Don’t remember him because the tenacious forward had 18 points, 11 rebounds and six assists in last night’s wildly exciting championship game.
Don’t remember him because he won nearly 33 games a year during his career at Duke.
Don’t remember him for the fact Duke retired his number earlier this year.
Remember the fact Shane Battier played college basketball for four years, and he will graduate in May.Battier is a dying breed.
The college game has become a rest stop on the highway to multi-million dollar contracts.
Players stop there long enough to take in the sights, then they quickly make their way back on to the highway of basketball stardom.
And sometimes players don’t even bother to pull over.But this is nothing new.
Players have been entering the professional draft earlier and earlier over the past decade.Players have been skipping college altogether.It’s old news now.
Sooner or later, some big star will win the hearts of Stillwater fans and then leave Oklahoma State early too. Get ready for it, and don’t be surprised when it happens.
It happened at Duke when Elton Brand, Trajan Langdon and Corey Maggette left school early. All three are NBA regulars now.
This is by no means another example of East Coast/ACC bias, but if it can happen there, it can happen anywhere.
So why lament the inevitable?
Instead, let’s go back to Battier.
He could have gotten hurt this year. He could have sustained some horrible career-ending injury.
He could have been a high, NBA draft pick last year, and already a multi-millionaire.
Would anyone have begrudged him for leaving school early?
Probably not.
Would Duke have missed him? Undoubtedly.
In fact, they may not have won this year without him, and that’s not a stretch considering his impact on both ends of the floor.
Players like Battier are few and far between.
The last impact senior we saw was Tim Duncan. He won an NBA title and the Rookie of the Year award in his first year at the professional level. Perhaps the future holds the same for Battier.
Either way, appreciate the college senior and his dedication to amateur athletics, because he deserves your admiration.
You may not see another like him.
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