As a young kid growing up in upstate New York, I can remember my mecca.
In the middle of the neighborhood I lived in stood a glorious concrete jungle, complete with a bounty of 10-foot poles attached to round cylinders and chain nets serving as its trees.
Like many kids with a love for roundball, I can remember the down-to-the-wire games I would play by myself with nobody else around.
“3...”
I bounce the ball and take a quick step to my right, but the imaginary defender has me covered.
“2...”
A crossover dribble back to the left has given me the thin shred of space I need.
“1...”
I let it go. I watch with the fictitious jam-packed crowd as the ball floats toward the net. Swish.
“He made it! He made it! And the crowd goes wild!”
OK, so given my marginal skill level, I more often heard a “clank” than a “swish,” but the point is, the kids playing the game in driveways, parks, gyms and dirt lots across the world are dreaming of being the shooter.
Which brings me to the ASU men's basketball team.
The Sun Devils in the Herb Sendek era are the imaginary defenders you play against in the backyard, but the problems they are causing for opponents' offenses this season are anything but imagined.
ASU defenders have been straight up bullies during the 2009-10 campaign. I'm talking the beat-you-up-and-take-your-lunch-money variety.
ASU (14-5, 4-2 Pac-10) leads the nation in scoring defense (54.6 points per game) and has held eight different opponents to their respective season lows in scoring this season.
In the team's last five games (4-1), ASU opponents have shot just 36.5 percent from the floor, and 13 of the 19 squads the Maroon and Gold has faced have converted field goals at a sub-40-percent clip.
And sure, these numbers give credence to the suffocating brand of basketball being played in Tempe these days, but it is the intangibles that don't show up in the stat sheets that are becoming more evident with this team with every game it plays.
Boards are being crashed, shots are being contested, screens are being run through and the hardwood is being mopped up by Sun Devil players hustling after every loose ball.
It isn't always sexy. The roster isn't stocked with Dick Vitale's “Prime Time Players” or McDonald's All-Americans. Players aren't getting put on magazine covers or garnering much national attention. After all, isn't this the team that lost those two guys to the NBA?
Like steel-mill workers in Sendek's hometown of Pittsburgh, the Sun Devils are bringing their lunch pails, clocking in and going to work.
And when it comes to playing defense, this crew is clearly happy to pour sweat for the cause.
“I take pride in it,” said junior guard Ty Abbott, who said he has been asked by Sendek to be the leader on the defensive end of the floor. “I like to play defense. The stops [are] what is leading to our transition now. The more stops we get, the more chances we get to put some shots up.”
The funny thing about playing a type of defense that leaves opponents confused and bewildered? It builds confidence. Lately, this group doesn't seem to be lacking any of that.
“When we don't want to give up points, I feel like there's times where we can just shut a team down for 10 or 15 minutes,” Abbott said. “We've gotten more of a competitive edge in that sense to just play defense.”
The Sun Devils aren't riding too high just yet, though. That's not exactly the kind of thing Sendek allows for around here.
But while offensive schemes have changed about as often as hotel bedsheets under the ASU coach during his four seasons in Tempe, the production on defense — which Sendek changed from man-to-man to zone during his debut season at ASU — remains constant.
Still, the coach and his team aren't satisfied. As ASU prepares for this weekend's game with UA, looking to extend the winning streak over its arch-rival to, ho-hum, six games, Sendek cautioned that even the strong suite of his squad is far from a finished product.
“Every time we watch tape, it's so obvious to us how much better we have to get,” Sendek said. “We have to make sure we do our best on the [defensive] end of the floor possession by possession.”
The nation's best defense getting better? Scary thought.
Reach Nick at nkosmide@asu.edu
