Davis impressing veterans with his positive attitude
Offensively gifted Raptors rookie slowly earning trust of head coach, teammates
Terence Davis II isn’t like most rookies in a number of ways.
Most first-time NBA players get rattled when they finds themselves in a situation they have yet to experience.
Not Davis.
Full stadium or empty gym, opponent in his face or simply working on his shot before a game, Davis is the same guy. He has his form down and that doesn’t change.
It’s what has made him a successful first year player.
His shooting skill is elite. He’s firing at just under 42 per cent from three and just under 49 per cent from the field. But the vast majority of his shots — 161 of the 293 — have come from behind the arc.
Inside the locker-room he’s well taken care of, with veterans surrounding him, including Kyle Lowry, Marc Gasol and Serge Ibaka.
On the team charter, he sits beside Ibaka, a no-nonsense (well, when it comes to the game anyway) worker with an unwavering commitment to the process.
That’s rubbed off on Davis. Head coach Nick Nurse joked about an exchange he and the rookie guard shared recently while getting off the plane.
“I got off the plane two days ago and I said to him ‘Don’t go to the gym tomorrow, Terence.’ He said, ‘I’m going coach. I gotta go.’ ”
Nurse wanted his rookie to rest, but the rookie has had
Ibaka in his ear all season, telling him of the importance of staying consistent and locked in. For Davis, that means off days are spent in a gym.
Ibaka, the 11-year veteran, makes it clear the relationship only works for him if the one looking for guidance actually wants to learn, and Davis has shown him nothing but willingness to soak up all the advice he can get.
“Yeah, as a vet, you always look to do that, but the difference is some young fellas, they don’t really take to it,” Ibaka said after watching Davis go off for a career best 31 points in Sunday’s win over Chicago.
“They don’t really listen. So you have to give a lot of credit to him for listening to me and wanting to do it. He’s always looking to get better. He’s always asking me, ‘Tell me what I should do here.’ That motivates me to want to help him more.”
Davis has had the path of the undrafted Fred Vanvleet to follow, too. This past summer he could have signed with any number of teams. Looking back now, and with the teammates around him cheering on his every move, Davis is thrilled that he chose Toronto.
“This is a great organization. We all love each other, we care for each other, and I wouldn’t want to be anywhere else, honestly,” Davis said.
Davis remains very much a rookie in other ways. He still tends to get a little lost in certain defensive coverages. When that happens, he’s corrected, and works to make the proper adjustment.
After Nurse called him out publicly for a run of poor performances, the 22-year-old Mississippi native responded with a then career high 23 points next time out.
Earlier this year, his mentor Ibaka lost his temper rather publicly with Davis.
It was during a game in Oklahoma City. Davis had the ball just outside the arc; Ibaka had gained position in the post and was calling for the ball.
Davis though didn’t deliver the pass right away, looking off him in a search for other options. When he came back to Ibaka, the pass arrived too late. Ibaka’s defender had gained the upper hand and the Raptors veteran wound up taking an offensive foul.
Ibaka was irate and he let his young protege know he’d blew it as they came up the floor. The tongue-lashing continued into the next timeout.
The Raptors went on to win that game and all was forgiven. In a quiet moment in the locker-room after the game, Davis acknowledged his mistake and told a reporter it wouldn’t happen again. The two hugged it out after the game.
For Davis it was a learning lesson and nothing more.
Nurse even seemed to suggest Davis would see more of the floor in light of his performance on Sunday.
“I always think of the games that I play him about six minutes and I wonder what the hell I’m doing. That’s the first thing I think of when he’s playing like that,” Nurse said after the Chicago win.
“I think he’s got a shooting component that’s pretty high level, right? You see it a little bit on a night like Sunday, and that’s usually the toughest component to get in this league. But there are lots of other areas of the game that he can improve on and will improve on as we continue on here.”
With all the vets in his corner and the ideal rookie attitude, we’re siding with Nurse on this one.