The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
THE HOT CORNER
COVERAGE CLOSER THAN A COURTSIDE SEAT.
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TENNIS: Gilles Simon will step away from the tennis tour for an undetermined period of time because he said his heart wasn’t in it right now. The 36-year-old Frenchman wrote on Twitter on Friday that mental health is also a concern. Simon did not say whether he is considering retirement.
TENNIS: French Open champion Iga Swiatek is into the Adelaide International final against secondseeded Belinda Bencic after a 6-3, 6-2 win over Jil Teichmann. Bencic advanced later Friday with a 7-6 (2), 6-7 (4), 6-2 win over American teenager Coco Gauff in 2 hours, 45 minutes. Bencic ended Gauff ’s victory streak at five — three in the main draw and two in qualifying.
BASKETBALL: The Women’s Basketball Hall of Fame has moved this year’s induction ceremony to late August because of COVID-19. It was originally scheduled for midjune. The Knoxville, Tennesseebased hall of fame has been closely monitoring the COVID-19 situation and made the switch to Aug. 21 for the safety of guests. Hall of Fame President Dana Hart says the feeling is August“will be a safer time to be together in person.”
PRO BASKETBALL: Minnesota Timberwolves shooting guard Malik Beasley has been suspended for 12 games without pay by the NBA for his recent guilty plea to a felony charge of threats of violence. Beasley, in his fifth NBA season, is averaging a career-best 20.5 points.
PRO BASKETBALL: The Toronto Raptors said six members of their coaching staff, including head coach Nick Nurse, would miss Friday night’s game against Houston in accordance with the league’s health and safety protocols regarding the coronavirus.
The Zoom interview was over, and Sahvir Wheeler was excused to leave the podium. But before getting up, the Georgia point guard asked the moderator from UGA’S sports communications office if he could “say one more thing.”
“Go right ahead,” he was told.
“You guys know I have a unique name, and if your child had a unique name, you’d want their name said right,” Wheeler told two dozen reporters participating into the videoconference call. “It’s Sah-veer,” he said, drawing out the emphasis on the first syllable. Then he spelled it out.
“S-A-H-V-I-R. Not SUH-VEER or nothing like that. So I just wanted to point that out to you guys. But thank you for having me. Always a plea- sure being here.”
If he’d been holding a microphone, Wheeler proba- bly would’ve dropped it there.
A couple of hours later and 900 miles away, a father heard about his son’s news conference epilogue, and he was beaming.
“I was proud of that, I was really proud of that,” said Teddy Wheeler, speaking this week from his home in Houston. “Because the phonetic spelling has been in (the Georgia media guide) since his freshman year; I know because I thought was pretty cool that they’d have that detail. So for guys to mispronounce it, he should correct them. He shouldn’t let people continuously say his name wrong every day.”
If Wheeler continues to play the way he has for the Bulldogs, there shouldn’t much longer be a requirement for rectification. In the game after Wheeler’s clarifi- cation, he recorded the first triple-double in the 116-year history of Georgia basketball. That his 14 points, 13 assists and 11 rebounds came in a stunning 91-78 upset win over LSU was a bonus.
That performance followed a game-high, 27-point scoring effort on the road against the Florida Gators on Feb. 20. And now, as the Bulldogs (14-9, 7-9 SEC) prepare to host South Carolina (5-12, 3-10) in the next-to-last game of the regular season today, Wheeler finds himself just four assists away from setting UGA’S single-season record for assists. Pertha Robinson had 169 in 1995, the last time the Bulldogs made it to the NCAA Tournament’s Sweet 16.
Not bad for the kid who, at a generously listed height of 5 feet 10, encountered some skepticism o ver whether he could excel in major-college basketball.
“I think it’s just a testament to the work that I put in, as well as a testament to the coaching staff,” Wheeler said of his accomplishments. “They believed in me and had a vision for me. After I decommitted from Texas A&M, coach (Tom) Crean and his staff showed a lot of faith in me, a lot of heart, and they wanted me here. They wanted me to come to be a part of something big, and they wanted me to come in and lead this team and the program. All that is to them.”
While the rest of the bas- ketball world may be taken aback by Wheeler’s career arc, Teddy Wheeler is not. Sahvir’s father has been watching his son outpace everybody’s expectations since he started teaching him
the gameatharlem’s Rucker Park as a grade-schooler.
“He’s not surprising me,” said Teddy Wheeler, who has coached his son at every stage until now. “We don’t put caps on our children when they think they can achieve something. I wouldn’t be surprised if he has even more success at this level. As a family, we don’t go into things thinking we’re going to fail.”
Sahvir originally committed to Texas A&M as a junior. The family was living near College Station at the time after Hurricane Harvey destroyed their home. But after coach Billy Kennedy was fired, Wheeler decided to reassess his decision. Enter Crean. “Coach Crean was rock star in the recruiting process,” Teddy Wheeler said. “He blew us all away in the home visit, and he and Sahvir just hit it off. There was an organic connection right away. You could see it then, and you can see it now during games.
“Crean and Sahvir are almost always on the same page, and that has been a godsend for Sahvir’s development at the collegiate level. I have to credit coach Crean, the way he uses him, allows his skills to flourish, emphasizes his strengths and challenges his weaknesses.”
Wheeler is undisputed as the conduit through which everything Georgia does runs. He leads the team in scoring (14.1 ppg), assists (7.2 pg) and minutes played (34.4 pg). His Georgia coaches and teammates are loving it. They fully expect Wheeler to run down the UGA assists record today against South Carolina and keep adding records this season and next — and however long he remains at Georgia.