More from Chicago, specifically on Mo Williams and PGs (Sporting News)

["Berry, Mark S" <berrym@xxxxxxxxxxxx>]

Williams is a guy I have my eye on. But is he another Omar Cook? Who knows?

Mark
Underclassmen gauge NBA draft status at Chicago camp 

June 5, 2003 Print it
<http://www.sportingnews.com/voices/mike_decourcy/20030605-p.html>  
CHICAGO -- That first jumper was perfect, so sweet it nearly erased the pain
starting to build in Maurice Williams' right ankle. The scouts at the NBA
pre-draft camp were wondering if the Alabama guard could shoot, and they had
a quick -- if incomplete -- answer to that question. 
Were Williams playing in a typical game, he might have stayed on the court
all night and fought through the discomfort engendered by an ankle sprain
that occurred earlier in the day. But things are different at a tryout camp,
because all the invited players must get their turn on stage. Everybody
plays their five minutes, then sits, then returns for another five. And
while Williams rested, his ankle rebelled. 
"When I was sitting down, it started to stiffen up and I really couldn't
move laterally," he said. "You're not playing against just anybody, where
you can camouflage and get away with it. You have to be 100 percent at this
time. But that's how it went. You have to go with it. It's life." 
 
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8336137343665353364333834373930> Although his experience was more pleasant,
the circumstances are similar for Saint Joseph's point guard Jameer Nelson.
Everything went right for him on his first night of camp competition,
starting with an excellent group of teammates including Kentucky's Keith
Bogans and sleeper star Jerome Beasley of North Dakota. Pittsburgh's Brandin
Knight, who'd been challenging Nelson early, got hurt and was out of the way
the rest of the night. Nelson helped his team steamroll the opposition with
a flood of fluid fastbreaks. 
"The most important thing is to win," Nelson said. "I'm not really out there
for individual stats. I'm there to run the team and play defense. I'll just
keep playing. I don't have to be Mr. Invisible or the Incredible Hulk. I
just have to run the team." 
Williams, a junior-to-be, has lottery-level skills as a point guard but has
yet to polish them to the extent that he'll be selected that high. This was
the opinion of one NBA scout, who suggested Williams likely would fall into
the second round if he remained in the draft. 
Nelson measured at 6-0 in sneakers, 5-11 in socks, so concerns he might come
in close to Earl Boykins-size were allayed. "It's no surprise," Nelson said.
"I'm not going to grow any more. That's no surprise, either." 
He still is likely to be squeezed out of the draft's first round by the
crush of international players expected to be selected. 
The deluge of foreigners is such that senior All-Americans Nick Collison of
Kansas and David West of Xavier could be among the last 10 picks of the
round and Brian Cook of Illinois, who has prototype skills and stands 6-11,
might fall into the second. If Nelson returns to college, he could have the
type of year that gets him placed into the draft near the neighborhood where
Kansas' Kirk Hinrich and Oregon's Luke Ridnour are this year; neither had to
attend this camp to solidify a position near the middle of the first round. 
Playing well here will keep Nelson's and Williams' reputations healthy and
enhance their confidence should they resume their NCAA careers, but it might
not be enough to get them to an attractive draft position. 
Neither seems in a Marcus Taylor-type rush to abandon college basketball.
They will hear from a panel of NBA personnel folks regarding their likely
draft status following this camp, then will have until June 19 to make their
final decisions about the future. 
"I'm excited to be here. There's no pressure on me," Williams said. "If I
don't like where I'm at, I can always go back to school. By the end of the
week, I'll have a pretty good idea. 
"The NBA, it's just timing. Maybe next year, I might be in a position where
I'm not even spoken of in the first round. You never know. You've got to go
when the opportunity is. You have to go when it's guaranteed. If you're
taken in the first round, it's guaranteed money. That's a decision I'll have
to make with my family." 
Williams entered the draft following a season that did not fulfill the
promise suggested by his first year at Alabama, when he was named freshman
of the year by Sporting News. He is at this camp to gauge his current value
to NBA teams and will decide based largely on their perception of his
performance here whether to return to the Crimson Tide. 
If Williams returns to Alabama, he does not anticipate a repeat of this past
season's dysfunction. The Tide began the year by overpowering Oklahoma and
climbing to a No. 1 ranking that was so erroneous that folks in the program
tried to laugh it off. Too late. The pressure of trying to live up to that
helped ruin a team that already had significant problems. 
Williams scored 25 in the Oklahoma game to help disguise the team's lack of
scoring options, but he couldn't run a team full of eager shooters by firing
on every trip. He tried to involve teammates and get the ball inside, but
problems Erwin Dudley and Kenny Walker had finishing plays frustrated the
Tide's wings, who then started shooting too quickly. 
Small forward Kennedy Winston arrived near midseason following an
eligibility investigation, but the time he missed limited his ability to
provide a reliable scoring threat. Alabama ended with 17 victories and was
fortunate to receive an NCAA Tournament bid. 
"I just think the chemistry -- we never had good team chemistry," Williams
said. "The next year, chemistry-wise, it'll be there. The younger guys who
were there last year will be mature. 
"This is the first year where I feel the team will be in my hands, and I'm
looking forward to that challenge if the opportunity presents itself." 
That's still an if, though. 
"Like I said: Right now, there's no pressure on me," Williams said. "I'm
just having fun." 
As much fun as he can have with his ankle wrapped in ice, anyway.