Watching the stories spread

A few thoughts after reading this in the Chronicle this morning:

1. Of all the things that can be said about Stephen, and are said, and presumably will be said, this I think is the absolute key:

From Staying Stephen:

When Stephen got to Davidson, the fall of his freshman year, he was bigger, stronger, faster, and taller than he had been at Charlotte Christian. All of that, though, was not what struck the Davidson coaches the most.

Stephen was able to take the information given to him and correct mistakes almost immediately. It wasn’t that he never made mistakes. He made a lot of them. He just usually didn’t make any of them a second time. McKillop has been coaching for three and a half decades, and he says he has never had a player like that. It was as if Stephen listened to what he was told, painted a picture of the movements in his head, then channeled those movements onto the court, at full speed, the very next play.

McKillop in this morning’s story:

“I was flabbergasted how quickly he took to coaching, how smart he was and how he was able to put coaching into action. He could make something a habit after hearing how we wanted it done one time.”

Somewhere in there is the intangible why and how of what by now is Stephen’s proven pattern of exceeding expectations.

2. Good answer from Dell: “He was drafted higher than me, took a college team further than me and is better than me at golf, so if he felt like he had to live up to something, I’d say he’s done pretty well.”

3. Most of the “Steven” and “Stephon” stuff seems to have gone away, which was overdue, so now I look forward to the day I never have to see or hear Davidson “University” again. Perhaps that’s a pipe dream.

Brings to mind what Jason said at one of those press conferences in Detroit, and I’m paraphrasing here: It’s a college, actually. Davidson College. A lot of people get that wrong.

It was quick, almost inside spoken parentheses, and I don’t think it totally registered with the guy who had asked the question about the “university,” or anyone else in the room, either, but I heard it, and loved it.