Great Article About CBH and UCLA In The NBA
I sure hope CBH is sending a copy of this article to every recruit, target, prospect, etc. It's a great read and very pleasing to know that our beloved UCLA has virtually set the standard as a pipeline for NBA talent.
Go Bruins!
4 months ago
Kingsfalife
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You beat me to it!
“Players who come from UCLA have pretty well ironed out the problems and have acquired a type of toughness and an ability to pay attention to detail that is necessary to be a pro. Trust me. That is not always the case with kids who have spent one year or four years in college at other programs. . . . UCLA kids get groomed in a culture of discipline. Do they all like it? Probably not. Did it help them? Yes.” – an NBA Western Conference team assistant GM.
Diane Pucin is not the usual times sports writer. She seems to have a kind of warmth about her writing about U.C.L.A. which I always appreciate.
Go Bruins!
She was our beat reporter,
somehow they took her off in a reorganization. Now she substitute when beat reporter is off?
In some senses
Howland type players are Howland players before they ever step foot on campus. The mentioned “culture of discipline” only works for kids with the mentality to accept it. No player under Howland should be recruited without this prerequisite. The last few years have shown us that ignoring this is inviting a disaster that is waiting to happen.
indeed!
it did us no good to get hot-shot recruits that wont accept coaching BenBall-style, only to leave later
by UCLA_beer&mathematics on Jan 18, 2012 11:22 AM PST up reply actions
I agree that the most successful have an innate discipline
but wouldn’t want to underplay the fact that the NBA coaches love that UCLA kids (a) have great fundamentals in defensive technique and (b) are used to being coached/choreographed on offense, rather than being allowed to just run around and ball.
That is just to say- I agree that it is a combination of the kids and of CBH’s coaching.
I'm not discounting the coaching part
They’re better off having learned from Howland than not. I’m saying that there’s no point in recruiting kids who aren’t mentally receptive to Howland’s methods. The players cited in the article have that fire and they had it in HS as well, thus they were Howland material before they were Howland recruits and Howland players.
+1
Why has Howland gone astray? Turnover on his staff? A savior complex?
I absolutely loved the fact that his first 5 Bruin teams were full of good players who were even better young men. If you’re like me, you probably thought that AA, DC, LRMAM et al were going to set the standard for a character-driven, drama-free, winning program for the next 15 years—and you were very, very proud to be a fan.
Instead, we’ve since welcomed cancers (Gordon, Nelson), the work ethically-challenged (Drago, JSmith) and even a laptop thief.
I still believe in Howland, and I hope this year has convinced him not to repeat the past. I think the Wears and Powell are kids we can be proud of, Kyle A appears to be as well. Larry Drew, on the other hand…oh well, he’s only here for a year.
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