Hicks Improvement..
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Focus and defensive sliding. Hicks can be dominant but HAS to be able to stay put of foul trouble to do it.
His turnaround and hook moves to score were vastly improved this season. If he can continue to improve them we should have a dependable post option on the court for 40 minutes.
I think maybe the mental aspect of his game needs the most improvement. There was an excellent article a while back where some (I think) family members were saying he doesn't always have "something" (confidence, drive, whatever) to really reach his potential in every game. Not saying he was physically lazy, it was described as more of a focus or mental thing. From what I have seen of him so far I tend to agree with the assessment in that article. I believe he has the physical tools to be a great player, but I am not sure his mental game has caught up to the physical yet. I love the kid, and would love to see him get it all together and live up to his potential.
Completely agree here.
He just seems like he doesn't know how good he can be. He plays timid at times, then over aggressive at others (thus the foul trouble). Hopefully with some maturity that will change.
If he improves as much this year as last his upside is unlimited.....mostly a mental thing.I love him n the post.
Playing defense with his feet, staying out of foul trouble, FT's.
Like Brice, he can't help us if he's on the pine with foul troubles.
Like Brice, he can't help us if he's on the pine with foul troubles.
He reminds me of James sometimes in the paint where he thinks too much about what he is going to do instead of it coming to him instinctively. ..
http://www.heraldsun.com/sports/col...-Oxford-s-Hicks-battles-savior-complex-at-UNC
This is the article I was referring to earlier. There is more at the link above........
WORK IN PROGRESS: Oxford’s Hicks battles ‘savior’ complex at UNC
Mar. 06, 2015 @ 04:44 PM
Brooke Pryor
North Carolina's Isaiah Hicks (22), shown shooting over N.C. State's Kyle Washington, is playing a key role for the Tar Heels as he begins to live up to his five-star recruiting hype after a relatively quiet freshman season. (The Herald-Sun/Bernard Thomas)
The Herald-Sun | Bernard Thomas Isaiah Hicks (22) defends against Duke point guard Tyus Jones in Duke's overtime win aganst the Tar Heels at home in February.
CHAPEL HILL —
North Carolina has trouble with the savior complex.
Highly touted recruits don’t pan out, at least not in their first year, and they’re written off.
The expectations soar for five-star recruits with impressive high school résumés and highlight reels. Yet sometimes they soar a bit too high, setting the bar at such an extreme height, not allowing for growing pains and missteps.
In 2013, Isaiah Hicks threw down a thunderous 34 points and 30 rebounds in Webb’s 73-70 overtime state championship win.
A year later, he was buried deep on North Carolina’s bench, struggling to figure out his role on the team, averaging just 7.3 minutes, 1.2 points and 1.0 rebounds per game last season.
The Tar Heels have seen it before.
Harrison Barnes came back for a second chance at a national championship only to fall flat in the NCAA tournament. They saw it again in James Michael McAdoo, who spurned a shot at a likely lottery slot in the NBA Draft only to struggle to find consistency in his next two seasons.
And now, Isaiah Hicks.
“We’re in the age where if you’re a five star talent ranking, you’re supposed to be dominating out of the gate,” said Evan Daniels, Scout.com’s director of basketball recruiting. “And to a degree, that’s not always fair.
“Sometimes, it takes some of these guys a little bit longer to develop.”
The road from Chapel Hill to Oxford is only 43 miles, but Hicks’ journey from state champion at J.F. Webb High School to standout member of Roy Williams’ ball club has been much longer.
WHERE IT ALL STARTED
Hicks can remember the first time he dunked a basketball.
He was in a middle school P.E. class.
Like most middle school boys, Hicks and his friends were obsessed with the idea of dunking and wanted to mimic the same moves they saw from their favorite collegiate and professional players night after night.
It was a race to manhood, boys vying to be the first to earn bragging rights.
At 6-foot-2 in seventh grade, Hicks won that race, leaping higher than his friends to put a foam dodge ball through the rim.
“Everybody was just mad because they couldn’t (dunk),” Hicks said. “And then it was like, you’re tall so of course, and I still said, well, I’m still not supposed to be dunking.”
But the feat in itself is somewhat expected.
Why wouldn’t the tallest kid in his class and future high school dunker extraordinaire learn how to dunk in middle school? By the end of his senior year Hicks was known for his dunks — there’s a video full of them on YouTube with nearly 32,000 views.
But just two years before his first dunk, Hicks wasn’t anywhere near grabbing the rim on any regulation basket.
Simply put, he was a shrimp.
His mom, Regina, recalls her second-youngest child being smaller than the other kids growing up. She carried him on her hip until he was five years old — earning him the moniker ‘hip baby’ among his family.
His oldest brother, Allen Mitchell, remembers his brother, nearly eight years his junior, as the tagalong to games at the local YMCA. When teams were divided up, Hicks wasn’t the last kid to get picked — he wasn’t picked at all.
“He used to be over on the side by himself,” Mitchell said, “just shooting by himself because we’d never let him play.”
ONCE UPON A TIME
There was a time when Hicks didn’t want to play basketball at all. In fact, it wasn’t that long ago that his older brother was bribing him to go to practices and games.
After playing his freshman season at Webb and earning an invitation to former high school scout Dave Telep’s Carolina Challenge, Hicks’ parents moved out of the Webb district to Creedmoor.
Instead of going to the public school in his district, South Granville, Hicks’ parents decided it would be best for him to attend Raleigh’s Body of Christ Academy.
The school routinely played against top talent and playing on the team would give Hicks a bigger stage than the Webb gymnasium could provide.
But Hicks wasn’t thrilled with the idea of leaving his home school for an unfamiliar school and basketball program.
His parents even sent his brother Thomas with their shy and reluctant son in hopes it would ease the transition. And yet, Hicks was still unhappy.
“I had to bribe him,” Mitchell said. “I would have to be like, ‘Oh, if you play in this game or go to practice, I’ll buy you an XBox 360 game.’
“A lot of those games he didn’t want to go to.”
It wasn’t the first time Hicks had thought about giving up. He started playing basketball when he was five years old, put in a recreational league by his mom to work out some of his energy. But as he advanced to higher, more demanding levels, Hicks began to really dislike the conditioning, so much so that he asked his mom if he could leave the sport.
“I never thought it would get to the college level because at one point, he didn’t want to play basketball,” Regina said. “I always told my kids, if y’all start something, you’re not going to stop until you finish.”
After a trying year, Hicks finally convinced his parents that Body of Christ wasn’t the place for him. He wanted to be back at Webb, he needed to be back at Webb.
“That’s where I started,” Hicks said. “That’s where everything happened. The moment that I got noticed and everything. I just wanted to be at home.”
CONTINUED AT THE LINK ABOVE
This is the article I was referring to earlier. There is more at the link above........
WORK IN PROGRESS: Oxford’s Hicks battles ‘savior’ complex at UNC
Mar. 06, 2015 @ 04:44 PM
Brooke Pryor
North Carolina's Isaiah Hicks (22), shown shooting over N.C. State's Kyle Washington, is playing a key role for the Tar Heels as he begins to live up to his five-star recruiting hype after a relatively quiet freshman season. (The Herald-Sun/Bernard Thomas)
The Herald-Sun | Bernard Thomas Isaiah Hicks (22) defends against Duke point guard Tyus Jones in Duke's overtime win aganst the Tar Heels at home in February.
CHAPEL HILL —
North Carolina has trouble with the savior complex.
Highly touted recruits don’t pan out, at least not in their first year, and they’re written off.
The expectations soar for five-star recruits with impressive high school résumés and highlight reels. Yet sometimes they soar a bit too high, setting the bar at such an extreme height, not allowing for growing pains and missteps.
In 2013, Isaiah Hicks threw down a thunderous 34 points and 30 rebounds in Webb’s 73-70 overtime state championship win.
A year later, he was buried deep on North Carolina’s bench, struggling to figure out his role on the team, averaging just 7.3 minutes, 1.2 points and 1.0 rebounds per game last season.
The Tar Heels have seen it before.
Harrison Barnes came back for a second chance at a national championship only to fall flat in the NCAA tournament. They saw it again in James Michael McAdoo, who spurned a shot at a likely lottery slot in the NBA Draft only to struggle to find consistency in his next two seasons.
And now, Isaiah Hicks.
“We’re in the age where if you’re a five star talent ranking, you’re supposed to be dominating out of the gate,” said Evan Daniels, Scout.com’s director of basketball recruiting. “And to a degree, that’s not always fair.
“Sometimes, it takes some of these guys a little bit longer to develop.”
The road from Chapel Hill to Oxford is only 43 miles, but Hicks’ journey from state champion at J.F. Webb High School to standout member of Roy Williams’ ball club has been much longer.
WHERE IT ALL STARTED
Hicks can remember the first time he dunked a basketball.
He was in a middle school P.E. class.
Like most middle school boys, Hicks and his friends were obsessed with the idea of dunking and wanted to mimic the same moves they saw from their favorite collegiate and professional players night after night.
It was a race to manhood, boys vying to be the first to earn bragging rights.
At 6-foot-2 in seventh grade, Hicks won that race, leaping higher than his friends to put a foam dodge ball through the rim.
“Everybody was just mad because they couldn’t (dunk),” Hicks said. “And then it was like, you’re tall so of course, and I still said, well, I’m still not supposed to be dunking.”
But the feat in itself is somewhat expected.
Why wouldn’t the tallest kid in his class and future high school dunker extraordinaire learn how to dunk in middle school? By the end of his senior year Hicks was known for his dunks — there’s a video full of them on YouTube with nearly 32,000 views.
But just two years before his first dunk, Hicks wasn’t anywhere near grabbing the rim on any regulation basket.
Simply put, he was a shrimp.
His mom, Regina, recalls her second-youngest child being smaller than the other kids growing up. She carried him on her hip until he was five years old — earning him the moniker ‘hip baby’ among his family.
His oldest brother, Allen Mitchell, remembers his brother, nearly eight years his junior, as the tagalong to games at the local YMCA. When teams were divided up, Hicks wasn’t the last kid to get picked — he wasn’t picked at all.
“He used to be over on the side by himself,” Mitchell said, “just shooting by himself because we’d never let him play.”
ONCE UPON A TIME
There was a time when Hicks didn’t want to play basketball at all. In fact, it wasn’t that long ago that his older brother was bribing him to go to practices and games.
After playing his freshman season at Webb and earning an invitation to former high school scout Dave Telep’s Carolina Challenge, Hicks’ parents moved out of the Webb district to Creedmoor.
Instead of going to the public school in his district, South Granville, Hicks’ parents decided it would be best for him to attend Raleigh’s Body of Christ Academy.
The school routinely played against top talent and playing on the team would give Hicks a bigger stage than the Webb gymnasium could provide.
But Hicks wasn’t thrilled with the idea of leaving his home school for an unfamiliar school and basketball program.
His parents even sent his brother Thomas with their shy and reluctant son in hopes it would ease the transition. And yet, Hicks was still unhappy.
“I had to bribe him,” Mitchell said. “I would have to be like, ‘Oh, if you play in this game or go to practice, I’ll buy you an XBox 360 game.’
“A lot of those games he didn’t want to go to.”
It wasn’t the first time Hicks had thought about giving up. He started playing basketball when he was five years old, put in a recreational league by his mom to work out some of his energy. But as he advanced to higher, more demanding levels, Hicks began to really dislike the conditioning, so much so that he asked his mom if he could leave the sport.
“I never thought it would get to the college level because at one point, he didn’t want to play basketball,” Regina said. “I always told my kids, if y’all start something, you’re not going to stop until you finish.”
After a trying year, Hicks finally convinced his parents that Body of Christ wasn’t the place for him. He wanted to be back at Webb, he needed to be back at Webb.
“That’s where I started,” Hicks said. “That’s where everything happened. The moment that I got noticed and everything. I just wanted to be at home.”
CONTINUED AT THE LINK ABOVE
Good article. Hopefully the national championship expectations this year will help motivate him to break out of his shell like the state championship aspirations did his senior year of HS. He's definitely got potential to be great.
Great article, I don't think we've saw the best of Isaiah yet. I sure hope this is the year he breaks out of his shell and shows himself and the world exactly what he's made of, he should have plenty of chances. Don't wait until your senior year Isaiah, you have all the help and talent to win that championship "this" year.
Get in the weight room and add muscle weight, strength, kid really needs both the strength as well as the confidence of feeling himself STRONG. Like to see him work more on a mid range face up jumper and keep working on that jump hook but take those shots believing they will drop!
Now is the time that Hicks really needs to take his game to that next level, if he doesn't he may find his senior season playing behind freshmen. How hard he works this off season will show how bad he wants to realize the amazing opportunity he has available to him, this kid has the golden ticket within reach, just needs to grab it and not let it go.
Now is the time that Hicks really needs to take his game to that next level, if he doesn't he may find his senior season playing behind freshmen. How hard he works this off season will show how bad he wants to realize the amazing opportunity he has available to him, this kid has the golden ticket within reach, just needs to grab it and not let it go.
Did anyone else read the article and think he'll basically end up as a Deon Thompson type player? One that you are constantly hoping will "get mean" but never does?
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