Nevada PG Deonte Burton is taking control - photo by Mark Rauh

“We kind of put all our eggs in one basket at point guard,” the Nevada Wolf Pack men’s basketball head coach said of his narrow recruiting focus two years ago. “We wanted Deonte (Burton). And if he had gone to UCLA I don’t know what we would have done.”

Wolf Pack starting point guard Armon Johnson had just declared his intention to jump a year early to the NBA. Carter’s Wolf Pack was suddenly in desperate need of a new leader in the spring of 2010.

“There weren’t many point guards out there at the time, guys that could come right in and help us right away like we needed,” Carter said. “Back in December (2009), we kind of had an inkling that Armon was going to leave. We knew we had to get a point guard in case he left. That’s when we started to focus in on Deonte.”

The Pack wasn’t alone in its interest in Burton. The 6-foot-1 combination guard was on his way to a You Tube-filled highlight film festival of a season, averaging 21 points, six rebounds and five assists for Compton Centennial High in Southern California.

UCLA wanted Burton. At the other end of the country the Cincinnati Bearcats wanted him. Just about every California college that needed a point guard had him on its recruiting radar.

“We knew he was being recruiting heavily,” Carter said. “But I knew we had to get him.”

Carter, a former point guard in high school and college, knows a point guard when he sees one. And he simply fell in love with the idea of Burton running his Wolf Pack offense for the next four years.

“In April, I knew we were close,” Carter said. “But Cincinnati and UCLA gave him offers. I didn’t know if we would get him. I wasn’t too worried about Cincinnati because I didn’t think he’d go that far away from home. But I was real nervous about UCLA.”

Burton shocked all of Southern California by signing with the Wolf Pack in late April 2010.

The reason? Coach Carter.

“He was a big factor in my decision,” said Burton, who has started every game for the Pack the past two seasons and is a huge reason why the Wolf Pack is 17-3 right now and riding a 15-game winning streak. “I knew he (Carter) played point guard at Crenshaw High School (in Los Angeles). That was big for me.”

Carter, who won two state championships at Crenshaw as coach Willie West’s point guard and went on to start for four years at Saint Mary’s, leading the Gaels to the 1989 NCAA Tournament, is a point guard savant.

“I’ll always have a good point guard,” Carter says matter-of-factly. “I know what to look for. I played the position. I know what it takes to be successful at that position.”

Adrian McCullough, Andre Hazel, Jerry Petty and Todd Okeson handled the point guard position in Carter’s first four seasons at Nevada as Trent Johnson’s assistant. Those four didn’t exactly make fans forget great Pack point guards of the past like Billy Allen, Kevin Soares, Eathan O’Bryant, Curtis High, Darryl Owens, James Fontenet, Robin Kennedy and Johnny High. But they helped build the Pack ship just the shame as a young coaching staff (head coach Johnson and assistants Mark Fox and Carter) had to build a program from the ground up.

Everything, though, clicked in the 2003-04 season as Okeson became the all-around, dependable, floor leader at point guard that Carter had been looking for since he came to Nevada.

“Nevada has had terrific point guard play over the last decade,” said Fox, now in his third season as the head coach for the Georgia Bulldogs. “And David (Carter) has been the one consistent factor in the development of each of them.”

Okeson, though, came to Nevada because of Fox.

“Coach Fox knew him from his connections in Kansas,” Carter said. “I had never seen him play in person. I saw some tape of him and I saw that he could shoot the ball well. But Trent didn’t really like him at first, thought he was too small. And I was worried about his body, too. I didn’t know if he could take the physical pounding. But I saw that he had that toughness, that calm toughness.”

The 6-foot, 165-pound Okeson helped turn around the Wolf Pack basketball program, averaging 11.2 points and 3.9 assists in 2003-04 as the Pack advanced to the Sweet 16.

“As a player it was easy to relate to him because he had been in the same situations as I was in,” Okeson said. “Having a coach that had success playing point guard in college gives him credibility and the trust of young guards looking to develop their game.”

Okeson shared the point guard duties with Petty as a junior in 2002-03 before taking over as the full-time starter as a senior.

“Coach Carter was always in my ear giving me advice and instruction on how to become the best point guard I could be,” Okeson said. “He has high expectations for his point guards. He expects his point guards to run the team, to get their teammates the ball in favorable positions to score, all the while looking for your own shot. His knowledge of the position and his ability to relate to his players is what makes him not only a great point guard coach but also a great head coach.”

Fox, who coached with Carter as an assistant under Johnson for four years and was the Pack head coach for five years with Carter as his top assistant, gave Carter total control over the most important position on the floor.

“When I was at Nevada, I had complete trust of David’s leadership of that position,” Fox said.

Ramon Sessions, a talented scorer and play-maker from Myrtle Beach, South Carolina, took over for Okeson at the point in 2005-06 and led the Pack to three more NCAA Tournament appearances in a row. Armon Johnson came from Reno’s Hug High in 2007-08 and led the Pack to three more postseason appearances (two College Basketball Invitationals and one NIT) before Burton took over in 2010-11.

“All four of them (Okeson, Sessions, Johnson and Burton) have four fairly different types of games,” Fox said. “Ramon and Armon were scoring guards in high school who always had the ball in their hands. But I felt when we recruited them, with David’s knowledge and ability to teach them, that both those kids could become terrific full-time point guards. One of my last recruiting days at Nevada was to go see Deonte work out. Watching him (Burton) play this year, it’s not surprising to me that David’s been able to do it again.”

Sessions finished his career in second place on the Wolf Pack’s list of career assists with 478. Johnson is fourth at 445. Burton, after a little more than a year and a half, already has 208 assists.

Sessions, who had the good fortune to play with Nick Fazekas in his three Pack years, averaged 4.9 assists a game in his 98-game career. Johnson, who played with such talented scorers as Marcelus Kemp and Luke Babbitt in his three Nevada seasons, averaged 4.4 in his 101 games. Burton, who is often times his own leading scorer, has averaged 3.9 assists in his 53 games.

Carter has a full checklist of qualities he looks for in all point guards. He selects his point guards on what he sees with his own two eyes and also what he feels in his gut.

“All of those guys (Okeson, Sessions, Johnson and Burton) have that it factor,” Carter said. “When I’m looking for a point guard, that’s what I have to see. It’s a toughness, a fearlessness, a competitiveness.”

And that’s just the first things he looks for.

“The things I look for in all point guards are their decision-making abilities, how they lead their team out on the floor,” Carter said. “Is he out there just looking for his own shot or is he looking to put his teammates in a good position to score? What is his demeanor?

“I saw Deonte score 30 points in the first half of one game in high school. That didn’t impress me. I already knew he could score. What I was interested in was his demeanor in the second half. Did he change? Did he become selfish or did he continue to lead his team? He went out there and didn’t try to pad his numbers. He went out there and always did what his team needed. That’s leadership.”

There is also something else that Carter looks for in his prospective point guards.

“I need to see their relationship with their head coach,” Carter said. “I need to see how he interacts with his head coach during a game. Does he listen to the coach? Does he communicate with his coach? Does that coach lean on him during a game? Does the coach ask him questions? Very seldom will you find a good point guard who is quiet on the floor and during timeouts. I want to see how he leads the team on and off the floor.”

Carter puts tremendous trust and faith in his point guards. That’s something that Nance taught him at Saint Mary’s.

“Coach Nance would look at me in the huddle and ask me what I thought, what plays we should run at certain times,” Carter said. “That instilled in me a great confidence that he trusted me. He trusted my leadership, my knowledge of the game.

“That’s something I try to do also. When we’re in the huddle, I’ll ask Deonte what he thinks and if he thinks a play I just called will work. A lot of times he’ll say, ‘No, Coach. That won’t work, let’s do this.’ And I’ll do what he suggests. The point guard sees a lot more just by being out on the floor. Coach Nance taught me to trust the point guard because a coach can only see so much from the bench.”

Burton’s gut feeling about Carter when he made his college choice has proven true the past year and a half.

“I knew he likes his point guards to be able to shoot and score and also to be able to run the team,” Burton said. “To play for him as a point guard you also have to be a leader of your team and you have to be an extension of him out on the court. That’s the most important thing. He has to know that he can trust me.”
Burton trusted Carter immediately.

“He can see what I see out there,” Burton said. “He knows what I’m thinking and he can correct all my mistakes. That’s big for me as a point guard because I know he’s experienced everything I’m experiencing out there.”

Carter was a pass-first point guard at both Crenshaw and Saint Mary’s. At Crenshaw he led the Cougars to a perfect 24-0 season his senior year and averaged 11.1 points and 6.6 assists. He did, however, score a pair of baskets in the final two minutes of the state title game to send the game into overtime.

At Saint Mary’s under coaches Bill Oates (1985-86) and Lynn Nance (1986-7 through 1988-89), he started 105 games and finished with the school’s all-time career assist record of 498 (since eclipsed by Kamran Sufi with 507). Carter’s career average of 4.45 assists a game is third in school history and his 130 career steals are fourth.

“I wasn’t the best athlete, the best shooter,” Carter said. “But I understood the game. I understood the commitment you have to have to be successful.”

“I have had many conversations with David’s high school coach, Willie West of Crenshaw, and his college coach, Lynn Nance of Saint Mary’s,” Fox said. “Both have said that David was a terrific leader on the floor because of his mind, his vision and his instincts. He was a champion because of those traits and not his pure speed and quickness. And those are the things he has been able to instill in Nevada’s players.”

Okeson might not have come to Nevada originally because of Carter. But, he says, he succeeded at Nevada because of Carter.

“If you buy into what he’s saying, the sky’s the limit,” Okeson said.