Colorado University Athletics
Brooks: Tireless 'Ski' Gets 1,000 Shots Of Confidence
November 21, 2012 | Men's Basketball, B.G. Brooks
The previous night, the Buffaloes had won the Charleston Classic, stifling Murray State's rev-it-up Racers, 81-74, in the championship game. Besting his career-high 19 scored in the previous game against Baylor, Booker got 23 points in addition to four steals, two assists and two rebounds.
He finished CU's three games with a 19.3 point average, which is the stuff of tourney MVPs. And the cardboard box he clutched in airport concourses in Charleston and Washington, D.C., held that specific trophy.
More good news was coming Booker's way when the team touched down at Denver International Airport: He had been selected as the Pac-12 Conference's player-of-the-week, and the Buffs had crept into the Associated Press Top 25 (No. 23) for the first time in 15 seasons.
After winning a championship and a ridiculously short night preceding an eight-hour day spent on buses and airplanes, CU coach Tad Boyle gave the Buffs the rest of Monday off. Booker took his cardboard box and its prized cargo home and unpacked.
Then he came back . . .
IN AN OTHERWISE EMPTY Coors Events Center on Monday night, Booker settled in to shoot 1,000 jump shots. Give the guy this: He realizes team championships and MVP trophies aren't won by dreaming of them. More productive things were to be done than sitting at home fondling his trophy and waiting to see ESPN's Charleston Classic highlights.
This is 'Ski' Booker: "You hear that saying, 'When you're asleep somebody else is working.' I'm that kind of guy. I don't like to think that anybody is outworking me, especially when nobody else is in the gym. I like being there, knowing I'm the only one there. I think it's a confidence booster."
Hard to believe, but there was a time when Booker's confidence barely moved the needle. The product of a rough, edgy neighborhood in Inglewood, Calif., Booker was hardly a garden variety basketball player at L.A.'s Price High School. But neither was he "the draw" for college recruiters.
That distinction went to Price's two big men - 6-11 Norvel Pelle and 6-8 Skylar Spencer - and CU assistant Jean Prioleau was among the recruiters standing in line for a closer look. Booker, at the outset, was a nice point guard who had his moments - just not enough of them consistently stitched together to make him anyone's "must-get" recruit.
The summer before Booker's junior year at Price, Prioleau maintained contact with Booker in AAU ball because . . . well, just because recruiters don't like to close doors if there's a chance a prospect steps up his game significantly. But Booker's game wasn't showing it and, he concedes, "It was time in my life when I had a reality check . . . Colorado completely fell off of me."
As his senior year approached, he was still in self-evaluation mode. His father, a couple of uncles and an older brother (Rene) had helped develop a mental toughness that allowed him to cope with a "neighborhood that was not the best," Booker recalled. "They taught me to be tough; they wouldn't let me be soft at all. I think that's where a lot of the fearlessness (now) comes from - where I'm from and who I was raised by."
Rene, a physical trainer in Southern California, helped him with that angle. "He taught me a lot that school can't teach you," Booker said. Another personal trainer, Andre Smith, assisted in hoops technique "and took my game to another level," Booker said.
IN THE SUMMER PRECEDING his senior year, Booker changed AAU teams, switching from Branch West to the Compton Magic - which in AAU circles is something like moving from Nederland High School to the Miami Heat. Compton, said Booker, "was stacked." Prioleau's assessment of Compton: "Loaded, really loaded."
The Magic roster included former CU signee Damiene Cain; Wesley Saunders, now at Harvard; Jahii Carson, now at Arizona State, and others. "These guys are big names and at the time my name was nowhere near theirs," Booker said. "I didn't play as much."
When he did get playing time, "I was on the court with the best players in California," Booker said. "We're in the best tournaments, you see them out there doing their thing and I'm like, 'Oh, my gosh, what do I do?' I think it came down to a confidence thing."
But eventually, Booker's court confidence began climbing. And his raw ability and improvement from one viewing to the next began to pique Prioleau's interest. The Buffs had a commitment from L.A.-area guard Spencer Dinwiddie, but Prioleau was in SoCal to do the "recruiting roundtable . . . we'd been in the home with Spencer, we'd make sure to get back to the high school the next week just to show your face."
On that trip, Prioleau had time on his hands and decided to drop by the Price gym because he'd heard there was a wealth of top-tier talent, "a boat-load of players," as he put it. "Some of the guys on the list we were kind of messing around with. Pelle was one, (Skylar) Spencer was one of them . . . a big man - a 'four' or 'five' - was what we were looking for. I walked in the gym and was watching them workout for the first time . . . I said, 'Man, they really do have a lot of players.'"
Prioleau wasn't alone in the Price gym, which is nestled in South Central L.A. Assistant coaches from UCLA, USC, Oregon State were there, too. But there wasn't too much (if any) interest in Booker. (The Bruins eventually took notice and had him on a handful of unofficial visits. But Booker, already committed to CU, said he liked the Buffs' style of play and wanted to remain loyal to Boyle. "It came down to the coach," Booker said.)
On his unscheduled visit to the Price gym, Prioleau said he only remembered Booker from a summer AAU viewing because "he really didn't do anything . . . then the practice starts, they start playing and he's basically the best player in the gym."
Prioleau's first thought: Maybe Booker was just having one phenomenal, lights-out afternoon. "And that happens," Prioleau said.
When a recruiter witnesses something like that, he's not apt to dismiss it as accidental. Prioleau returned to Boulder and brought up Booker to Boyle. Recalled Prioleau: "I told him, 'Askia Booker is pretty good.' But it wasn't like full-blast we've got to go after him right now."
Prioleau's itinerary that week also included stops in Texas and elsewhere. He was running through his list of A and B prospects. The next week brought a return trip to L.A., and his curiosity about Booker lured him back to the Price gym for a second look.
ONCE AGAIN, BOOKER STOOD OUT - "And it was by a long shot," Prioleau said. "As soon as the workout was over I called coach and was like, 'We have to get this guy." Prioleau told Boyle he had scouted and charted other top players and fall-back choices for that freshman class - "And he was better than all of them."
His advice to his boss: Get out here and see for yourself. And that's when CU's in-earnest recruitment of Askia Booker began. An official visit was set up, but not until Boyle went for another look at Booker to make certain the future investment was solid.
Still in L.A., Boyle called Prioleau, who was in Texas at a junior college, and confirmed what Prioleau had been telling him: Once again, Booker had been the best player in the gym.
Things on the AAU circuit eventually played out well for Booker for a couple of reasons, said Prioleau: "It was just being in a situation of him being on an AAU team that was loaded. You can also be on an AAU team that's not very good and doesn't win any games - and you look bad."
Booker might have played lights out on a poor team, but what if there was no one there to notice? "'Ski's whole thing came down to his raw ability," Prioleau said. "It wasn't that he made other guys better or that his team won in the pickup games I watched; it wasn't about that. It was, 'What are his raw abilities?' And they were off the charts. He's really athletic, over the top really, he can shoot and handle the ball and he has a motor."
Booker is 6-1, 170 pounds and has gotten stronger in each summer at CU. His coaches say he carries a chip on his shoulder (maybe both shoulders) and plays with an intensity that maybe spun him out of control at times during his freshman season. He's better now at harnessing the intensity, and Boyle undoubtedly sees more of an upside with that than trying to rein him in.
Sabatino Chen, CU's only senior, said Booker's shot selection has improved, he's a better spot-up jump shooter and he is "more confident under pressure . . . and he definitely takes care of the ball better now; he's one of our better ball handlers. There's not a worry when he's bringing the ball up in transition."
The chip(s) on his shoulder(s) appeared, said Booker, when he stepped onto the Boulder campus: "I don't think there are many people who thought I'd be where I am now. I don't think there are too many people who thought I could play Division I basketball - especially at a high level. Sometimes I still feel like that. I feel like people look at me and where I came from . . . you're always going to have people who doubt you. I like that kind of stuff."
"Yeah, he's got a chip on his shoulder - even with life," Dinwiddie said with a laugh. "He's always trying to prove something. I think that's what brings out his best. I joke around with him sometimes and say he's like the little Chihuahua that's going after the big dogs because he feels like he's just as big, strong and tough. It's hard to describe him. He's an interesting person."
BOOKER'S TATS INCLUDE THE face of Jesus on his left calf, with the inscription, "I Can Do All Things Through Christ." His mother's side of their family is the religious side, he said. Booker also likes time to himself, but by no means is a loner. When he's noticeably apart from his teammates on road trips or before games, he said "it's because something is on my mind - and most of the time it's basketball. It's not so much of a not-joking mentality, it's wanting to be prepared at all times. Some people can turn the light on like that. For me, it comes over a period of time where I need to mentally prepare myself for that night. I just like to be prepared at all times."
If Booker credits his father, uncles and older brother for steeling him for neighborhood survival, he points to Prioleau for injecting the work ethic that brought him back to the CEC Monday for the night of 1,000 jumpers.
"I mention coach Prioleau a lot; I think he's instilled something in me," Booker said. "I think it carries a long way and it shows so far. I'm not going to stop."
Booker averaged 9.1 points last season, Dinwiddie averaged 10.0. Their combined 677 points made them the top pair of freshman scorers ever at CU. Through four games this season, Booker's average is a team-best 17.8, with Dinwiddie at 12.5. Dinwiddle calls his backcourt mate "a scorer at heart. He's hard-wired to score. That's his thing - put the ball in the basket."
With a grin, Dinwiddie says he's not sure whether Booker is playing more under control now "or if it's just gotten to the point where they can't take it from him. Sometimes he does take the ball and go off on his own, but like I tell him, 'If you're going to take the shot, make the shot. I don't really care what shot you're taking, if it's going in we're good.'"
In Charleston, Booker's shots were falling. He was a shade over 50 percent from the field (24-of-47) and drained seven three-pointers. He ventured into the tournament sensing an opportunity on a big stage. Before the season began, he scanned the schedule, saw the Charleston field and concluded, "It was another level of play and players. I told myself, 'This is the place where you can standout or be a shadow and stay in the background.'
"I knew I had to play above average to give our team a shot. Andre (Roberson) can't do it by himself, Spencer can't do it by himself. Before this tournament, those two guys were probably the biggest names on this team. I'm not saying it could be done in one event, but I wanted to make a name for myself. At the end of the day, I wanted to win and I was going to do whatever it took for my team to win."
He did - and when the Buffs got back to Boulder, he didn't stop working. Don't count on that happening any time soon.
Contact: BG.Brooks@Colorado.EDU
