It's called growing up

In HOU, Aaron Brooks is experiencing some growing pains now that he's moved into the starting PG position.

In his words, "it's a little bit of a burden."

While Brooks is settling into his role, he does not fit into the traditional point guard mold, someone who looks to set the table. Without Tracy McGrady in the lineup — especially at the end of games — Brooks is the primary creator. That means he’s going to be more offensive-minded, because that is what is required of him.

What leaps out are games such as Saturday’s, when Brooks played 31½ minutes, took 18 shots and did not deal a single assist.

According to teammate Shane Battier, for Brooks, "the next step for him is to find a way to use his speed to make his people better. It’s part of the maturation process, and you can’t rush it. It’s called growing up. It’s called living."

The benefits of a point-forward

Having watched Louisville's Terrence Williams on TV, it's obvious he's an excellent athlete who is projected as a small forward in the NBA. He'll likely come off the bench as a limited-minutes player used primarily as a defender -- one who can guard an NBA 3/2 man off the bench.

Williams (pictured here with Coach Pitino) does a good job of rebounding his position and creates extra possessions for his team. Offensively, he's an unselfish player.

Coach Pitino and Louisville work a lot on shooting drills, and since Williams has spent four years with Coach Pitino, I don't see him improving significantly as a shooter. [Had he been coached poorly the last several years, there might be room for improvement, but that's not the case here.] Speaking of coaching, it's interesting how Coach Pitino advised Williams to "imagine that he's always doing commercials on himself in public."

Williams' offensive game is a concern. He's a poor FT shooter, failing to hit more than 62 percent of his free throws in his college career. There aren't many NBA small forwards who are shooting in that range who are in their team's rotations.

On the other hand, he's improved as a 3-point shooter, but has room to improve as a scorer. At this point, he's a player who is likely to be drafted in the 25-35 range.

As this article in SI this week points out, "Williams fills the rarest role in college hoops — that of point forward, which means he orchestrates the offense from the small-forward position, leading his team in assists at 5.1 per game, with a 2.2-to-1 assist-to-turnover ratio."

Louisville coach Rick Pitino knows that the two logical candidates to run the offense, 5'10" senior Andre McGee and 6'1" junior Edgar Sosa, "would rather score than assist, whereas T-Will would rather assist than score," and that Williams's court vision is second to none on Louisville's roster. At his height he can see over perimeter defenders; he can rebound and start fast breaks without the delay of an outlet pass; he can take ball-handling pressure off the guards or simply slide over from the wing and initiate offensive sets.

Williams is driven by what he feels after making a nice pass. Here's how he describes it:

"The feeling I get when I make a pass for an assist is like the one you'd get if you had a baby brother and every time he tried to walk, he fell down, until one time, he finally walked and you were there to see it. That's the kind of happiness I get from seeing other guys score."

Williams learned to appreciate the fine art of passing from watching Lakers great Magic Johnson. "My uncles used to show me old tapes of Magic," Williams says, "and I'd see the passes he'd make and think, 'That looks tight.'"

W's coach Don Nelson, who played Paul Pressey and Marques Johnson point-forwards in the mid-1980s while coaching the Bucks, is quoted in the SI story as saying, "It allow[ed] us to release our guards, who [were] not real quick, earlier, and alleviate[d] some of the pressure on them and [gave] me a chance to play two nonballhandling guards, like Kevin Grevey and Sidney Moncrief, together."

Nellie's requirements for the point-forward position?

He has to be a leader, has to rebound well, has to defend, has to have an assist-to-turnover ratio of at least 2 to 1 and has to be 6'5" or taller.

When the ball moves, the offense is fun

Boston's defense gets so much attention that the Celtics' offense is often overshadowed.

But while "the Celtics held opponents to the lowest field-goal percentage (42.3 percent) in the league, they also ranked second to Phoenix in field-goal percentage offense (48.3 percent)."

As this article points out, "the Celtics had four starters shooting 50 percent or better entering the weekend, Kendrick Perkins (59.3 percent), Kevin Garnett (52.5), Rajon Rondo (51.0), and Ray Allen (50.2). Rondo, Allen and Orlando’s Jameer Nelson (50.5) were the only guards with more than 200 field goals shooting 50 percent or better. Paul Pierce (44.2 percent) was the only Celtic starter under 50 percent, but he’s the team’s leading scorer."

That's a credit to BOS assistant Armond Hill (center with Doc Rivers and Kevin Eastman), the "Ivy League Player of the Year in 1976 at Princeton University under famed coach Pete Carril."

Coach Hill played pro ball for eight seasons, was an assistant to Coach Carril at Princeton in the early '90s, then served as Columbia's head coach from 1995-2003.

According to BOS coach Doc Rivers, one reason for Ray Allen's improved shooting percentage this season -- especially in the paint -- is because "he's no longer dancing."

“Last year, I thought he was so used to getting the ball and dancing around and holding the ball. I got on him a lot about that. This year, he’s a quick decision maker. He catches it, he shoots it or makes straight line drives. When he does that, because he can shoot and because of what we have on the floor, we’re more efficient and he’s more efficient.”

The writer contends that Boston's players are also more willing to find "the open man instead of forcing well-guarded shots."

“If there’s anything that bothers Armond more than anything,” Coach Rivers said, “it’s when the ball stops. You can hear him all game, ‘Move it, move it.’ You see him in the huddle, that’s what he’s ticked off about.”

Says Ray Allen: “The offense is fun when the ball moves. That first, second and third pass tires them out on defense.”

You don't win by being comfortable

Like fine wine, Ray Allen seems to be improving with age.

As Ian Thomsen writes, "Shooting guards are supposed to become lame and ineffective at his age, but Allen is having what may be his finest season. He continues to defend at a better rate than over his 11 years before coming to Boston, while at the other end of the floor -- the end that has always defined him -- he is shooting a career-best 49.7 percent. He has moved past Kevin Garnett to become the Celtics' second option, with 18.1 points."

"He's doing it more efficiently than he's done it earlier in his career,'' Boston coach Doc Rivers said. "If you don't need the ball in your hands for 15-20 seconds, if you can have it in your hands for five seconds of a possession and you're still really good -- that means you're a really good basketball player. And that's what Ray has become with us.''

One of the NBA's best shooters, in the Celtics' title run last season, Allen was "asked to shoot less. When times were bad in previous years (and there were a lot of those bad nights, as Allen's teams in Milwaukee and Seattle missed the playoffs six times), he would naturally take it upon himself to shoot his team out of trouble. But that approach, as Allen noted, wasn't going to help the Celtics win a title."

"If on a season you're averaging 22-23 shots a game, you're going to shoot yourself into a good rhythm,'' Allen said. "But the majority of the time, if you have to shoot that many times, you don't win. Now I pass first more than anything. When I'm coming off a screen and it's early in the game, I just try to make a hard move, get to the basket and pass it so somebody else can get an easier shot. It builds your way into the offense that way.''

Says BOS coach Doc Rivers, "It was difficult for him but he did it. He did it and he got better and better at it. And now he's taking it to a different level.''

"I hear so many times guys say they want to win a championship, I want to be a winner, but what they're really saying is they want to win so long as it's comfortable for them,'' Rivers said. "You don't win by being comfortable. You win by doing things out of your comfort zone to make the team better, and Ray epitomizes that to me. He's completely come out of his comfort zone to fit into this team to make us better, and Ray has proved that he's a champion because he's willing to do that. He's accepting double teams and getting rid of the ball, where in the past he was the only guy who would get doubled and he'd still try to create a play.''

There is nothing you can do at any level without being able to pass the ball

Going back through the book "Winning is an Attitude" with former Temple coach John Chaney (who guided the Owls to 17 NCAA tournament appearances) and came across several good sections, including this one:

"Passing the basketball is the most important item of all. Being able to pass -- whether it's hockey, soccer, football -- is the most important skill of all. It's important because there is nothing you can do at any level without being able to pass the ball.

Dribbling is an individual skill, shooting is an individual skill. Passing is the only skill that can be individual and add to the team concept. All the Xs and Os in the world can't go anywhere without passing the basketball."

Less is more

Thanks to Coach Petrino for forwarding this article from the Portland paper. It's about one of the lessons Oregon State coach Craig Robinson learned playing for Pete Carril at Princeton in the early 1980s:

"Being from the South Side of Chicago, my identity (as a basketball player) was killing guys with my offense," Robinson said. "You get it in your head that in order to be good, you've got to have the ball in your hands and destroy a guy. Coach Carril taught me that less is more, that passing and cutting and giving yourself up for the other guy makes everybody a better player. It took me awhile to understand."

The keys to shooting

ASU has won two big road games in the last five days, snapped UCLA's 10-game winning streak this past Saturday before downing in-state rival Arizona last night on the road.

In the win over UCLA, Herb Sendek's Sun Devils shot 52 percent from the field in the first half. Senior forward Jeff Pendergraph hit nine of his 10 shots in the game. Guard James Harden, who connected on 10 of 11 vs Oregon State and 14-25 against UTEP earlier in the season, went 8-15 from the field.

But in the win over UA last night, ASU shot just 28 percent from the field (16-56), including 5-28 from 3-point range.

According to Coach Sendek, having players who are effective shooters is only the start:

"The key to shooting, more than anything else, is to have good shooters. But then to execute your offense, so guys know where their shots are coming from, making passes on time, on target, taking shots in rhythm. If you have guys who have that ability and they do it, it's probably not any more complicated than that."

A player whose agenda is to make his teammates better

Doc Rivers on PHX guard Steve Nash's role and what third-year BOS guard Rajon Rondo can learn from Nash, who is in his 13th NBA season:

"Every night Steve's agenda is to make his teammates better. And he does it every night. He does it some nights by scoring and passing. Other nights he decides to be a ball mover and does it. But that's what Nash does every single night. He always does that.

The one thing that Rondo can learn from Nash is Nash may not play well every night, but he doesn't have an off night. He has a great mental focus every single night. He does it every night. I've never seen him play in a game where he has no focus or low focus. Young players, in general, are up and down in that."

Making the extra pass always leads to an even more open shot

Saw where UCLA beat Arizona by 23 last night at Pauley. UCLA had 20 assists in the game.

The Bruins spent all week preparing for matchup zone defenses belonging to both Arizona and Arizona State. Integral to beating the zone was passing, ball movement and, obviously, making shots.

Said one UCLA player after the game: "Making the extra pass always leads to an even more open shot."

"Any good team has good balance," [UCLA coach Ben] Howland said. "We have a team where anybody can go off on a given night and get 20-plus points. [What makes a good offense is] making the extra pass, shot selection. But most of all, good players. Good players make a good offense. We have good players. They're very unselfish."

Player movement with a purpose

Any time Tex Winter talks, I listen. After all, when a coach has been on the sidelines for 60 years, he has a lot of basketball knowledge.

[In Coach Winter's case, that knowledge dates back to at least 1947 when he took over as head coach at Marquette.]

When asked how well the Lakers are executing his Triangle Offense this season, Coach Winter replied, "They're doing OK. It's just a question of staying with the offense, staying with the principle of the offense. Sometimes we get away from it, give up on it too soon."

According to an article in today's LA Times, "What bothers Winter the most is when the Lakers stop sharing the basketball, when they don't make the extra pass, when players decide to play more one on one rather than the team concept. The concept of the triangle offense is ball and player movement with a purpose, to pass the basketball to the first open man, to cut hard."

"The ball stops, often times when the ball is in Kobe's hand," Winter said about Kobe Bryant. "That's fine, as long as it's an isolation situation that he can take advantage of. But the other players have to play without that basketball and stay spaced and make themselves available."