Chapter 256 The University 6
"I really liked the coaches, Coach Guthridge who invited me to come here and I also respect Coach Dean Smith a lot even though I didn"t talk to him."
Jake avoided talking about the players because it would be weird no matter what he said because of the current situation he was in after all he knew he was being ignored and excluded from the team because of sponsors.h.i.+p.
But they also had a lot of respect and were even a fan of some players like Vince Carter, so if he spoke badly it would be normal for the situation he was in and Charlie would not enjoy listening, and if he spoke well as he thought it would look like he was just being fake.
Luckily Charlie understood Jake"s dilemma and didn"t press the issue anymore, after all, he knew the team wasn"t doing something right either and luckily everyone had already forgotten about it.
"I know we haven"t been very nice to you these past few days, but some of you really get upset about this injustice in the NCAA and have come to discount you having nothing to do with it."
"I apologize for my colleagues and I will talk to them so we can all be friends and play together."
"Alright, I understand, I would probably do the same as you if I were in the same situation."
"It"s good that you understand something else I wanted to talk to you about was training, we know you have almost infinite stamina and can play basketball and then run a marathon later."
"But the rest of the team can"t keep up with your training pace, we are finding the training very difficult right now and I ask you at least not to increase the training load."
Jake understood what Charlie said, he didn"t expect the other players to try to follow his training, he was just excited because he found that training could help him improve his skills.
In his past life, he often saw that the top performers did a separate team training and stronger because they could take it longer, so Jake thought he could do the same, but now he understood that he had better stop.
"I understand Charlie, I won"t do so much in training anymore, I can make my individual training later heavier."
Charlie was delighted to see that Jake was very understanding and didn"t really seem arrogant like other players who don"t have humility.
Even though sometimes the hierarchy was not highly respected at the university, those who respected it were appreciated by the more traditional ones like Charlie, so even if the other players didn"t talk to Jake during training he would do that.
Charlie wanted to keep talking to Jake, but he had to talk to the other players that everything had gone well and he also wanted to give Jake some s.p.a.ce, so the two broke up and Jake returned to the dorm.
Jake was delighted to know that his team situation would improve after this conversation, even if he understood the indignation of his teammates he was not happy to be treated unfairly.
He arrived at the dorm and was reprimanded by Zack and William who had been waiting for him, Jake had not warned that he had gone to the cafeteria with Charlie after he left training, it was difficult for Jake to get used to having people waiting for him in a place that was not at home.
And so the days went by normally, Jake had gotten used to his cla.s.s routine and fortunately liked most teachers, so even if he didn"t have much to learn he wouldn"t be bored at all.
Jake at this university was thinking of doing the reverse of what he did in high school, he would do his best in every game so that he could improve his skills quickly and gain recognition when he joined the NBA.
But in cla.s.s he would try not to look so smart and stand out so much, he would help William and his friends in the dorm and just do enough to get the best grade in the room and get a degree.
In training, the players no longer ignored Jake and even talked and joked with him, but no one approached him as Charlie did, only Charlie still talked to Jake several times and even called his other friends to get Jake into the team faster.
Coach Smith was watching everything going on in the team, he was someone who valued the team"s unity and rapport to win the games, he believed it was better to have a team-playing game than someone who was like Michael Jordan in skill and didn"t know how to play in a team.
So he still wouldn"t let Jake play if the situation continued as he was right now knowing it wasn"t Jake"s fault, of course, he intended to step in and demand that the players be jealous and accept Jake.
But seeing how things were now he realized that the situation was improving and soon would be quiet, so Jake was a player that Coach Smith thought to give game opportunities.
After all the team had recovered form and was ready to begin play training because Jake encouraged other players to train harder, the players themselves did not realize, but ignoring Jake they were already starting to respect him.
So Coach Smith thought Jake just had to perform well in a game in order to gain acceptance from all of his teammates and fully engage with the team.
As for Jake"s ability Coach, Smith was already convinced of that, he seemed to have a lot more hits in mid-range shots and 3 point shots, Jake also missed no Free Throw in training, this shows how good he is offensive.
He also realized that Jake had a lot of ability to pa.s.s his teammates and control Jake"s ball, so his dribbling must be very good, as they had not done play training the coach didn"t know if Jake was well in defense either.
The coach needed more than one player who could play both defensively as well as set up and score points, with Jake"s steal statistics that was so high for any player he was probably the player Coach Smith needed.
The team had a lot of talents, veteran Center Serge Zwikker, a player who was good at both attacking and defending and catching rebounds with Antawn Jamison, was skilled but had no prominence in either defense or attack, just played well.
Shammond Williams was the highlight of the team and very good offensively, scored several points and still helped in the defense doing the basics, helped with a.s.sists too, but did not show their full potential in games.
Antawn Jamison was another big highlight on the team, the one who got the most rebounds and scored the most points in the games was very good at offense and helped in defense as well.
Vince Carter was good at both offense and defense, was a very important player for the team this year, helped by scoring a lot of points, rebounds, and a.s.sists, another important player for the team.
Ed Cota was a player that Coach Smith thought very well and would be a key player if Jake didn"t have the team, so Jake was the outstanding player the team needed to win.
The only question was how he could play in college basketball if he kept an average of over 35 points per game and 13 a.s.sists the team would already enter as a favorite to win the NCAA Tournament.
Not to mention the average 7.1 steals per game Jake had in his senior year of high school and the average of 8.7 he had in all of high school, even if Jake did half of that on the Tar Heels team would be the enough for them to fight for t.i.tles.
Jake didn"t know that Coach Smith trusted him so much even though he never came to talk to him, but even without that confidence, Jake was thinking of winning every game he could and winning the NCAA this year.
The truth was that Jake had already decided to finish this university ahead of time, he wanted to get into the NBA and earn as many t.i.tles as he could, after all, he just wanted to earn playing at the university and have a degree to show his mother.
It didn"t matter that Jake spent four years in college, so every year it mattered for Jake to be able to earn as many t.i.tles as he could and also to beat every record he could, he wanted to enter the NBA as a bigger star than LeBron James would be.
In over 7 years he wanted to become the highest-paid athlete in the NBA and have several t.i.tles to get a better deal with the shoe companies, so he had to play the best he could.
Even though Jake wasn"t so confident in his overall ability to be better than the others, he had to dominate all of his opponents with his physical stats, with those 2 points in all statistics he earned as a reward for the Olympic gold medal He was more confident.
Jake was sure his statics were the same as many top-level NBA athletes and second only to the biggest stars, but next year after winning a few major marathons he would have more stats than anyone in the NBA for agility and endurance.
So by next year, he was sure to dominate all his opponents at the university that was a level below the NBA, in fact even at high school Jake had games that made the most of his skills.
But he never made the most of his stats for fear of hurting his opponents, he held on too tightly to contests and didn"t come close to using his agility to the fullest, so this year his agility would be even higher he would show what speed was to your opponents.
He was already doing several tests in his imagination training s.p.a.ce, in this s.p.a.ce even with opponents a skill rank above him, Jake could still pa.s.s all easily, it was a pity that he would not do so many 3-point moves.
In addition, Jake was prepared for tougher games where opponents would not hesitate to make fouls to stop play, it is in these plays that Jake will be able to show his physical superiority and get 3 or 4 point play after suffering a foul.