Young is a leader
Former Norman North High basketball star Trae Young is only a true freshman at Oklahoma, but he’s already taken a leadership role. And that doesn’t surprise his close friend -- and Texas Longhorn -Mohamed Bamba.
It didn’t take long for Mohamed Bamba to sense a difference in his new friend.
Over the past few years, Bamba, who is now a freshman at Texas, and now-Oklahoma freshman point guard Trae Young traveled around the country together as two of the most coveted recruits in the 2017 class.
They spent plenty of time with the other top recruits.
Young isn’t like most of the rest of those players, though, Bamba said Tuesday at Big 12 basketball media day at the Sprint Center.
“One thing that’s underrated is his ability to lead and bring people together,” Bamba said. “The fact that he was able to do it at (these) different camps where people don’t necessarily care about each other or, ‘I’m going to do it this certain way so this guy can do that,’ (is important).
“The fact that he was able to do it at camp shows that he’ll be able to do it at any level.”
Bamba was Young’s teammate at the Jordan Brand Classic. He was an opponent at the McDonald’s All-American Game and at the Peach Jam.
On either side, Bamba was impressed with what his close friend was able to do to bring along players who came in primarily focused on individual goals.
“I always treated my team before I treated myself, individually,” Young said. “It’s tough in an environment like the McDonald’s All-American Game to treat that as more of a team than an individual type of game.
“I’ve always been naturally good at that.”
That ability figures to go a long way in determining how far the Sooners will go this season.
After a disappointing 11-20 season a year ago, the former Norman North star is expected not only to be a key piece for the Sooners but to be their leader.
When he was at Norman North, Young’s scoring — he averaged better than 42 points per game — was a big focus. While he’s expected to score plenty at OU, he also has to play a more traditional point guard role and distribute the ball in coach Lon Kruger’s offense.
“He’s competitive,” Kruger said. “He’s driven to win. He’s kind of made that way. That’s always a good influence on others around him. He’s competitive every day in practice, and those habits that you have every day in practice certainly carry over and other guys certainly appreciate that competitiveness about his as much as anything else.”
When Young arrived this summer, sophomore Kameron McGusty kept a close eye on the prized recruit.
He wondered how Young would handle not only the expectations from the outside but the expectation that the point guard — even if just a freshman — had to be a leader right away.
“I thought at first it was going to be a slow process for him, but he jumped in the seat and took over initially,” McGusty said. “He had no hesitation doing that. That’s good. You don’t want to shy away from anything as a player.”
Young isn’t shying from the outside expectation that he’s the key to turning things around for the Sooners, either.
“There’s no such thing as pressure,” Young said. “There’s expectations. There’s a lot on my plate. But I have great teammates and a pretty good coach, too. He’s going to help me and my teammates get through and do well.”