Doc: Jackson's snarl represents overachieving UC team
Senior has blossomed by accepting what he's not
Feb. 3, 2014


Justin Jackson wears his passion on his face when he plays, and also shows it in how he plays, like some of the best big men in UC's recent past. Rob Leifheit/USA Today Sports

Written by
Paul Daugherty

He says it’s a spontaneous eruption of macho joy. Justin Jackson doesn’t plan The Face. He doesn’t rehearse it. The Face just is. “I really don’t know what the face looks like,” Jackson shrugs.

You do. You have seen The Face. It is, in fact, the face of a UC team that remains on an overachieving run that has stretched Sunday to 14 wins in a row and a possible Top 10 ranking Monday morning.

The Face is unmistakable, and it does not vary. Jackson swats a shot into the second row, or rattles the rim with a jam, and there it is: A half-scowl, half-gloat that is accentuated when Jackson hunches his shoulders and sticks out his neck, sort of like a turtle seeking a better view. His jaw could cleave China, from Japan.

Jackson offered The Face Sunday, less than a minute into the game. He backed down South Florida center John Egbunu and popped a six-foot jumper that clanged around the rim before dropping. The Face celebrated. Game on.

After the UC win – a labor-intensive, 50-45 slam that was absolutely as close as the score showed – Jackson said, “We’re not here just to be undefeated and lose when it’s time to win. You know what I’m sayin’?”

The Face is always dangerously close to Look At Me, but never overtly so. UC coach Mick Cronin worries that The Face will be misinterpreted by first-timers – referees and opposing coaches and players who haven’t seen it – and taken personally.

Cronin: “I don’t want people to see him for the first time and say, ‘That guy’s crazy.’’’

That’s when misunderstandings occur. “I’m looking out for his career,” Cronin explained.

Jackson’s future became sunnier last year, when Cronin finally convinced him that any money he’d make playing basketball, he’d make with his back to the basket. How often did the coach arrive in the gym to see the 6-foot-7 Jackson jacking up 3-pointers? “Multiple times,” Cronin recalls. “He’d say, ‘Coach, I made some in high school.’”

“I thought I was Kevin Durant,” Jackson says.

Cronin showed Jackson film of Jackson, and of former Bearcats big men. “I saw what I could do and what I couldn’t,” Jackson says. What he couldn’t do was be Kevin Durant. Or make 3-point field goals.

“I had the quickness and energy to be out there,” Jackson says. “But there’s more to it. You have to be able to guard the guards. I thought it would be easier than it was.”

Jackson’s fury is obvious. Less apparent is his almost balletic ability around the basket. Most centers can’t defend his quickness. Jackson made his first four shots Sunday, against the 6-10 Egbunu, simply by creating space. He made the opening jumper, followed that with a banked 10-footer, a left-handed hook in the lane and a layup.

His offensive game has progressed this year the way Kenyon Martin’s did his final three years at UC. Jackson isn’t Martin. But he is joining an impressive pantheon of Bearcats overachievers, from Erik Martin to Eric Hicks to Steve Logan to Martin, who was the ultimate example of the Bearcat Way.

“Ferocious guys,” Mick Cronin recalls. “Justin has that kind of heart.”

In his only year in the Big East, Eric Hicks was first-team all conference ... as a 6-6 center. “He had the mentality of being a man,” says Jackson. “That’s how I want to be.”

The Face does not let down. It has toned down, though, according to Cronin. He says part of Jackson’s success this winter owes to him handling his emotions better than before. “A much more cerebral player this year,” says Cronin.

At this stage, it’s obvious the Bearcats will go as far their three seniors take them. Each has his own skill set: Sean Kilpatrick is a Go To scorer who is starting to take over games when he has to; Titus Rubles is long and athletic, a player who helps UC win in lots of subtle ways; and Jackson, whose offensive game is becoming as forceful as his defense.

The Face is emerging, at precisely the right time. “I got a little bit of strength in me,” Jackson says.

More than a little. UC fans fell madly for Martin and Hicks, for the passion they tossed at their jobs.

Jackson is entering that zone. Face it.

http://news.cincinnati.com/article/20140...302020067/

It's true. Jackson plays defense with the intensity of Martin and his post game features tons of moves. Too bad he can't shoot that turnaround jumper from the elbow, or shoot 70% from the FT line.

Although if he could shoot those jumpers I wonder if his Kevin Durant dreams would have blocked his improvement. I'll take him just as he is except I agree 70% or even 60% from the free throw line would be nice