Jeremy Lin’s boxscore from last Saturday’s victory at Brown seemed a bit anemic, as he got himself in foul trouble early and only played 9 minutes in the first half. He finished with just 5 points, but still had 7 assists, 6 of them in the 2nd half, in just 25 minutes of play out of a possible 40. He shot an un-Jeremy-like 1-for-6 from the field.

This was less than 24 hours after he fouled out against Yale, in what was eventually an overtime nailbiter that Harvard eeked out by three points. In that game, he scored 18 points but had to sit on the bench with his 5th personal foul and still two minutes on the clock, usually the climax of the Jeremy Lin Show — remember, he scored 11 points in the last 1:38 of play against UConn! Instead, Jeremy finished with just 32 minutes played out of a possible 45.

Does this mean his draft stock has plummeted?

To prolong the metaphor, Jeremy doesn’t even have his stock listed at this point, in terms of being on any of the major NBA Draft board websites such as NBAdraft.net or DraftExpress.

Tonight, Harvard plays Cornell in another most-important-game-ever matchup. If Harvard wins, they tie Cornell for second place behind Princeton. Then, after a few more “should-win” league games, face Princeton for the last Ivy League game on 3/6. If Harvard wins out, then they will at least tie Cornell and Princeton for the best record, at which point there would be a playoff for the championship. The champion gets an automatic berth to the NCAA Tournament. Second- and third-place probably result in being shut out of the NCAA Tourney, but will likely earn an invitation to one of three possible lesser-known post-season tournaments.

Harvard has been playing “small ball” with starting center Keith Wright out with an Achilles injury, power forward Pat Magnarelli questionable with a high ankle sprain he sustained in January, and backup power forward Andrew Van Nest out with pneumonia.

Against Cornell’s 7-footer Jeff Foote, once again the tallest players available for Harvard will be 6′7″ Doug Miller and Kyle Casey, with the 6′7″ but green Jeff Georgatos off the bench. Foote dominated against Wright and Van Nest in the first meeting.

Cornell’s been mired in a shooting slump over the past couple of games, but I doubt that will continue. They are due. There’s a chance that Casey’s recent heroics for Harvard will throw Cornell off a little, and maybe their shooters will be too eager to atone for recent brickfests and will ignore the post-ups of Foote, but remember, Cornell has a myriad of weapons and is extremely well-coached. Basically, it doesn’t look good for Harvard and Jeremy Lin.

The good news is, Jeremy’s draft “stock” won’t plummet because he doesn’t have any. The bad news is, he doesn’t have any, much to my great disagreement with these online draft boards (something I will write about in due time). This means that it all boils down to his invitation and potential performance against other NBA hopefuls at the Portsmouth Invitational Tournament the week after the Final Four.

He’s already on the radar especially after the UConn performance, the SportsIllustrated piece and making the second-to-last Cousy Award cut, but the conclusion on Jeremy as it pertains to the NBA Draft is currently “wait-and-see”. NBA people already know he can play, but it’s too early to say (or reveal) if expending a 2nd-round pick would be worthwhile for any given NBA franchise.

I would even say that the recent “superficially sub-par” numbers have shown the more attractive side of his NBA potential: that of distributor. As reported in the Harvard Crimson campus newspaper…

“It looks like his point production has dropped, but his effectiveness hasn’t changed any,” Brown coach Jesse Agel said. “As his teammates have developed, he’s had to do less, and he’s done more facilitating, all to the greater good of their team.”

And, as Yahoo/Rivals.com put it in their Ivy League team-by-team report…

Ivy League coaches have four years worth of film on the senior, and the defenses he is seeing now reflect that. Teams are determined not to let Lin beat them with his shot, and he isn’t getting the looks he often saw in nonconference play.

That puts pressure on him to find his teammates, and on those teammates to make opponents pay for mistakes. Against Brown on Feb. 13, Lin was held to a season-low five points and was hounded all over the court, not even getting a shot off in the first half. But he had six second-half assists to lead his team past a pesky Bears squad.

So, it doesn’t really matter until Portsmouth. With the publicity he’s received thus far, an invite to Portsmouth is a virtual lock no matter what he does on the court during the remainder of the season, NCAA bid or not.

The only thing that could derail this path that fate has laid out is if he miraculously topples both Cornell and Princeton in the next three weeks. He has forced fate’s hand before, though.

How about this for an “all-decade” team: Kobe Bryant and Paul Pierce in the backcourt (I guess Kobe would have to play point), Dirk Nowitzki at the wing, and Tim Duncan and Z down low?

Well, according to The Truth’s blog (yes, he has one!), posted back in December, these five were the only five that have been on the same team for the past ten years. Wow! Not bad.

Z can still be part of this five since his trade to the Wizards doesn’t change the fact that he’s been with the Cavs for over a decade, but it’s a tad different now, this “all-decade” lineup.

Anyways, Pierce writes…

I remember a couple years ago — the summer I signed an extension — I was talking with my mom and my brother about the possibility of going to play in other cities, maybe trying to win somewhere else. It was something that I was always talking about with the people closest to me. And it was crazy because my mom said to me, “You’ve already started building something special over there in Boston.”

I had great friends here, knew the restaurants, the hotels, the club owners. I was really comfortable, you get so used to it. When I moved from Oakland to LA — I think I was 8 or 9 years old — and it was traumatic because I thought I lost everything I knew, all my friends all the relationships I had built. It’s like you’re starting over, and you think about that. 

Bob Cousy (click to vote).

In case you haven’t heard, Jeremy Lin is now on the shortlist of 11 finalists for the Bob Cousy Award.

He’s also on the final list of 30 for the Wooden Award, but I’ll save that — or rather, the cross-section of Cousy/Wooden Awards — for another post.

The Cousy Award is given to the top point guard in the NCAA. There’s also a popular vote right now, in which…

The player that receives the most fan votes will receive one vote toward the final committee vote. Fan voting will run one month – beginning February 5 and will conclude March 5.

So, who are these guys? The casual Jeremy Lin fan probably hasn’t heard of most of them. Does Jeremy actually have a chance of winning? Does it increase his odds of being drafted or making it into the NBA? As someone who has seen everyone of these players play at least once, I will try to answer these questions for you.

The other ten finalists are as follows, ranked in reverse of what I believe is the most probable order of winning the award (least likely first)…

• Devan Downey (senior, 5′9″, 175 lbs, South Carolina) — The diminutive leader of the SEC’s Gamecocks is averaging a gaudy 22.8 ppg and 2.9 spg, but just 3.2 rpg, 3.4 apg, and 0 bpg. He’s the unquestioned captain of his team and has had some heroics this season. However, South Carolina is struggling in the middle of the pack in the SEC this season. He’s too small for the NBA, does not have quite high enough assist totals, and does not appear on any of the major NBA draft boards.

• Ronald Moore (senior, 6′0″, 160 lbs, Siena) — At 160 lbs, the skinny Moore is helping Siena to a conferencing-leading and dominant 15-1 record, 22-5 overall. He also leads the nation in assists, at 7.9 apg. These two factors have him ranked slightly ahead of Downey in my book, but Moore is only averaging 7.1 ppg, to go along with 3.3 rpg, 1.7 spg, and 0.1 bpg. The points per game average and the rail-thin frame just will not cut it in terms of any NBA talk. He does not appear on any draft boards. He still is, however, an excellent passer.

• Trevon Hughes (senior, 6′0″, 193 lbs, Wisconsin) — Again, another Cousy Award finalist who does not have an NBA body, but I think he’s on the list because Wisconsin is 9-4 in the Big Ten with a 19-6 overall record, which would probably be good enough for an NCAA bid if the season ended today. He’s averaging 15.4 ppg, 4.7 rpg, 2.9 apg, 1.6 spg, and 0.6 bpg. The assists average is just not where it needs to be to warrant consideration for the NBA as a point guard. You will not convince an NBA GM to pick someone who is averaging 2.9 apg as your point guard. Hughes does not appear on any NBA draft boards.

• Kalin Lucas (junior, 6′1″, 190 lbs, Michigan State) — Michigan State is currently ranked 10th in the nation and Lucas is its unquestioned leader. He leads the team in points at 15.8 ppg and also averages 2.0 rpg, 3.9 apg, 1.0 spg, and 0.1 bpg. To my surprise, he is actually listed as a first-round pick on some draft boards. However, in my opinion, he plays more like a two-guard and as an NBA shooting guard prospect, he’s probably too small and not quite quick or explosive enough. He has a nice midrange game that is not transferable to the taller, more athletic NBA which can block the midrange shot, and he doesn’t take a lot of threes. He’s been injured recently and is just getting back, but the stats while having the injury have probably brought down his averages a little. You can see that his steals-per-game is not particularly high and that reflects his lack of quickness/speed, although the middle of the pack of these Cousy finalists does not possess a whole lot of flair in that department.

• Scottie Reynolds (senior, 6′2″, 195 lbs, Villanova) — Reynolds is another senior floor leader. He’s led the 5th-ranked Villanova many times this year to victory, boasting a 19.0 ppg average to go along with more modest numbers: 2.8 rpg, 3.5 apg, 1.6 spg, 0.1 bpg. While all of these players are still relatively young, you could call Reynolds the “crafty veteran” of the bunch. He’s not particularly quick laterally nor speedy north to south, yet he gets the job done, at least at the college level. He takes calculated gambles on D and has a knack for coming up with the bucket on O, sort of “manufacturing” points. However, he doesn’t have the sweetest stroke (it’s a flat-footed trey), doesn’t have dazzling handles, and won’t be posterizing anyone soon. He’s just a little too small, just a little too slow, and basically just a tad not there yet for NBA consideration. Most mock drafts do not have him included, although he’d probably be right up there if there were a 3rd round.

• John Scheyer (senior, 6′5″, 190 lbs, Duke) — Playing for high-profile Duke certainly has its advantages. You get big game after big game in the ACC, and Scheyer has done well, even garnering talk of mid-season #1 All-American player by one of ESPN’s analysts. Scheyer has some great numbers: 19.2 ppg, 3.5 rpg, 5.4 apg, 1.5 spg, and 0.2 bpg. You can’t knock him on the numbers. But now’s where we start talking about serious NBA consideration. First of all, he’s 6′5″ and can handle the rock. He has a nice stroke and isn’t afraid to hit treys, shooting a very solid 40+% from beyond the arc and 89% from the charity stripe. However, the knock on him is his athleticism. At 190 lbs, he’s pretty light. His upper body lacks muscle and he’s not particularly quick off his feet nor speedy in any direction, east-west or north-south. Most NBA draft boards have him going in the late 2nd round. This is where I start to get a little annoyed because Jeremy Lin is left out of the picture. People have a hard time comparing Jeremy’s Ivy League numbers (16.7 ppg, 4.2 rpg, 4.6 apg, 2.7 spg, 1.3 bpg) to the usual major conference averages. While everyone thinks Jeremy’s numbers are inflated, I think the opposite. I think it’s harder to achieve numbers in the Ivy because league play is, how shall I say, “quagmired”. You have 7 other Ivy teams (and only seven!) who know you intimately and will just refuse to guard you one-on-one. You have teammates who can’t draw a double-team like you. You have deliberate opponents (take Princeton, for example) who will drain the shotclock and keep things close. Anyways, you can see that Jeremy’s numbers are right there with Scheyer’s, although I would say they are completely different players and Jeremy’s incredible steals and blocks tallies totally blows away Scheyer, but both of them are just good ‘ol basketball players. Yet, Jeremy isn’t there where Scheyer is, at least at the end of the draft board. I am particularly flummoxed because I’ve noticed that Scheyer likes to cheat on his man on D, making up for his lack of quickness by overplaying the entry pass whenever an opposing guard decides to take him into the middle-area post. In the NBA, you get back-doored for an alley-oop dunk if you do that. I also don’t like Scheyer’s center of gravity, or lack thereof. I have concluded that he will get battered by NBA offenses. I’m not sure that NBA draft board authors agree with me.

• Matt Bouldin (senior, 6′5″, 224 lbs, Gonzaga) — Here’s where we start talking legit NBA-caliber players. Bouldin’s a rock-solid, stocky, NBA-ready 224 lbs. He’s averaging 16.8 ppg, 4.7 rpg, 4.0 apg, 1.6 spg, and 0.1 bpg. He can hit the trey, handle the rock, make good passes, and find a way to the tin. However, he doesn’t have break-neck speed, isn’t really a lateral player, and doesn’t have a lot of flair to his game. At the same time, what I just described, I could probably say the same for, oh, Chauncey Billups, right? So anyways, most NBA draft boards have him going late 2nd round because of his lack of speed. The fact that he’s at Gonzaga helps him tremendously. Please, can we stop calling Gonzaga a mid-major? That is just utterly ridiculous. Look at their program, look at their talent, look at their previously recruited talent, look at the teams they play, look at how they are now shoe-ins for the tourney every year. Gonzaga is a major basketball program and Bouldin is the leader of the Duke of the West (I can’t be the first person to say that, right?). How would Bouldin stack up against Jeremy Lin? Well, as I’ll postulate in a future post, it all comes down to Portsmouth. Interestingly enough, one hoops blogger predicted they would be on the same Portsmouth team (why would you predict that two Cousy finalists would be put on the same roster?), which further reinforces the fact that people do not know who Jeremy Lin is. Jeremy can get off his feet much quicker than Bouldin, but Bouldin’s got him on height, strength, and shooting. In a more open-court style, you want Jeremy. In a half-court “Van Gundy” set, you want Bouldin. The west coast TV announcers who regularly cover Gonzaga all think Bouldin will make some NBA roster.

• Greivis Vasquez (senior, 6′6″, 200 lbs) — I put Vasquez just ahead of Bouldin because of his length, albeit by only a tad. Like Bouldin, he can shoot the rock, uses his length to his advantage, can’t really be displaced at his weight (unlike Scheyer), and can create something on O. Vasquez has some really good numbers in a really great conference, the ACC: 18 ppg, 4.7 rpg, 6.2 apg, 1.5 spg, and 0.3 bpg. He’s hitting 40% from beyond the arc and 80% from the FT line. He had a triple-double last year against eventual national champion North Carolina. However, he got outplayed by Scheyer last week in a Duke vs Maryland head-to-head (I still need to watch the tape of that one). And, like Bouldin, Vasquez isn’t particularly athletic in terms of getting to the rim quickly or posterization potential. Still, most NBA draft boards have him going in the 2nd round (again, like Bouldin). I’m just not convinced that the 6′6″+ ballhandler who lacks speed has been a proven commodity in the NBA yet. Look at Francisco Garcia of the Kings. Tall but yet lanky ballhandler with a solid base, but what has he done? I might also add that maybe Jeremy was lucky Ricky Rubio spent this year in Europe, otherwise really tall lanky point guards would be the latest fad in the NBA. The other thing about Vasquez is his sometimes fiery attitude on the court, which can end up with a dumb hard foul, a “hero”/selfish shot, or some confrontation with the crowd or an opposing player. NBA = No Boys Allowed (that includes attitudes), you know. Again, in determining potential amongst peers like Jeremy, this will come down to Portsmouth.

• Sherron Collins (senior, 5′11″, 205 lbs, Kansas) — Currently averaging 15.4 ppg, 2.1 rpg, 4.3 apg, 1.3 spg, and 0 bpg. The only way Collins wins the Cousy Award is if Kansas beats Kentucky prior to the Cousy Award announcement the weekend of the Final Four, which is not going to happen because, barring unforeseen circumstances, Kansas and Kentucky will each get #1 seeds and would not face each other prior to the Final Four. I just think it will come down to Collins vs John Wall, with Wall way ahead at this point (btw, we’re not talking about the popular vote here) and assuming Jeremy’s Harvard doesn’t do some miraculous thing to not only get into the tournament, but also advance. Collins is built like Baron Davis, but does not compare to BD in the athleticism department, as the rather low 1.3 spg would indicate. That, in a nutshell, is this year’s point guard draft class, which in some ways helps Jeremy and in others, hurts him. For Collins, it’s his high-value, high-exposure leadership role on the #1 team in the nation, his big butt and his 205 lbs that may make him not only an NBA first-rounder, but a potential lottery pick, depending on the unpredictable quirks of the NCAA Tournament and the lottery teams. As far as performing in the NBA, I think Collins has a chance. We’ll see when he suits up for NBA Summer League and goes head-to-head against other strong, diminutive point guards like Ty Lawson and Jonny Flynn (well, chances are, these two might not need to go to Summer League). If he were mano-y-mano on Jeremy, I think Jeremy would be able to hold his own in terms of the strength and height department. However when Jeremy has the ball, Collins would present a problem with both the quickness and strength on D against Jeremy. Not easy to get around a guy built like Collins and Jeremy might have trouble against stocky-ish quick point guards (he hasn’t faced any this season).

• John Wall (freshman, 6′4″, 195 lbs, Kentucky) — The fact that he’s the only underclassman up for this award amongst a bevy of well-seasoned seniors ought to be a big enough hint. As I said earlier, I don’t see how Wall does not win this award. Only a head-to-head beat down convincingly by Collins, before they vote for the winner during the Final Four weekend, can possibly change that, and if Kansas and Kentucky earn #1 seeds for the tourney, mathematically that will be impossible. You can Google John Wall yourself. He really needs no introduction. He’s the consensus #1 pick and many, many, many analysts agree that he may be one of those NBA landscape-altering first picks. They’re saying he’s better than Derrick Rose. Alright, I’ve already said enough. Let’s move on.

What are Jeremy’s chances of winning the Cousy Award? As of this writing: nil. Absolutely nil. Two words: John Wall. However, fans of Jeremy should still vote for Jeremy. It will be an eyebrow-raiser to the Cousy Award committee if and when he wins the popular vote. The bigger the margin Jeremy wins the popular vote by, the more news it will be. Who knows, maybe NBA GMs listen to the news, maybe they don’t.

Will Jeremy make the final cut from 11 to 5 finalists? Btw, this will happen on March 1st (although the popular vote balloting will continue until March 5th). I think Harvard must beat Cornell this Friday and run the table on the remaining five Ivy League games after that, to even suggest that Jeremy makes the final cut. Otherwise, the final five will be Wall, Collins, Scheyer, Bouldin, and Vasquez. Because character does play a role, the only one Jeremy can unseat is Vasquez. Incidentally, the only way Harvard beats Cornell is if either of their starting big men, Keith Wright or Pat Magnarelli, comes back healthy for that game. Well, either that or Jeremy goes “MJ” and scores 36 on Cornell.

Are Jeremy’s chances of being drafted increased by being on this list of 11? By itself, no. Coupled with the mentions in ESPN, Time, and especially SportsIllustrated and the Wooden Award, yes. Winning the popular vote would help, too, since the NBA is ultimately a business and if there’s anything that’s consistent about the NBA and their franchises, even the ones that lose year after year, it’s that they are no dummies when it comes to the marketing potential of certain players.

There’s another point guard who appears on many mock drafts but was cut from the Cousy list of 30: Manny Harris of Michigan (junior, 6′5″, 185 lbs). He has some nice numbers: 18.4 ppg, 6.3 rpg, 4.2 apg, 1.9 spg, and 0.4 bpg. My guess is that he was cut because Michigan is having a blah year and he had faced some unpublicized disciplinary action by his coach earlier in the season.

One last thing. In terms of the Cousy Award, Jeremy is darn lucky that 6′7″ Evan Turner of Ohio State got injured early in the season (I’ll let you Google that). Since he’s come back, Turner has been sensational and Ohio State is actually using him to bring up the ball and initiate the halfcourt set. In other words, Turner can legitimately be considered a point guard. However, it’s a little late to be throwing him in the mix right now. Turner will also most likely be considered a small forward in the draft, although he does have point guard skills. It’s kind of like asking a young Grant Hill to play point. He can do it, and he’d do it well, but you’re wasting him putting him at the point in the NBA.

Cousy Award fan voting ends March 5th, but the list gets whittled down to five from eleven on March 1st. Harvard’s crucial game with Cornell is this Friday.

Ron Artest gets hit by a cup right before the malice.

Whenever I see an anonymous insult posted as a comment, it reminds me of Ron Artest when he got hit by some random cup (although they eventually figured out who it was), which ignited the “malice at the palace”.

On Dream League’s YouTube account, I recently uploaded a clip of Brady Morningstar (3 million views in 3 days, who woulda thunk?!) where he was about to shoot a free throw with no one else on the blocks, and the ball slipped out and he tried to save the situation by quickly catching the slip and throwing it up for a shot, while losing his balance.

I probably see one airball free throw per season in our leagues, so I posted it and shared on Facebook and Twitter, to poke fun to our hoops community. However, I said in the video description that I think Morningstar is a fantastic player. I saw him play in a few closed scrimmages this past summer and he was solid and held his own. I had no idea who he was and was pleasantly surprised to learn that he was a starter for what is now the #1 college team in the nation: Kansas.

But soon the influx of YouTube comments came in and many of them were sh*tting on him, about 50% of them.

TrueHoop recently bemoaned (1) the posting of nasty comments and (2) posting them anonymously. The blogpost referenced a New York Times blogpost about a high school basketball player’s mom who dug around and found that…

Sports fans are a zealous bunch, to be sure, so I thought I would investigate the wider blogosphere; surely rabid fans were to blame for such a breakdown in civility. Wrong. Political blogs, celebrity blogs, literary blogs and, yes, even some mommy blogs had one overwhelming thing in common: snark.

But the beginning of her post summed it up perfectly…

Who are these people? Seriously. I want names.

That, of course, is exactly the problem when it comes to online commenters, even on high school sports blogs. Hiding behind a screen name allows the unidentified to say anything without taking responsibility for their words.

There’s a couple of things going on here. One, TrueHoop and the NYT allow for anonymous commenting. Back in the day before ESPN bought it out, TrueHoop was a thriving community and when you commented with something of value to add, someone usually reciprocated with a well-thought-out response.

ESPN and the NYT are stuck in the beginning of Web 2.0. That was when you wanted as many comments as possible — even spam! — because doing so got you ranked higher on Google. That’s how TechCrunch was built. Big companies like ESPN and NYT are always a few years behind the curve and, quite frankly, don’t get it (not like they need the extra traffic). They’re just trying to keep status quo, for whatever reason.

Luckily I’ve sensed that snarky comments aren’t as prevalent as they once were. People have grown tired of them and if there are enough negative comments on a post, there will be enough people out there to help balance things out, to put things at 50/50. I think it will continue to improve, back to the point where, for example, TrueHoop used to be (although TrueHoop will never be the same, sadly).

Times have changed. We’re now in the Facebook era where, for the most part, you know who you are talking to. MySpace is pretty much dead and people want a real social “network”. Facebook’s users have a real identity, be it a person, a corporation, or a group/organization. There’s a way to reach people; it’s a two-way street. Thank goodness.

I think the popularity of Facebook reveals that most people are sick of seeing the snark. I hope more and more blogs get their readership somehow integrated into Facebook as well.

For the record, I like Twitter better than Facebook because of its versatility and have criticized Facebook for being a “walled garden” many times, which requires a bit more upkeep, but Twitter’s great in that you can only post 140 characters. Facebook’s “real people” policies and Twitters limitations will discourage trolls. Both services also allow you to block other users.

Pretty soon, I hope the advancement of Facebook and Twitter reinforces that snark is cheap and is a waste of time.

Jeremy Lin, pre-game intros, family.

NOTE: This is Part 4 of a four-part series of blogposts. Part 1, Part 2, and Part 3 were published in the three days prior. I re-titled this post because I felt it was the most interesting of the four.

From deity to defeated

After Friday night’s win over Columbia, there were hundreds of fans lined up to meet Jeremy Lin, to get autographs and take pictures. He was very accommodating. He was a hero. I could only shake my head and smile in astonishment.

Even the Santa Clara post-game hadn’t been that frenzied, at least from my vantage point, although I did overhear his teammate mentioning autograph-seekers outside the team bus. I think the fans were not found in droves on the Leavey Center floor after the Santa Clara game primarily because of the long post-game press conference. The scene at Leavey ended up being picture-taking sessions mostly with family and extended family, and reconnecting with long-lost former teammates and even former opponents, such as Anthony Goods of Stanford fame, who played against Jeremy in the first home-coming three years prior.

Even as his friend, after the Columbia game it was nearly impossible to navigate the waters just to say hello. At one point, after autographing a sign and some t-shirts, Jeremy was rescued by Coach Tommy Amaker, who called him over from about ten yards away to take pictures with Jeremy’s relatives. Even his flat-mate Cheng Ho (running back for Harvard football team) told Jeremy rather abruptly, “Eh, you’re too popular. I’ll just see you later.”

The intimate setting at Columbia made it quite a sight to see. Here he was, a bonafide celebrity athlete.

By contrast and true to enemy territory form, I saw zero autograph-seekers after the Cornell game.

Jeremy came out of the locker room with a decidedly frustrated look on his face. He had a larger support group on this night. Adding to the Lin “posse” (I’m trying to be facetious!) was his dad, his two brothers and, I presume, a few cousins. The fact that the Columbia game was on a school/work night probably had something to do with their absences the night before.

His mom rushed to him the moment he appeared, inviting a hug to try and take away the agony of the blow-out loss to a crucial opponent. If my personal life is any comparison, and if I remember correctly, nary a mom’s affection was going to change that torturous feeling for a young adult that lasts for about four hours immediately following a loss. As such, Jeremy was predictably stoic.

I could see him pointing at the other end of the court and explaining something to his mom, which I speculate had to do with the exasperation of the two “phantom” (i.e., “ticky-tack”, or for the non-basketball readers: they shouldn’t have been called) fouls called on him in the second half. The 4th foul sent him to the bench, on the brink of disqualification and unable to help his teammates spark a comeback — not that it would’ve made a difference against the ferocious Cornell team that showed up that night.

Still, perhaps ingrained in the Lin DNA, mom attempted another hug or two (which Jeremy did oblige), seeing that her son was so bothered by the huge disappointment of the loss. Eventually, Jeremy cracked a smile as one of his cousins said something, but then, true to a baller’s heart, the gravity of what just took place on the court re-plagued his mind and the frustration was back on his face not long thereafter.

Back at Santa Clara, his dad had come up to me and said he was very thankful for sharing the perhaps unnoticed qualities that Jeremy brings to a team, both on my blog and as a contributor to GoldenStateOfMind.com. Jeremy’s dad said that I saw things most people don’t see with Jeremy’s game. Then he paid me the ultimate compliment: “I read every word, every word.”

After the Cornell game, I hoped that we could talk shop again and I was grateful when Jeremy’s dad again came by and wanted to know what I thought of the game. I pretty much gave him the condensed version of the recap I wrote in Part 2, and we agreed on a lot of points, giving sort of our first-take analysis, as Silicon Valley engineers do. But I told him that, despite the embarrassing outcome, I was proud of his son, how courageously he played in the second half, fearlessly attacking on offense and meeting 7-footer Jeff Foote at the rim on numerous occasions, against insurmountable odds.
_

Jeremy getting taped before the game.

Finally, I said hello and goodbye to Jeremy. I told him to stay strong, that nothing’s really changed, in reference to their quest for the Ivy League title (it’s still, in essence, a 3-game series against Cornell, although Harvard now has to beat Cornell twice in a row: once in the remaining regular season matchup and, if upset losses to any other teams are avoided, one more time in what would be an Ivy League championship one-game playoff).

Then Jeremy said what I knew he would say: “Thanks for coming. Sorry.”

I told him not to be sorry, that he never had to apologize for a loss.

You apologize when, for whatever reason, you didn’t or couldn’t give it your all. Or when you didn’t practice something you should have. You apologize if you got frustrated at a teammate and snapped at him (that’d be me snapping at my teammates, as those of you who know my potentially fiery personality on the court can attest, but not Jeremy). But you don’t have to apologize when you gave everything you had, pulled nearly every trick out of the bag, and you or your team just wasn’t good enough that night.

At that point I caught a glimpse of Jeremy’s mom, who was a little teary-eyed. I think it was because she knew we all cared for Jeremy a great deal, and she appreciated that, and she also knew that losing and being disappointed that the outcome did not happen as we may have envisioned it, was a painful part of competition.

I think there was some element of Jeremy feeling he might have let his fans down. Well, as an eyewitness, I can convey to all of you Jeremy Lin fans, he and Harvard may have lost that night, but the way he played that second half practically one-on-five, with the fifth being seven feet tall, me watching this from just eight rows back, how he took several hits (the hard foul and the slap that wasn’t called by the ref) and kept fighting, as an Asian-American, you can be proud of Jeremy even in a 36-point defeat.

The final score doesn’t show this. The boxscore doesn’t show this. The play-by-play transcript probably doesn’t even reveal it. I don’t even think the average basketball fan can appreciate it. But as someone who has watched adult men play competitive basketball, up close, for more than 10,000 hours in the last two decades, most of it from the last seven years since Dream League’s inception, as a basketball aficionado, a former player, a coach who has been through it all in countless tournaments, what I saw from Jeremy in the second half against Cornell — and this has nothing to do with being Asian-American — that’s a guy I want on my team.

And I wouldn’t have traded witnessing Jeremy and his mom, for any of Jeremy’s previous wins, dunks, buzzer-beaters, or fabulous plays. I mean, I would trade it, because as a baller I’d rather take the win, of course. But I sure have a greater appreciation of Jeremy’s mom and family and their relationship with him, and this memory will be ingrained with me just as the wins, dunks, buzzer-beaters, and fabulous plays will.

Not that other basketball players’ families aren’t the same. I don’t mean to prop up Jeremy as someone who takes responsibility for a loss more-so than any other elite competitor. Nor his mom as a better mom than other basketball players’ moms.

But some star players don’t necessarily give their heart and soul to the team, or they look to blame someone or something else for a loss. On the other hand, this particular star player carries a loss with him and takes responsibility for the many people, from family to friends to colleagues to nameless supporters, who care about him. And his family respects that and feels the same. With Jeremy, you will never get any drama whatsoever after a loss.

Out of respect for the privacy of the Lin family, I internally debated whether or not to post what I saw with Jeremy and his mom, but I think it was a tidbit that needed to be told. This may be the wrong metaphor, but Batman wouldn’t be interesting without Bruce Wayne. When the warehouse blew up and took Rachel Dawes with it, it was Wayne’s anguish and feeling of responsibility, to not just certain individuals but also people in general, that made Batman more human. (To the inevitable detractors lurking out there: I know, I know, a comparison to the Dark Knight is a bit much, but you get my drift. Geez, let a man make a point.)

This past weekend, I got to see the hero vanquish his opponents and achieve the status of a deity, and the next day I witnessed him defeated and dealing with a major emotional setback at the hands of an archrival.

And yet, in both instances, he was considerate of someone else.

Throughout my travels watching adults play basketball, be it the NBA, the NCAA, or at any level of any of my amateur leagues — and I say this even if, in a myopic way, only relative to the other players on any given court — I’d have to think real hard to remember someone as young as him who possessed such skill, stamina, determination, leadership, and MATURITY.

Tonight, Harvard picks itself up after the knockout punch by Cornell, to face Princeton at home. Tomorrow, they face Penn. They will have a rematch against Cornell on Fri 2/19.

Jeremy Lin is not afraid to attack the rim (via Pablo Torre via SI, click for Pablo's blog).

NOTE: This is Part 3 of 4. Part 1 and Part 2 were posted in the past two days. Part 4 will post tomorrow.

Back to that vaunted Cornell team

Unfortunately as it relates to competing against a team like Cornell, Harvard doesn’t and didn’t have anyone else with the smallish-stocky or longish-quick blueprint — see the last few paragraphs of the previous post — against Cornell. Nor did they have anyone posing a threat down low (usually this would be Keith Wright or Kyle Casey), or nailing shots outside (Oliver McNally, Christian Webster, Dee Giger, or Andrew Van Nest).

The Cornell defense was just too intense and smothering. They can be that way and scramble-and-gamble on the defensive perimeter because Jeff Foote can protect the rim. It’s like in high school when your varsity squad scrimmaged the JV kids. The varsity guys would risk — and most likely win — every overplay on the perimeter, knowing that they had a physically superior team.

Likewise, on offense they can run a series of picks up top but still with Foote planted down low. This creates a quite simple but effective attack of (a) dumping it to Foote or (b) setting enough perimeter picks combined with looks at Foote, that eventually a Cornell outside threat will get the ball. That night, it was John Jaques who answered the call, hitting trey after trey.

Cornell also has a solid ballhandler in Louis Dale, a diminutive point guard who was hitting his opportunistic shots and cutting up Harvard’s confused man-to-man. Dale often looked like Chris Paul out there, but his numbers won’t attract a lot of NBA scouts. This is because Dale has sacrificed his game for the success of the program. Bobby Knight would love this kid.

Sometimes that’s what happens in the dynamics between the NCAA and NBA. I’ve often called it a “holy war”, although there are certainly guys on both sides of the fence. In this context of Cornell, my point is this: Dale is probably not on any NBA scout’s radar (and Ryan Wittman may be only because of his dad, Randy Wittman of Minnesota Timberwolves fame). Dale doesn’t have the numbers to justify a scout’s time. His numbers have actually decreased as the team around him has gotten better. As a result, his impending pro career will start with him very, very far from the pole position. That is the price he pays for being on a great team and winning with a storied program like Cornell. A great many future pro basketball prospects go through these dynamics every year. It’s one of the many profound things I’ve learned while following the career of Jeremy Lin.

So, Cornell’s a pretty scary, balanced team. Even if Harvard pulls off the Ivy miracle (i.e., beats Cornell in a few weeks, then beats them again in a one-game playoff as a tiebreaker to decide the conference champion), I think Cornell gets an at-large bid and wins the opening round of the NCAA Tournament, no matter who they play.

If I were a European billionaire, I’d consider starting a new franchise in some Euroleague B division and drafting all four starting Cornell seniors. With a few more professional pieces, you’ve got a solid team with incredible chemistry that could last for years. Of course, Wittman and Foote need to pursue the NBA, so even if I were a European magnate, keeping this team together past Cornell graduation would be impossible.

It should come as no surprise that all five Cornell starters scored in double-figures against Harvard. They made Harvard blink, early, and strangled them from there.

Jeremy Lin, warrior

The other thing that needs to be put out there in terms of Jeremy is that it’s his defense that sparks his offense.

It’s almost appalling that we tend to consistently overlook this, isn’t it? But time and time again, defense is the foundation of the Jeremy Lin Show.

That night, Cornell’s bulletproof offense, with Foote anchoring the attack, afforded Jeremy few opportunities to spark his offense. From that perspective, Jeremy was really amazing as he tried to create something out of nothing from the halfcourt set in the second half.

Jeremy wound up scoring 15 of his 19 points against Cornell in the final twenty minutes, courageously penetrating into the teeth of Cornell’s defense which was anchored by “Big Foote” and a Charles Oakley-esque bruiser teammate (6′5″ 222-lb Adam Wire) who made sure Jeremy felt pain when hard-fouled.

There was even one play where Foote seemed to have slapped Jeremy’s wrist as Jeremy was challenging for a layup, but there was no call, to the dismay of us thirty or so fans tucked in behind Harvard’s bench who clearly heard the slap.

To jeering taunts of “over-rated” from the devout Cornell crowd, Jeremy managed to hit 7 of 8 free throws, while continuing his astonishing shooting percentage from the field at 6-for-9.

We Harvard fans were surrounded by elder Cornell alumnae and even they were appreciative of Jeremy’s play in the second half, nodding in agreement that his “and-one” was a good move, or that his spin on the right baseline to split two Cornell defenders, stopped by a foul, was impressive.

I know, he had 8 turnovers. I understand, that’s not a good stat to have. But I’ve seen other NBA hopefuls rack up turnovers as well. More on this later, as I will write an in-depth study of Jeremy’s potential draft peers, but I have a feeling what I will find is that turnovers don’t rank that far behind personal fouls in terms of possible irrelevancy in NBA draft-speak. Sure, when a shooting guard commits a bevy of turnovers — think Caron Butler this past week — that’s kind of glaring. A playmaker like Jeremy (remember, in Part 2 I declared that Jeremy is not a “shooter”) who is trying to get that X to cut to the hole to create a little something past two O’s is not the same thing as a stop-and-pop shooting guard dribbling through traffic when he’s supposed to let the point guard do that, but is unfortunately measured by the same archaic stat.

On the court, I’m no longer (as) surprised by what he can do. The double-spin move on Columbia? Haven’t seen his spin all that much, but I knew he had it in him. A courageous effort against Cornell’s “Terminator” defense, fearlessly challenging Foote to meet him at the rim? Can’t be more proud of him, but I knew he had it in him.

What I hadn’t yet seen came post-game at both the Columbia and Cornell games.

Part 4 will post tomorrow, as Harvard gets back on its feet to host Princeton and Penn this weekend.

Harvard-Cornell tipoff. Can we have a do-over?

NOTE: This is Part 2 of 4. Part 1 posted yesterday. Part 3 will post tomorrow.

The game action

At Columbia, on the court Jeremy Lin did what he had to do to put away the underdogs. The right-handed shoulder-leading drive that knifed into the gut of the defense could only be contained so much by Columbia’s zone. And Jeremy showed off a double-spin move, which he capped with a dump-off pass to a wide-open Keith Wright for an uncontested layup.

Before the half ended, Jeremy had the ball with the clock winding down. Usually he takes the last shot, but this time, he drew a couple of defenders and dished off to Brandyn Curry, who nailed a three-pointer as time expired.

After Harvard took the floor in the second half, they soon gained control of the game and routed Columbia. Jeremy subbed out with about 12 minutes to play, and there wasn’t a subsequent situation which warranted him checking back in. The guys sitting next to me suggested that he was going to be saved for Cornell, but I didn’t necessarily agree because I have seen Coach Tommy Amaker put Jeremy into games in which Harvard had a twenty-point lead. However, in this game, none of the opportunities to put him back in made sense, and he spent the rest of the game on the bench. He tallied 14 points on 5-for-6 shooting in only 24 minutes of play.

At Cornell, Harvard came out nervous against the Big Red’s 1-2-2 three-quarter court press, despite Amaker starting senior Doug Miller ahead of Ivy League’s recently named rookie-of-the-week, Kyle Casey, who is a freshman, but also Harvard’s most talented and athletic player outside of Jeremy.

As Harvard kept turning the ball over, Cornell took an early lead that just got worse and worse for Harvard. At a burly 6′8″, Keith Wright was the only Harvard big man capable of providing any defense against Cornell’s 7-footer Jeff Foote, giving up four inches in the process, but Wright had expended all but one of his personal fouls by mid-second-half.

Fellow 6′8″ frontcourt teammate Pat Magnarelli, a scrappy and difficult-to-displace power forward who plays like a center, was out with a foot in a cast, and the only remaining frontcourt presence was 6′8″ Andrew Van Nest, a three-point specialist who is too skinny to guard any post player at this point in the freshman’s young career.

At times, 6′7″ small forward Casey was Harvard’s biggest body and had to cover Foote. Foote’s deliberate yet versatile array of drop steps, crossover steps, jump hooks, brute-force putbacks, and the ability to recognize teammates cutting to the hoop and delivering out of the double-team, turned into a nightmare for the weaker Harvard frontline. Here’s hoping Magnarelli will return in time for the second meeting against Cornell.

Harvard stuck with a man-to-man, probably because on paper, zone wasn’t going work against the tall Cornell outside shooters, who all managed to have a solid game shooting. In retrospect, after Cornell got up by 20, Amaker should have figured it couldn’t get any worse and switched to a 2-1-2 zone (you know, pyschological warfare) — although going against the grain like that is very hard to do in the heat of the moment.

I would even suggest that next time, he start his quickest, most mobile lineup (Jeremy and six-foot Curry and Oliver McNally along with Casey and Wright) and press the Cornell guards. Inasmuch that Harvard’s players were shredded one by one, Amaker didn’t show much innovation or risk-taking after it appeared clear that Cornell would be the dominant team, both physically and mentally, that night — well, outside of Jeremy, of course.

Don’t get me wrong. I think Amaker is a great psychologist and motivator for young ballplayers. He is brilliant when it comes to his positivity and the best thing about him is, he’s always composed on the sidelines and rarely complains to officials, rarely gets worked up about things that are out of his control. But when you play a monolith like Cornell, you better win in the X’s-and-O’s department. Every single facet of the game counts against them. Preparing for Cornell literally requires military strategy, especially when your troops are at severe disadvantages.

NBA Draft prospecting

We’ve definitely got to talk about Foote. Like Jeremy and perhaps all past, present, and future Ivy Leaguers, it remains to be seen at the Portsmouth Invitational how Foote stacks up against better competition. Earlier in the season, Foote held his own against consensus lottery pick and fellow 7-footer Cole Aldrich of Kansas. However, just when you felt Foote asserted his dominance over poor Harvard, he’d be called for traveling, end up airballing a jump hook, or pass it out when he should’ve attacked one-on-one.

Big Foote!

So I’d have to say, perhaps he’s not quite there yet in terms of mental toughness, otherwise the one-off airball or slip into passiveness goes away. He really doesn’t need to fix that much to become an up-and-coming NBA prospect. When you’re 7-feet, you just need to convert when you’re one-on-one and deliver the ball to the open teammate when you’re double-teamed. Pretty simple (the rest, you figure, can be drilled, taught, or corrected). That night against Harvard, he did this most of the time, and still only against a far physically inferior defense.

The other detracting aspect of Foote is that he may be too slow to execute or defend the NBA’s high-pick-and-roll style of play. I could be wrong, but I cannot recall Foote participating in any high screen situations for Cornell. Not that he needed to. In the college game and with the personnel that they have, Cornell is better off with Foote near the basket on every possession.

Ryan Wittman is a different story. Contrary to Foote’s game, it’s a lot harder to evaluate a non-post-up player after just one game, but if Wittman has been consistently taking ill-advised catch-and-shoot jumpers with a hand in his face this season, as he did that night against Harvard, then I’m afraid he’s either going to have to start hitting more of them or he’s not going to find a job in the NBA.

Let me put it this way: at times it seemed like he was gunning for the NBA and not necessarily a Cornell win. Being an effective role-playing off-the-bench shooter in the NBA doesn’t require you to hit 6-for-7 treys, all in people’s faces. It requires you to hit 2-for-2 if you only got two opportunities. Granted, if you’re hitting 6-for-7 in people’s faces three nights in a row, then you’ve convinced me that you’re just a cold-blooded sniper and you’ve won a spot in my regular rotation of 8, but doing that in the NBA is kind of a super-human feat (ask Jason Kapono). But who knows, maybe NBA scouts don’t look for the same things that I do.

So anyways, I can understand Wittman’s need to put up shots, but he wasn’t making them that night, nor has he been lately, per ESPN’s game log. Come Portsmouth, I think he needs to just make the open ones and not jack them up so much.

Compare that to Jeremy’s shot selection. To be honest, I can’t remember the last time Jeremy forced a bad shot this season. And no, I don’t equate his attempt to draw free throws against Foote by faking a jumper then drawing Foote’s contact and throwing it up — which Jeremy amazingly made late in the 2nd half, against a 7-foot body hurtling into him! — as a bad shot. (By the way, the ref did not call a foul on that play and I’d be curious to see the replay.)

In other words, Jeremy’s shots are all calculated gambles or, quite simply, meaningful attempts — most of them layups, mind you. I’ve seen enough adult men’s basketball at all levels to know that it is very hard for a human being not to take a bad shot throughout an entire game. It may be a shot that’s too early in the shotclock, it may be a selfish shot because your teammate failed to pass you the ball when you were open last time down, or it may be (as Doc Rivers coined for Rajon Rondo two years ago) a “hero” shot.

When people talk about Jeremy, that’s where people get it wrong. He’s not a “shooter”. A shooter is someone, a la Kobe Bryant or Ray Allen or Reggie Miller, who will take a shot in your face as a way to dominate you. Jeremy’s not like that. Therefore, speaking as a basketball purist, I’m okay with people saying that Jeremy is a “scorer” as long as they recognize his contributions as a table-setter for his teammates. He’s a facilitator. He delivers the ball to the basket, one way or another, but it’s typically not with long jumpshots.

Notice how he took zero three-pointers against Cornell, which may indeed be a testament to Cornell closing out knowing that Foote has their backs, but how many “streetball” players do you know, how many potential NBA Draft-pick guards, would have jacked up a trey trying to catch up in this game?

And that’s why he could be a fantastic point guard in the pros. His discipline and overall game plan is truly amazing for a 22-year-old.

Perhaps that’s why so many people don’t think he’ll make the NBA. Perhaps the litmus test is, can he take over a game like Brandon Jennings, who will not only scissor the defense but also show off an array of step-back three-pointers in people’s faces and just light it up in that way? I’ve said it from Day One: Jeremy Lin is like Jason Kidd. Have you ever seen Jason Kidd “light it up”? Sure, he can take over a game, but not with his perimeter outside shooting. Jeremy is similar.

Also, the difference between Jeremy and the average college player is that he can get down low in attack mode and use his shoulder to create a seam between defenders. In this era of basketball players, most guys who attack like Jeremy are well over 6′3″ — Damion James of Texas and Evan Turner of Ohio State come to mind.

I’m not sure that most NBA Draft evaluators are even self-conscious of this aspect of the game, the secret sauce which ultimately made Michael Jordan the most perfect player we have seen in history — check the videotape and play MJ in slow motion. Incidentally Kobe and Dwyane Wade subscribe to MJ’s style of attack, whether they know it or not (I’m sure they do).

When you see a point guard shorter than around Jeremy’s height, you expect him to have blazing lateral quickness and a stocky frame that can absorb contact when the defender recovers from the lateral move. Tim Hardaway would be a good NBA example. In more modern times, think Jonny Flynn, Derrick Rose, or Sherron Collins of Kansas.

When you see a point guard taller than around Jeremy’s height, you expect him to have long limbs that can step around defenders and deliver the ball with passes that go around other bodies. Magic Johnson would be a good NBA example. In more modern times, think Russell Westbrook, John Wall, Ricky Rubio, or Manny Harris of Michigan.

Just put all these guys I mentioned in slow motion. Advance the video, frame by frame. You’ll see that most players don’t get their bodies at that a sharp an angle which makes them difficult to stop when they attack. Even Kidd doesn’t really play that way (he uses more of a bulldozer-like power). Wall relies on his lateral length, side-to-side jukes, and big first step. Collins relies on beating you to a spot and using his bulk to create space (a la Kidd). Thus far, in my limited scope of college basketball observations, I’ve only seen one other top table-setter who attacks like Jeremy: Iman Shumpert of Georgia Tech. (Perhaps Evan Turner also has it amongst a huge repertoire of moves, but I need to see him play more.)

I think part of the reason why Jeremy’s draft stock isn’t as high as it should be (among a few other glaring things such as the fact that he plays for Harvard and has an unorthodox jumper) is that people aren’t used to seeing this style of play, which I believe is the most reliable and effective in basketball, in a 6′3″ 200-lb body.

Stay tuned tomorrow for Part 3 of 4: “Back to the vaunted Cornell team” and “Jeremy Lin, warrior”

Photo courtesy Jennifer Ho.

You never know what you’ll see from Jeremy Lin.

I’ve said that a lot, but usually it’s pertaining to some move I saw him do (not televised and streamed online and you probably can count the number of other people simultaneously watching it on one hand), such as hitting the buzzer beater from near-half-court — with the foul! — in triple overtime against William & Mary, or making four steals in a span of five consecutive possessions by Dartmouth, or baiting Georgetown’s impressive backcourt duo into a half-court steal and dunk, or racing back full court and swatting a layup by UConn’s potential future NBA draft pick Jerome Dyson, or vanquishing Boston University in a 27-second stretch near the end of the game by converting an incredible layup while nearly going too far under the backboard, followed immediately thereafter by a steal and thunderous one-handed dunk to cap a personal 11-0 run. I’m sure I’ve left out more.

I’ve now met with bonafide evaluators of the NBA Draft and there is consensus that, at a minimum, Jeremy can be a star in Europe and/or Asia. So when there’s a real possibility that the months of February and maybe a little bit of March may be the last time to see him play live on American soil, I make it a point to go see him.

A coast-to-coast excursion to the concrete jungle where dreams are made of, where the streets make me feel brand new and big lights inspire me (they really do, actually!), where my old college roommate Brian Yang — yes, he of ESPN blogpost fame — runs Dream League New York? No problem.

A tangential trek in freezing temperatures to witness a showdown with profound post-season implications, a potentially epic non-televised clash against perennial Ivy League juggernaut Cornell? Even though it’s in the boonies known as Ithaca, yes, I will find a way (in case you were wondering: Jetblue to Syracuse straight north, only an hour drive southwest!).

Most of you might say it was a waste. I watched Jeremy and Harvard destroy an overmatched Columbia squad, then not more than 24 hours later, I saw the tables turned as Jeremy and Harvard got destroyed, similarly overmatched by the league bully, Cornell. Two blowouts, back-to-back.

Neither game resulted in a boxscore set ablaze by Jeremy’s play. Neither game raised eyebrows with the casual observer, nor the die-hard hometown fan, nor the bandwagonner curious to witness Jeremy “live up to the hype”. Neither game was all that competitive between the two teams.

Still, I wouldn’t have missed it for the world.

Approaching game time

Off the court, the Columbia game for me was the little cousin of the Santa Clara game. (Incidentally, it’s time I set the record straight. We did not sell tickets at a “heavy discount”, which suggests that we paid people to attend. We bought tickets 25 at a time at $5 apiece, then resold them for $8.88 — eight is a lucky number in Chinese tradition. I think our largest order through Dream League was for maybe a dozen tickets, which at $8.88 offers only a small discount off the $10 retail price at the Santa Clara ticket office. We actually made a very modest amount of money on the Santa Clara event, and this includes fronting the fifty or so up-close reserved seats, sold at $20 retail, that we comped for our most favorite Dream League friends. I would like to take this opportunity to say thank you to Taylor and Ed in the SCU ticket office for all of their hard work in taking our bulk orders, multiple times on the phone and in person. And thank you to Columbia’s Anthony Di Fino, for dealing with all of our last-minute will call seat assignments for by email, merely hours before tipoff.)

Now, Columbia’s gym (capacity: 3,400) doesn’t have baseline seating and a sellout can make you feel like you’re in a sardine can, while Santa Clara’s arena (4,700) feels like it’d be a nice NBDL venue built for decent 360-degree viewing angles.

The entrance at Columbia consists of two single-file turnstiles, one for entering and one for exiting, that lead into a narrow L-shaped lobby. While milling around before tipoff, our guests, some of them who had been to Columbia games in the past, were amazed by what a zoo that area had become. I found a little “cove” where I could hand out half of our crimson-colored Dream League t-shirts, which were to show support for Jeremy and the Harvard Crimson team. I also got a chance to meet Loo Yee-Shin, former Taiwanese National Team star and a friend of Dan Rosen, who occasionally writes for SLAM Magazine.

It was a much more intimate setting at Columbia than Santa Clara, and the ticket-selling and redistribution effort on my part was, thankfully, proportional. This means that while the Santa Clara project was a “beast”, getting people to go to Columbia was quite manageable, although it still kept me busy for as much as two days prior to tipoff.

Couldn't find this issue of SI yet!

In fact, the day before I had departed for New York was my last conversation with Pablo Torre, who writes for SportsIllustrated (”SI”). He had wanted to get my feedback on some of the wording for the impending SI article, to avoid any potential controversies pertaining to the Asian-American angle of the story. He also said that the new issue would hit newsstands the next day.

When I arrived at JFK, none of the newsstands at JFK had the latest issue. When I arrived in Brian’s neighborhood, not even the local Border’s bookstore had them. Luckily, Brian’s been an SI subscriber since 1985 (!), so that afternoon, as we typed away on our keyboards getting our work done, in the backs of our minds we were waiting anxiously for the new issue to arrive in the mail. When it finally did in the early evening, we were just sitting there, stunned with amazement.

Jeremy had been featured in America’s most revered, venerable sports magazine. As teenagers, Brian and I used to keep every issue of SI that had Michael Jordan or Tiger Woods on the cover. Actually, to this day, Brian still absorbs every issue, reading every word from cover to cover (something I had less and less time for over the years). We would have never thought an Asian-American basketball player could be featured in such a time-honored publication — well, outside of SI’s “Faces In The Crowd” section, that is.

It was only fitting that we would be reunited this past week for that reason.

At the Columbia game two nights later, it was great to see DLNY’ers I hadn’t seen since last year’s Gotham Games tourney. I got to meet Twitterers, random youth fans, and other guests invited by Brian, who brought his camcorder and took the opportunity to capture the fan fervor. I sat next to Peter Robert Casey, basketball social media “maven” (for lack of a better word). Dan occasionally took down some notes and asked me questions here and there, while Brian candidly interviewed random fans and got them on videotape.

Contrast this with the Cornell game. Again sticking with off-the-court stuff, my drive from Syracuse to Ithaca was memorable, indeed. With outside temperatures consistently at zero degrees Farehnheit, I learned that everything is the opposite of visiting Las Vegas in the middle of July for NBA Summer League.

In Vegas, you hurry on up into your car and turn the air conditioning at its coldest setting on full blast. And you leave it on full blast. In Upstate New York, you hurry on up into your car and turn the defrosters (front and rear) on full blast. And you leave them on full blast unless, of course, you don’t want to see outside your fogged up windshield and windows!

The crowd at Cornell was a sight to see as well. The students were raucus and “hostile environment” was an understatement. Cornell star Jeff Foote later was quoted as saying…

“I would compare it to the first time we won the Ivy League title,” Foote said. “The crowd was rocking. They gave us tremendous energy and made it a great college basketball atmosphere. It really fires us up and we really like to play in front of a lot of people.”

I really felt like I was in enemy territory.

Stay tuned for tomorrow’s installment, Part 2 of 4, “Game action and NBA prospecting”.

[The following article first appeared on GoldenStateOfMind.com.]

Just got done texting Atma Brother ONE on how to report this breaking, below-the-radar-ish GSW news, especially when we hear it from our fellow blogosphere and no one in GSoM has yet FanShot it. The way this one came up was pretty cool…

• Mellow Saturday night for me, so I flip on my access to @unstoppablebaby (GSoM’s Twitter account, in case you didn’t know), which is a great source of real-time Twitter news because Atma has followed like every NBA celebrity athlete, every notable NBA blogger and beatwriter.
• Lo and behold, I stumble upon our Northwest friends, @blazersedge. I’m thinking they might be good to follow on my other Twitter account (just looking to lower the pressure on the FIREHOSE that is @unstoppablebaby, haha!), because I like to see in-game tweets real-time during NBA games. One more click to see what kind of stuff they tweet.
• They’ve retweeted the RidiculousUpside.com story via @RidiculousScott: “Anthony Tolliver to be your newest Golden State Warrior”.

So I tell Atma, “Hey this GSoM story’s just gonna be a straight (boring) link to RU, since I don’t really know much about Tolliver and I bet the GSoM community isn’t gonna care too much about another random NBDL call-up.”

Then it hits me. Tolliver’s being called up from the Idaho Stampede and I happen to know assistant coach Joel Abelson, who is from the Bay Area.

Guess what, one text later, we have AN EXCLUSIVE SCOOP on Anthony Tolliver!  Here’s what Abelson had to say:

He’s the most NBA-ready player I’ve seen in 3 years in the D-League. Not only can he contribute on the basketball court, but he’s an insanely hard worker and a tremendous human off the court. All he needs is an opportunity to play and he will be an NBA rotation player for the rest of his career.

Now, perhaps the best story of the NBA this year was Sundiata Gaines hitting that buzzer-beater for the Utah Jazz the other night after also being called up from the Stampede.

So of course I had to ask Abelson the obvious follow-up question: “Wait, then you’re saying Tolliver’s more NBA-ready than Yatta Gaines, right?”

Abelson’s response:

100 percent. Yatta is a gamer with NBA-caliber skills and can develop into a very good NBA player. But today, A.T. is the most NBA-ready player in our league. After bouncing around for 3 years, he now understands what he has to do to be effective every night.

Since I love following the history of the NBA Draft and NBA Summer League, below are Tolliver’s college stats, which aren’t really that eye-popping. He played for the Creighton Bluejays and went undrafted in 2007. According to Wikipedia, he played two games for the Portland Trail Blazers this past December.

I tried to add an SBNation widget for Tolliver’s stats from Portland, but it came up blank. His NBA stats were pretty barren on Portland’s deep roster.

This one’s a diamond in the rough, so I thought I’d spend a blogpost on it.

Pleasanton native Kevin Laue is 6′10″, just got a Division I NCAA scholarship to play at Manhattan College in NYC, and was born with only one hand.

Here’s one of my favorite quotes from the article…

The demands on Laue’s time are so great that his mother, Jodi Jarnagin, was happy when he lost a fall election for freshman class president at Manhattan.

“He’s a little overwhelmed,” Jarnagin said. “The media thing does not make a difference to him. Affecting people’s lives does.”

…because I know someone else who’s a first at something, commands a lot of media attention, and has a bit of burden on his shoulders.

Here’s another quote I really like…

Coach Fletcher Arritt, who says he has sent more than 200 players to Division I schools in his 40 seasons, said he needed just one look to know Laue was Division I material.

“He catches the ball better than some guys with two hands. And remember, it only takes one hand to block a shot,” Arritt said. “If he had two hands, he wouldn’t have been at Fork Union. He’d have been at Kentucky or North Carolina.”

…because someone saw through the superficial and evaluated him purely from a basketball skill standpoint. More people should have, but that’s the way it goes. Again, sounds like somebody I know.

Here’s the link to the article:

East Bay native plays with one hand, big heart