Jan. 28, 2002
by Tom Musgrave – Host Communications
Being a freshman in college is quite a paradigm shift for most students, especially student-athletes. They come from high school where they are Joe or Josephine Cool and enter an environment where they are smaller than they were on their respective high school campuses.
Wildcat freshmen Josh Carrier and Chuck Hayes are bearing that burden this year. As scholarship recipients on the UK basketball team, they know they must start paying their dues again, like they did when they started high school basketball.
Both key starters for their respective high schools – Modesto Christian (Calif.) for Hayes and Bowling Green (Ky.) for Carrier – they admit the role change from high school senior to college freshman hasn’t been a piece of cake.
“It’s been a real eye-opener for me,” Carrier said. “I didn’t think it was going to be that busy or as hard, but is has been. Every bit of it. We stay busy all the time.”
“The biggest adjustment I’ve had to make is managing my time better,” admitted Hayes. “I’m used to always having my parents tell me what do to, when to do it and how to get it done. Now it’s all about me.”
“Here, you have a day off between classes, so you have to stay motivated,” Carrier said. “You have to stay on top of your work or it can get on top of you and you’ll get behind early.”
While Carrier and Hayes may be going through the same paces getting adjusted to college life, their paths to UK basketball were distinctly different. In fact, Carrier might very well have been sporting Cardinal red this fall had it not been for some persistent Wildcat recruiting.
“I grew up with Louisville basketball,” Carrier said. “My dad and (former U of L head coach) Denny Crum were pretty good friends and my cousin was a student assistant at Louisville. He would always talk ‘red’ to me. I went up to a few Louisville games when I was little, but it’s hard not to know about the program at Kentucky.
“One thing I remember about being recruited was my junior year in high school when I came here for Senior Day (they were playing Florida),” Carrier explained. “(Coach Tubby Smith) called me into his office after the game and that was the first time he offered me a scholarship. He told me that he wanted me to come to UK. I waited and waited after that, made a few unofficial visits to other schools, but the offer was always there no matter what I did.
“I thought that was something special,” Carrier added. “He was always there, always recruiting me.”And you don’t just have to live in Kentucky to know the power of UK basketball. Hayes, a native of Modesto, Calif., stumbled onto the magic of Wildcat hoops flipping through the channels on his television one night. “My very first impression was seeing Walter McCarty get a dunk,” Hayes recalled. “I just started watching more. The crowd was pumped. That was sweet. And seeing Rupp Arena on TV was amazing too. It was like you just had to work to be worthy of playing in a place like Rupp. Everything was so live and the enthusiasm was great.”
A lot of people tune in to Kentucky basketball games and feel the same way – excited, pumped, ready to high-five the guy or gal next to them. But Hayes is one of the lucky ones. He gets to experience that excitement firsthand now, not from his living room.
“The experience is definitely as good as it looks on TV,” Hayes said. “People out here are crazy about Kentucky. You can see that just from the lottery line the other night (for tickets to the U of L game).”
Something both freshmen brought with them when they moved in for the fall semester was a deep admiration for Coach Tubby Smith. Like many players they describe him as a father figure on and off the court.
“He knows how to push you and knows how to love you when it’s all over,” Carrier said. “He’ll give you that tough love. In practice he may chew you out, but after practice he’ll be calm, he’ll tell you why he did it and you know it’s just to make you a better person, as well as a better player.”
“There’s so many good things about Coach Smith, you can’t just name one,” Hayes said. “He’s loyal to the players. He treats everyone the same and he has no favorites.”
As both Carrier and Hayes work to be worthy of playing time, they have noticed improvements in their style of play.”I’m doing well in my shooting and court awareness,” Carrier said. “When I’m on the bench, I’ll watch and concentrate on the game. I look at the people I may need to guard, find out what their tendencies are so I can have a head start on them before I even get in the game.”
“My strengths are my rebounding and unselfishness,” added Hayes. “I’ll pass up a shot any day for another player. And when the ball goes up, I always tell myself I’ve got to get the rebound.”
Hayes is also noticing differences in the college game and the game he was accustomed to playing in high school.”It’s a much quicker game with more intensity,” Hayes said. “In high school, you can play a team and blow them out. I’d be sitting on the bench in the second half talking about what I’m going to be doing after the game. In college everybody is at the same pace you are.”
Carrier said keeping pace is one thing he’s getting better at the more time he spends playing the college game.”I’m getting stronger and quicker,” Carrier said. “I always need to be improving. I also need to work on my defense. My effort and intensity has improved a lot since I’ve come here, but they could always be better.”
