Baker gets ready for familiar opposition

ATLANTA

Most of Virginia’s basketball team will focus on trying to upset Boston College in tonight’s opening round of the ACC Tournament. There’s more on tri-captain Calvin Baker’s mind.

The 6-foot-2 junior guard from Newport News wants to win as much as the next guy, but he won’t have as much time to think about it. Baker has emerged as the Cavaliers’ stopper, usually drawing the toughest defensive assignment.

In recent weeks, he has pretty much handcuffed three of the ACC’s top eight scorers, smothering their games, suffocating their offense with a blanket of defense they’re not accustomed to seeing. During that span, Baker held Miami’s Jack McClinton to 11 points, Wake Forest’s Jeff Teague to 12, and harassed Maryland’s Greivis Vasquez into an 8-for-21 shooting performance.

Virginia lost two of those three games, but it wasn’t because of Baker’s effort. He also contributed offensively and with leadership.

Back to high school

Tonight’s assignment will be a familiar one: Boston College star Tyrese Rice. Baker has been going against the BC guard since their high school days (Baker played at Woodside High, while Rice played at L.C. Bird High in Richmond). They know one another’s secrets, so there shouldn’t be any surprises.

“Tyrese will be a tough challenge because he does so may things well,” Baker said after Wednesday’s practice in the cavernous Georgia Dome. “Tyrese runs the team, he never rushes, takes his time.”

That being said, Baker has already prepared his game plan for tonight.

Too fast for comfort

“I’m going to try to speed him up,” Baker said. “BC runs a slow-paced offense, so if I can speed up Tyrese a little, hopefully that will speed up their offense and they won’t be as comfortable as they normally are.”

Of course, that’s easier said than done. But Baker has found ways to be successful during a season that has been anything but successful for Virginia (10-17).

He’s not the most gifted athlete on the Wahoo roster. He’s actually playing well below 100 percent because of a stress fracture in his foot that will require surgery after the season. Some call his game ugly as he twists his body into all sorts of weird configurations in getting off jump shots that more closely resemble wounded ducks than lethal 3-pointers.

Mention his vast array of off-balance shots, the kind that make coaches and teammates say, “No, no, no .... Yes!” and his teammates can’t help but chuckle. Neither can Baker.

But it’s uncanny how many of them find their way home.

“He is probably the most unorthodox shooter that you will see in terms of the ball actually going into the basket,” UVa coach Dave Leitao said. “He sometimes wills the ball in. It’s not always pretty. Sometimes he does things that aren’t good. The thing about him is that he has a strong will.”

Leitao has admitted that he often gives Baker more leash than other players simply because of the heart and spirit he exhibits, hoping it will spread to teammates. Because of that lone intangible, the oft-demanding coach can tolerate the ugly part of Baker’s game, an assortment of gawd-awful looking shots and out-of-control turnovers.

Still, he plays lockdown defense and converts 40.5 percent of his field goal attempts (30.9 percent from beyond the arc). Both of those figures jump in ACC games to 43.4 and 38.5, respectively.

He’s second on the team in steals and third in assists and averages 8.6 points per game, although he has scored in double figures in five of the last six games heading into tonight’s contest.

“Calvin’s got a lot on his plate,” Leitao said. “He’s not a natural point guard and he’s trying to think the position through as he’s playing. He’s trying to impose his will on his team and on the other team. He’s trying to score. He’s trying to play defense. A lot of times he’s got too much on his plate, but he’s trying. As a result, he looks bad at times.”

While Leitao said that those times are not necessarily good for Baker or for Virginia, at least he’s trying. The coach always encourages Baker because he knows exactly where the little guard’s heart is, the same place that Leitao wished it were in every player he coaches or ever will coach. He won’t give up on Baker because he knows there’s no give up in Baker.

When there’s a lull in practice, the one guy out there screaming at his teammates is Baker. Leitao believes that one of the reasons Virginia has played better down the home stretch of the season is that the rest of the players have listened more to Baker.

“Calvin’s a tough guy,” said teammate and ACC rookie of the year Sylven Landesberg. “That’s the first thing that pops out about him. Him being able to play through his injury and waiting until after the season to take care of it, yet still be able to contribute the way he has, speaks volumes about him.”

Landesberg said Baker never backs down, even if the challenge appears insurmountable.

“We could be down 20 and he’s the one always pushing and yelling at us, saying ‘C’mon, don’t put your head down,’” Landesberg said.

Still, the UVa freshman sensation can’t hide his smile when the subject of Baker’s jump shots and awkward looking drives comes up.

“We all take bad shots every now and then,” Landesberg giggled, unable to block out visions of some of Baker’s — ahem — unorthodox shots. “But Calvin does so much that we can just overlook those. His defense is great and the energy he brings is unmatched.”

Now that’s a diplomatic answer if I’ve ever heard one.

Baker even chuckles when he is asked about his shooting style.

“I really don’t know how they go in sometimes,” Baker confessed. “I’ve been playing like that and shooting this way my whole life. Things that may look out of the ordinary to a lot of people, well, I do it that way all the time. My teammates? They see it every day, so it’s just getting used to seeing my game.”

He’s not really out there for his offense, which often may make even the most loyal Wahoo fan look away from the court or TV screen. He’s out there for defense, as Mr. Rice is apt to find out this evening.

“I’ve been around a lot of really good defenders and there’s a mentality, there’s a swagger, there’s a confidence in the way they go about their business every day,” Leitao said. “I think Calvin’s had that in the past and I have seen those things coming back. But I’m trying to be careful because I think about his foot issue and that if I wear him out on both ends of the floor, or if he wears himself out, it could be detrimental. At the same time, you’ve got to go with what you’ve got.”

Good defense has been a rare commodity around Charlottesville, so Leitao will take it wherever he can get it.

“If I know there’s a guy I can trust, who’s going to work his tail off and is having success at guarding the best scorer on the other team, well, to me, that’s like having gold,” Leitao said. “That can be infectious to other players because they know that’s what they have to do to get into the game.”

When Baker hits the court tonight to play “Me and My Shadow” with BC’s Rice, he will have every move down. He studies game film of his opponent, relentlessly searching for any weak spot, any tendency that he can exploit.

“They’re all different,” Baker said of his victims. “Teague was more of a fast-break, break-you-down guy. Tyrese tries to lull you to sleep and then explodes. McClinton was the hardest, though, because he runs off of so many screens.”

There’s one thing he’s always looking for, though.

“When they’re getting a little more anxious to score, when they’re coming off screens and you can see they want to score more than they normally show, that’s when I know I’ve got ‘em,” Baker said. “That’s when you know you’re getting to a player. They try to get a little more physical, and so I step it up, too.”

Defense is the one phase of the game where Baker doesn’t care what it looks like, just the end result, the bottom line.

That’s when he earns his keep. Just like having gold.