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Opening Night at the EBC: Ain’t Nothing Like It |
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Written by Administrator
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Tuesday, 20 June 2006 |
 HARLEM, NY, June 20, 2006 --All night long, even the customarily smooth-tongued EBC announcers had trouble coming up with the right nickname. Should it be “Son Rise†or “Son Shine�
Actually, either moniker will work. Joakim Noah, the son of fabled French tennis champion Yannick, is such a contagiously son-ny personality that his very presence casts a golden glow onto any basketball proceeding. Loyalty, not so easy to come by these days in sports (or anywhere else), is another one of the kid’s attractions. Noah had barely won the NCAA Championship, and the Final Four MVP Award, with Florida, when he announced: “I’m coming back to school. And I’ll be back with my people at EBC.â€...
And there he was on Opening Night of the Entertainers’ Basketball Classic, a gangly kid with a wonderfully open face and long dreads, with three beautiful young women in tow. “I love it here,†he said. “I mean, why not come back? I learned to play ball here. I’m grateful. Besides, there’s no place to play ball like New York. It’s just like the song says, if you can make it here, you can make it anywhere. This is the true test. The fans are merciless here, man. If you can deal with this kind of pressure, you will be able to deal with anything. Actually, I love their hostility. I draw on it – it fires me up.â€
“Besides, I’ve got a lot to improve on as a player, including getting stronger,†added Noah. “Then there’s all that unfinished business: last year, I missed two crucial foul shots in the championship game. This year I’ll make them.â€
He might get the chance, too. Noah’s â€H3†squad, coached by the legendary “Angry Man†Tony Rosa, has Antwan “Anti-Freeze†Dobie -- last year’s EBC MVP -- and Adrian â€A-Butta’†Walton in the back court, giving them an inside-outside balance and overall level of talent that any EBC team will find it difficult to contend with.
Before H3 took on D-Block, there was much live entertainment happening in Harlem’s venerable Rucker Park, topped by The Breeze Team, a group of break dancing geniuses you may have seen perform in the Subway Station at Times Square. Above ground, they were equally awesome.
As was H3, putting a serious whooping on well-regarded D-Block pretty much from the get-go -- and in spite of Noah’s clear deficiencies as a player. “He did the right thing coming back,†one of H3’s dozen or so assistant coaches was muttering under his breath. “At Florida, they ran a system to accentuate his strengths and hide his weaknesses. Here, he’s exposed.†As a tremendous shot block-er and defensive player with great quickness and athleticism -- but without much of an attacking arsenal around the hoop. On this night, it hardly mattered; even though D-Block had Memphis Grizzly Dahntay Jones and onetime UConn point guard Taliek Brown, the Noah-Freeze-AButta’ onslaught flattened them to the one-sided tune of 82-45. However, they couldn’t have done it sans the incandescently athletic “Africa†whose alley-oop flights to the hoop brought down the demanding house time after spectacular time.
“That’s what it’s about,†Noah, who had about 15 rebounds and ten blocks to go with a baker’s dozen of turnovers, said afterwards. “About the team, not myself. I’m just a cog, a part, one player who is here to get better, to get coached, here to learn. In the end I just want the pinkie rings, my man. One for every finger.â€
Tom Kertes
http://www.nba.com/knicks/news/ebc_060620.html
Photos of opening day
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