The complete 1999-2000 Mark Madsen biography. |
Mark Madsen Diary #8 - 3/2/00
Michael McDonald, our starting point guard, is one of the big reasons whywe're having a great year. We have a lot of great shooters on this yearsteam and Mike is able to pass them the ball right where they can beeffective. Mike delivers the ball into their shooting pocket so that theycan go straight up and shoot the ball without getting their ryhthm mixed upby trying to catch a wild pass. Mike could go out there and be a selfishplayer shooting all the time, but he likes to get the team involved. Butwhen a game is on the line, he's been a guy who's made huge plays for usthis year. In the Duke game, in overtime, Mike went out and nailed twoclutch three-pointers to give us the lead down the stretch.  |
I've played with hundreds of point guards over the years on different teams,pickup ball, and in summer leagues. Now I want to talk about something thatis a lot more subtle. Over the last few years, Mike has thrown a lot ofpasses to a lot of players. Sometimes he throws the perfect pass and histeammate will miss the pass, or even drop it. This is common for a lot ofpoint guards. When anyone on our team drops a pass, Mike will go over tothat person and say something like, "Don't worry, I'm coming back toyou...keep playing hard." I know this, because I've dropped my share ofperfect passes from Mike! When Mike says something like this to me, it justmakes me want to play a whole lot harder and a whole lot better.
A lot of players out there might start yelling at the guy, or they mighthave really negative body language if a teammate missed a pass, but Mikeknows what it means to lead a team. Mike knows when to get on a teammate ifhe's not focused, but he always knows how to do the more difficult thing;keep his emotions and frustrations under control and build the confidence ofhis teammates. There's always going to be adversity in basketball. Thereare going to times when everything seems to be crumbling in a game. Thereare going to be times when no one can hit a shot. Mike just understands howto handle adversity and lead his team through tough times. Mike'sleadership, clutch scoring and passing has helped us have a great season.
This week we have a huge test against USC and then UCLA. My three toughestmathups in the Pac-10 are Sean Lampley, Michael Wright, and BrianScalabrine. Tonight Brian Scalabrine is in town. What makes Brian such aneffective player is that he's 6'9" and 250 pounds and yet he can play anyposition on the court. After the last game when we played against USC, Iguarded him most of the night. All I can remember is trying to chase himoff double screens the whole night. After we played them when we were atthe airport waiting for our flight to go home, all I could do was just laythere and try to recover. Brian's a great player and a great competitor;win or lose, I'm looking forward to playing against him.
These last two home games are the final time David Moseley, Alex Gelbard andI will take the court. We're all graduating in June and going on to dodifferent things. Getting to know David and Alex, and the rest of the guyson the team has been one of the highlights of my life. I look forward tostaying in touch over the years. But before all of that happens we're allreally excited about the upcoming games and about the NCAA tournament!