Ever wonder what it’s like to be a college basketball player? Pipe Dream Sports Editor E.Jay Zarett attempted to find out by participating in a one-on-one workout with Binghamton’s men’s basketball coordinator of player development, Chretien Lukusa.
Freshman year, I was that guy who took intramural basketball way too seriously. After a particularly good game, I distinctly remember draining a 3-pointer, turning to my opponent, saying that he “couldn’t guard me” and that Binghamton men’s basketball head coach Tommy Dempsey had “missed me on the recruiting trail.” I was only half-kidding, but that proclamation was proven completely off-base following my workout with Lukusa last week.
Lukusa joined Dempsey’s staff prior to the 2014-15 season. He was a member of the Binghamton men’s basketball team from 2007-11, playing on the lone Bearcat squad to capture the America East championship in 2009. He played 31 minutes against Duke in the NCAA Tournament game that year.
Prior to our workout, I asked Lukusa not to take it easy on me because I wanted the real experience. In order to try to understand the athleticism required of a college athlete, I needed to be worked out like a typical player on the team. He honored my request.
I didn’t head into our practice session without any experience. I played two years of varsity basketball in high school. But “play” might be an exaggeration here, since I mostly rode the bench. My career highlight? A five-point outburst in a non-conference game my senior year. Besides that, I scored one other point in my varsity career. Impressive, right? By no means was I a good high school player, but I figured I might be able to hold my own in most of the drills.
That thought evaporated from my head in under five minutes. Lukusa opened our session by putting me through a dribble series. I was told to stay stationary while alternating between dribbling one ball in each hand, followed by dribbling the two balls between my legs and then doing crossovers in front of my body. After doing that, we added a passing component, where we dribbled a basketball between our legs and then passed to one another.
The only problem? I could barely control the ball at all. My basketballs were rolling all over the gym and I had to go scampering around to pick them up. I even got hit in the face with a pass. Meanwhile, Lukusa was making it look easy. Not a great start.
“Overall, with the handling, you did decent,” Lukusa said, in what I think was an attempt to make me feel better. “You have a lot to work on. You had your head down a lot of the time when we try to teach our guys to have their heads up and be able to see the court.”
Lukusa informed me that all of the drills we were going through are designed to simulate game action.
“We try to make it as realistic as possible,” he said. “We try to incorporate things in our workouts that players will see in a game.”
After about five more minutes of that, I think he felt bad for me, as we moved on to conditioning drills.
Things went from bad to worse. Lukusa sent me on a series of sprints where I had to dribble up and down the court. First were ladders, aka suicides. I started on the baseline, dribbled the ball to the free throw line and back, to half-court and back, to the opposite free throw line and then the alternate baseline, all at a full sprint. After about two of these, I was huffing and puffing and ready to move onto something else before I passed out.
Lukusa must have seen it on my face because he laughed and told me that this conditioning portion was just a warm-up. A warm-up! When those words came out of his mouth, I was shocked. But this aspect of the workout is something that new players sometimes have difficulty with as well.
“Some of the stuff is stuff [players] struggle with,” Lukusa said. “If it’s your first time getting a college-level workout, your conditioning is going to always struggle, just because we expect you to work out at a higher pace, higher speed, higher intensity.”
Luckily, my performance rebounded just a bit. After what felt like an hour but was actually about five more suicides, around 10 baseline-to-baseline sprints and a much-needed water break — which I made last as long as possible — we combined conditioning, dribbling and an offensive component.
I was instructed to do a different set of dribble moves — between the legs, crossovers and in-and-outs — around a set of three cones and finish by attacking the basket for a layup. The catch: Lukusa was standing near the basket with a huge pad, whacking me in an attempt to prevent me from making the layup.
As already established, I can’t dribble and I can’t run either, so this drill looked really ugly. Again, basketballs were rolling everywhere and I was moving slower than molasses. But, I was able to finish a good deal of my layups through contact and, after a terrible performance up until that point, I impressed Lukusa just a tiny bit, which was better than nothing.
After another water break, which I turned into five minutes so I could collapse on the floor, we ended with 3-point jump shooting and practicing some post moves. It was my time to shine, as the only thing I can competently do on the court is shoot (except for this year in intramurals, when I made just four of my 30 3-point attempts, but we’ll just ignore this). For the only time in our entire workout, I managed to look like I belonged a bit. I shot 15 jumpers in sets of three. After each set of three, starting from the left corner and working my way to the right corner, I had to sprint to half court and back before continuing to shoot. When all was said and done, I hit eight of the 15, which was a small miracle as the running really got to me — a continuing theme in our workout. I’m sure that was way more than Lukusa expected me to make after my ghastly performance up until that point.
We finished with about 10 minutes of post moves. In my high school program, I was listed as being 6-foot-2, but that was a total lie: I’d be lucky if I were 5-foot-11. So, if I were actually a college basketball player, any shot I attempted in the post would be blocked into the sixth row of the stands, but Lukusa let me try anyway.
He again whipped out the pad and whacked me as I attempted to complete hook shots, spins and up-and-under moves — which involved pump faking and ducking around an imaginary defender — with both my left and my right hand. To put it kindly, I struggled using my left, barely hitting the rim on most attempts. But, my right wasn’t completely embarrassing, as I managed to make a few.
“You were able to finish through some of the contact,” Lukusa said. “Your left hand is much weaker than your right hand. That’s just how it is for a lot of people.”
I think Lukusa may have ended the session five minutes earlier than I expected because he felt bad for me. I was clearly exhausted. I was gasping for air, clutching my water bottle and I really don’t think I was walking straight.
After we parted ways, I threw up in a West Gym toilet. When I made it home, I crawled into bed and slept for hours. I think I’ll stick with intramurals.