Monday, Dec. 06, 2010

Morris: Horn’s program is further along

WHEN DARRIN Horn looked down the sideline, past the scorer’s table and at the opposing team’s bench Sunday afternoon at Colonial Life Arena, he might as well have been looking at himself a couple of years ago.

The South Carolina coach could empathize with first-year Clemson coach Brad Brownell, who is suffering through the growing pains of teaching a new system to a group of players inherited from the previous coaching regime.

Coaching with your players and coaching with someone else’s players can mean a world of difference in college basketball. It probably was the difference in USC defeating Clemson 64-60 Sunday afternoon.

One of Horn’s players — point guard Bruce Ellington, star recruit of a year ago — made the play of the game to help USC snap its six-game losing streak to Clemson. With the shot clock about to expire, Ellington hit a bull’s-eye from 3-point range that gave USC a 61-55 lead with 52 seconds remaining.

Ellington provided the same kind of heroics a week earlier in USC’s overtime victory at Western Kentucky. He has proved to be the difference-maker for USC during its 6-1 start, the kind of player who “turns programs,” according to Brownell.

Ellington is Horn’s kind of player, one who has been tutored from his first day on campus to the style his coach wants to play.

Horn spent the previous two seasons making adjustments on the fly, mostly with players from the Dave Odom years. That meant he often had to abandon his preferred pressure defense and all-for-one offense.

Aside from senior forward Sam Muldrow, Horn now has all his own players. The other eight players who saw action Sunday were recruited by Horn. Although youthful in basketball years, they are fast becoming veterans to Horn’s system.

“Every game presents a different challenge to our team, whether it’s the way the team plays or the environment,” Horn said. “ Every game is sort of like a different test. This team, win or lose, continues to respond.

“I’ve been really pleased with this team that they’ve responded, and they’ve done it in practice as well when they’ve been challenged. That’s what’s exciting about moving forward. That doesn’t mean you’re always going to win, but this is a team that wants to be good and is willing to do the little things it takes to get that way.”

Brownell is essentially where Horn was when he arrived at USC before the 2008-09 season. Brownell has dropped the full-court zone pressure defense of his predecessor, Oliver Purnell, in favor of man-to-man pressure. Brownell also instituted a motion offense that is difficult to learn.

“It’s like having 12 freshmen, 11 freshmen now,” Brownell said in reference to losing sophomore Noel Johnson, who left the program last past week. That leaves Brownell with a junior- and senior-laden team that has had to break old habits and learn new ones at the same time.

“Every day we go to practice, it takes longer to do everything than it normally does when you’ve been on with a team for a couple of years,” Brownell said. “You just can’t get through the things you want to get through because you have to go back and re-explain it.

“All of the terminology is different. There are days it becomes very difficult. It’s not attitude. It’s not effort or trying. It’s just all new and, because of that, everything takes longer.”

Twice in the final minutes, Clemson failed to execute plays Brownell had drawn up, unable to get the ball in the hands of an open shooter. At the other end of the court, Horn knew whose hands he wanted the ball in when the outcome was on the line.

Ellington has been in the program for only seven weeks, and at times it shows in his decision-making. He had six turnovers Sunday to go with 14 points and two assists. But he is seasoned beyond his years, and he already looks to be an extension of his coach as the quarterback on the court.

So, while senior Clemson point guard Demontez Stitt occasionally looked like he was unsure of what Brownell wanted, Ellington approached the biggest play of the game as if he knew precisely what Horn wanted.

The proved to be the difference in this game and, really, the difference in the programs for now.

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