Frank Martin weighs in on Gamecocks latest signees
South Carolina men's basketball coach Frank Martin previously spoke on his first group of signees - T.J. Moss, Jermaine Couisnard and Alanzo Frink.
On Friday, Martin spoke for the first time about the Gamecocks' three latest additions:
On Georgetown graduate transfer Tre Campbell...
I didn't want to go into the season with so many freshman guys [at point guard]. He's an interesting deal. I watched him play a ton when he was in high school. Very good player in high school. Went to Georgetown, didn't visit anywhere else, played a ton of games for Georgetown. I'm not going to sit here and try to figure out, well he averaged 3 points a game, so he's not very good, he's a stop-gap - I'm not into that.
I think the way he plays fits who we are. I like his demeanor. I've always respected him as a player and he's a point guard. Rather than worry about the stats and all that, he had to play in the structure that Georgetown played in. JT3 ran a version of the Princeton offense, which meant you have to sacrifice to play in structure. Unlike the new wave of thinking, life is not about just showing up and doing whatever you want to do. It's about to coexisting in structure with other talented people and he's shown he's willing to do that. So I get excited about that.
On George Washington transfer Jair Bolden...
Jair has been on the radar for us from the day he said he was leaving GW. I like him a lot. He played for Bob Hurley in high school. My first conversation with him and his dad, it was pretty simple, it was like, Bob Hurley drug the best out of him and they want to be around somebody that's going to challenge him every day. For them to even put my name in the same sentence with Coach Hurley, was just like unbelievable to me.
So I'm excited about Jair. Once again, a point guard, can play the 2, has played major minutes just like Tre. ... The matchups in practice are where guys get better. So, now we take TJ or Jermaine, they're dealing with a guy who's played 65 college games on the court, they're dealing with that guy in practice. There's a maturity, there's an attention to detail, there's an excitement that those older guys bring to the table every day that makes those young guys learn how to do things and have to compete at a higher level.
On Winterhaven (Fla.) three-star wing Keyshawn Bryant...
Key is a dynamic player. Once again, been on our radar for a while. If you guys pay attention to recruiting, I couldn't take Key if Brian was going to be here. It wouldn't have been fair to him or to Brian, so we were waiting and he waited on the whole Brian situation to get cleared up. So once Brian made his decision, then obviously we had a necessity for a big wing and we pushed in his direction.
High-flyer, athletic. He shoots it - has to learn how to trust his shot. Some guys shoot it and it's ugly. He shoots it and it looks good, but he's so 'get-to-the-rim' mindset that he's got to learn how to trust his shot.