Building by the Beach

Just a few feet from his spot on the sideline, Jamion Christian watched his vision for GW men's basketball come to life last Saturday afternoon.

Armel Potter's nifty layup through traffic had excited the Smith Center faithful, and racing back down the floor to defend Morgan State, Shawn Walker Jr. turned toward his teammates clapping and shouting encouragement.

To Christian, it was no coincidence when Ace Stallings came up with a steal seconds later. The junior forward fired around his man to deny an entry pass before drawing a foul securing the loose ball to prompt an even louder roar from the home crowd.

As his youthful group finds its footing, Christian wants to celebrate progress in all its forms. The first-year coach points to that easily overlooked sequence in the first half vs. the Bears as an important moment in the Buff and Blue's continued development.

"That's what it should look like," Christian said. "Every possession we should be passing energy to one another like that. That's what it's going to look like when we're hitting on all cylinders."

Over four games, Christian has watched his Colonials slowly-but-surely learn how to play together and move closer to his preferred brand of basketball.

After Saturday's outing, the coach began his press conference by saluting his club's intensity, calling the performance the best example yet of the attitude and effort that he prizes.

GW will look to continue that growth this week with three games in as many days at the Bahamas Showcase, starting with a Friday matchup vs. Kansas City.

"It's a great time to go on a trip like this," Christian said. "Get away a little bit armed with the information from the past with the want to get better for the future.

"It's a chance to play three good opponents that all provide different challenges, and that makes it fun. More than anything, just the opportunity for us to get together by ourselves for a while as a group, I think, is huge. It allows us to keep building that connectivity."

Christian has made energy and connectivity a priority over his eight months in Foggy Bottom, from leading a seminar called "The Power of Touch" to stressing high-fives, fist bumps and eye contact on the practice floor.

The staff maintains an effort chart tracking deflections, box outs and contested shots, but in Christian's program, there is even more to working hard for the team.

"We've been talking so much about the body language piece of it and what it does for us," Christian said. "There are just a lot of guys who are energy-givers right now, and that's great to see."

The Colonials are encouraged to show – or more precisely, share – emotion, whether that's Walker spurring on his teammates before a defensive possession, extroverted Jamison Battle flashing three fingers to the crowd after a made long ball or soft-spoken Arnaldo Toro punctuating an and-one with a word-less flex of his biceps.

"It's reinforced every day," Walker said. "If you're not bringing energy and not connecting with your teammates, then you're going to be called out. If everybody else's doing it, then you really have no choice. That's just the culture of our program."

Walker provided an unmistakable spark vs. Morgan State.

The first-year guard didn't hide his excitement to be starting in his collegiate debut, doling out chest bumps during introductions with the widest smile on the court. That attitude carried into the game as his ability to balance passion while displaying poise under pressure led him to earn a team-high 35 minutes.

Christian said Walker had showed he was ready to handle that kind of role over recent practices, and the North Carolina native delivered with seven points, six rebounds and a +4 plus-minus rating.

"That's the guy we recruited," Christian said. "We know he fits the system with his size and passing ability and scoring, but it was his energy level that I liked the most. I felt like he was a guy people wanted to play with and wanted to play for."

In film study this week, Christian used the clip of Walker's exuberance sparking Stallings' steal and a couple of other high-energy highlights to illustrate his oft-preached point about the power of being a good teammate.

Moving forward, the challenge is to maintain the effort and bump up the execution.

There have been flashes of individual brilliance, such as Jameer Nelson Jr.'s 11-assist effort in the win over Howard and Toro's 24-rebound performance vs. American to tie an A-10 record, that show what's possible.

It's a process, to be sure, to get the group to put together 40 quality minutes vs. more experienced competition, but Christian is maintaining a patient and positive outlook.

One of the coach's strategies for keeping the build on track involves an ordinary sheet of paper: There's a side that lists the team's strengths, while the other is a list of areas for improvement.

"It's a simple exercise," Christian said. "We want to move the things we need to improve on to the other side of the page. If we can keep improving game-in, game-out and move one thing from needs-improvement to good-at, we're going to be really successful. It's really just locking in on those little small details and holding ourselves accountable to the list."

After four games, energy and enthusiasm have migrated to the good side of the sheet, which will make the trip to the Bahamas. The Colonials figure to need a healthy dose of both as they try to cross a few more items off their needs-improvement list over three days in paradise.

"Everyone's going to be tired by the end of it, and the question is 'How will we respond?'" said Battle, who ranks third on the squad at 10.5 points per game. "It's going to be key for us that everyone's going to be connected, and everyone's going to bring each other up. We know that's huge for us every game but especially in this tournament."

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Jamison Battle

Jameer Nelson Jr.

Armel Potter

Ace Stallings

Arnaldo Toro

Shawn Walker Jr.

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