the Longwoods, the Delaware States and the Radfords, but when the calendar was flipped to January and those Big East teams started rolling in, the Truck sometimes went into idle.
He was 0 for 4 with four turnovers against Matthews, James, McNeal and the Gang in a 22-point loss to Marquette. That was the game Coach Bob Huggins told his team afterward never to forget. Bryant put up another goose egg three days later in a surprisingly difficult three-point win against South Florida at the Coliseum.
More tough games for Bryant followed at Louisville and Syracuse. Like most freshmen used to playing about 20 high school games a season, Bryant hit the wall in mid-February. He went 0 for 7 in 18 minutes of action against Notre Dame. West Virginia wasn't able to turn that game around until Huggins put 6-foot-9-inch Devin Ebanks at the point.
"I wasn't losing confidence but I was just feeling down on myself a little bit," Bryant admitted. "I have a lot of confidence in myself and no one can take that away from me. Eventually I started playing well again."
Bryant's best stretch came at the end of the year when he scored 13 points in a road win at South Florida, added 12 in a home victory against DePaul and scored 17 in West Virginia's big win against Notre Dame in the opening round of the Big East Tournament.
Bryant was also one of the few bright spots in WVU's disappointing 68-60 loss to Dayton in the opening round of the NCAA Tournament. Truck scored a team-high 21 points, including a 4-of-6 shooting performance from 3. It was one point shy of the season-high 22 he scored against Marshall in the Capital Classic.
The Dayton game was a bad ending to an otherwise solid 23-12 campaign. To the Mountaineer players expecting so much more from the 2009 season, it was like a punch in the throat.
"That's something that we know now that we have to come in and play hard every play," Bryant explained. "Last year, when we came in as freshmen none of us knew that we had to play hard on every play. In college you can't take plays off."
Of course there was more good than bad for Truck. He finished the year averaging 9.8 points, 2.7 assists and shooting 37.7 percent from 3. Before you shrug consider this: that's pretty much on par with some of the best freshman point guards this conference has ever produced.
Truck's 9.8 points scored in 2009 is better than the 8.5 points Brandin Knight averaged as a freshman in 2000, and much better than the freshman seasons that Mark Jackson (5.8 ppg.) and Sherman Douglas (5.4 ppg.) had.
Bryant's 39.6 percent frosh field goal percentage was higher than guys like Allen Iverson (39.0) and Troy Bell (36.8). And his 37.7 3-point field goal percentage was close to or better than guys like Eric Murdock (35.5), Khalid El-Amin (36.5), Chris Smith (38.4), Bell (39.9) and Gerry McNamara (40.1) when they were freshmen.
That in no way is meant to imply that Bryant is in their league, but rather it serves as a reminder that some of the Big East's best guards didn't just glide through their freshman seasons.
Iverson, probably the best freshman guard to ever play in the Big East, averaged 20.4 points per game in 1995, but he had to hoist up 520 shots to do it.
Where Bryant finishes in relation to those guys is solely up to him. His coaches seem to think he has the skills to become a big-time college point guard if he keeps working hard and improves.
Bryant got some good news recently when assistant coach Larry Harrison informed him that he was one of 17 players invited to attend USA Basketball's U-19 National Team trials. That tryout camp will have the best young players in college basketball there.
"I know I am going to get better in the three days that I'm there at training camp just playing against basically all of the top players," Bryant said.
Bryant's chances of making the team improved dramatically when Connecticut guard Kemba Walker announced Wednesday that he was withdrawing from the trials to attend summer school and participate at the LeBron James Skills Academy at the beginning of July.
"Kemba is like my brother," Bryant said. "He was on my AAU team and we always keep up. I just spoke to him the other day."
Bryant says there is plenty for him to work on.
"Basically I have to work on my game, period," Bryant said. "(The coaches) didn't tell me to work on specific things but I've just got to work on my all-around game. I've also got to work on becoming a better leader."
Truck will be on the same flight out to Colorado Springs with WVU teammate Da'Sean Butler, who is trying out for USA Basketball's World Team. Bryant said he is taking six summer credits right now to make sure his school work is on schedule. And the time he is missing away from strength coach Andy Kettler will be superseded by the fact that he is going to be playing against terrific competition.
"I'm actually happy I get to get away from that," Bryant laughed. "That will be like a break to me where I can just work on my game individually instead of just working on weights. Of course I'm going to still lift while I'm there if I make the team.
"This is a huge experience for me this summer," Bryant added. "I am representing my country and getting an opportunity to do that is good."
Nearly as good is the experience he will get playing against some of the best 19-year-olds in the country - or the world for that matter if he ends up making the team.
