They take their basketball seriously in Indianapolis . . . even while on duty.
Four Indiana State policemen, in full gear --- yes, even with handcuffs and fire arms dangling from their hips --- took turns firing up about 20 minutes’ worth of jump shots during the Nike Basketball All-America Camp’s dinner break Saturday evening in the National Institute of Fitness and Sport gymnasium.
A couple of them had more than enough pop in their right wrists to launch on-target attempts from behind the 3-point arc that were repeatedly right on or right at the mark, even without the advantage of getting any lift on the shots minus any basketball shoes.
I kind of wish they had broken off into a 2-on-2 game. I’d like to have seen which of them played ``lock-up’’ defense.
I’m sorry, it’s already late Saturday evening here in Indy and I’m getting a bit loopy.
The approximately 120 campers engaged in drill work, as well 3-on-3 and 5-on-5 (full court) competitions.
As I’m often heard to say, there’s nothing quite starting a day with three hours of 3-on-3 basketball viewing.
I spent at least two of those three hours sitting on a folding chair along a baseline, in between head coaches Lorenzo Romar (Washington) and Ritchie McKay (New Mexico), two of the most sincere and humble Christians I know.
Maybe I picked up something via osmosis.
Mike Krzyzewski – you know him by way of his television commercials but he’s also a basketball coach of note – and his Duke University assistant coach (and former guard) Chris Collins, showed up a little past 9 a.m. and didn’t bail until a few minutes past 10 p.m.
That’s because the Blue Devils’ No. 1 recruiting target, South Medford (Ore.) forward Kyle Singler, played in one of the final two games of the evening after arriving from Oregon a few hours earlier in the day.
Singler was given the OK to show up a couple of days after the other campers because he had just wrapped up 16 days in San Antonio as a member of the eventual gold medal-winning U.S. 18-Under team.
Duke is supposedly the ``leader’’ in the Singler Sweepstakes, although Washington (Romar was the head coach on the 18-under squad) and UCLA (which was represented by assistant Donny Daniels Saturday with head honcho Ben Howland in New Jersey for the Reebok/ABCD Camp, where the Bruins’ top target, center Kevin Love, was in action).
Singler’s game looked ever-so-slightly stale after a near-week off from competitive hoops although he turned in three or four plays that demonstrated why he’s considered one of the top five prospects in the national class of 2007.
But the guy whose performance was as crisp as the contents of an un-opened bag of Lay’s Potato Chips was 6-10, 226-pound junior Greg Monroe of Helen Cox High in Gretna, a Louisiana town of not quite 2,000.
He reminded me a little bit of the Lakers’ Lamar Odom (duh! He’s left-handed!) and was easily the most overall skilled big man that I’ve took a long look at during the first two days in Indianapolis.
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