LAS VEGAS — In this cutthroat league, you obviously need talent, but you also need more than that.
The best teams have people who can dominate a game.
Unearthing a few of them is the task for most rebuilding teams, and especially for the Washington Wizards, who are starting close to rock bottom. Right now, the Wizards would be happy to simply identify young building blocks who at least have the guts, and the confidence, to try to bend a game through the force of their will.
This, perhaps, was an undercurrent to a fascinating answer by summer-league coach Cody Toppert when he was asked Friday morning what he wanted to see from rookie Alex Sarr in Sarr’s Wizards debut Friday night.
“He’s got such a high-character disposition about him,” Toppert said. “He cares about his teammates. I think we want to see a little bit of a killer come out on the court. We want to see a guy who is bringing an aggressive mentality on both sides of the ball, a level of physicality on defense that’s going to establish a baseline for what he’s going to be in the future. And then on the offensive side, it’s got to be a level of aggression. We don’t want him to hide on the offensive end. We want him to hunt action.”
Seven hours later, inside UNLV’s Thomas & Mack Center, the Wizards’ hope-craving fan base saw the team may have just drafted not one, but two, youngsters with killer instincts: Sarr and guard Bub Carrington.
Carrington fought off a few nerves against the Atlanta Hawks to stuff 19 points, nine rebounds and eight assists into the stat sheet.
“When you know that you’ve hooped for this, you’ve trained for this, it’s kind of like butterflies kind of turn into confidence,” Carrington said.
Overcoming his own case of butterflies, Sarr deterred Hawks players from attacking the basket. In a single, tantalizing 23-second span, he blocked three shots.
“Just protecting the rim, when you see the opportunity, you just jump and get the ball,” Sarr said. “It’s really simple. So I just did what I had to do.”
Sarr displayed additional facets to his game. Deployed more as a facilitator than as a scorer, the towering teenager handled the basketball with ease, delivered a few deft passes and sank a pair of 3-pointers. He finished with 12 points, seven rebounds and four assists to go along with his four swats.
What made the night even sweeter: The Wizards won 94-88.
Do Sarr and Carrington have plenty to work on? Yes, they do, and that’s OK. But on Friday, they at least showed the capacity — and the will — to change the tenor of a game. Sarr, 19, did it with his rim protection, with Toppert calling him “the anchor” of the Wizards’ defense. Carrington, a week shy of his 19th birthday, complemented his strong shot-making with sound passing and smart court sense.
With his parents and grandparents in town from Baltimore and watching from the stands, Carrington set the tone on the game’s opening possession by draining a 3-pointer from the left wing. On Washington’s next possession, he drew a shooting foul and then hit both free throws.
“I think the awesome thing about his game was that early on they tried to speed him up and they were successful in that, and then he figured out how to settle down, handle the pressure and run the team,” Toppert said. “He figured out how to get us organized, which is a big responsibility.”
All the usual caveats apply about summer-league games, which aren’t really games at all, but instead are exhibitions. Washington was facing an Atlanta team that arguably was even more inexperienced and cobbled-together. Tougher competition awaits in the fall.
But on Friday night, Sarr and Carrington appeared to handle the expectations well.
Sarr, the second overall pick last month, sank his two 3s in the second half. In both cases, he hoisted smooth shots over a 6-foot-11 defender. On one fourth-quarter sequence, he dived to the court to save a potential defensive rebound from going out of bounds.
“He made a couple of tremendous blocks,” Toppert said. “He rebounded at key points. He fought through some cramps, and those 3s were huge when we needed them.”
Although Sarr will play extensively in the season ahead, the Wizards intend to be patient with his development. He has only 225 pounds on his 7-foot frame, and one of the reasons the Wizards signed veteran Jonas Valančiūnas this offseason is to have Valančiūnas, instead of Sarr, face off against some of the league’s most rugged centers.
When the Wizards drafted Sarr, they knew his defensive skills are well ahead of his offensive skills. In that sense, he resembles the Wizards’ prized second-year forward (and another Frenchman) Bilal Coulibaly. Sarr and Coulibaly are long-term plays.
Against the Hawks, Carrington looked impressively advanced for someone who played a one-and-done season at the University of Pittsburgh. His performance mirrored his performances in the Wizards’ practices leading into their trip to Las Vegas: He’s been mature beyond his years. General manager Will Dawkins has called Carrington the team’s most vocal player in recent weeks.
“I’m just trying to be a leader,” Carrington said. “I came here to play a guard position, and at a guard position, you’ve got to be vocal. So, coach has been staying on me, and some of my older guys have also been helping me throughout that, just trying to keep me active, keep me vocal, just because I have to be one of the leaders on the team.”
With Carrington and Sarr, the Wizards may have found more than that.
In time, with plenty of elbow grease, they might become the killer-instinct players Washington so badly needs.
Friday was a good start.
(Photo of Bub Carrington: Lucas Peltier / USA Today)
