STARKVILLE – West Point High basketball coach Brad Cox believes he had a great team in 2014, one of the best in school history.
He just didn’t have a player like Newman.
Newman, then a junior, scored 35 points and made a number of game-changing plays on both ends of the court for Callaway High in a 71-56 Class 5A playoff win over West Point that night, a key step in leading the Chargers to the third of four consecutive Class 5A state championships.
In a word, Newman was dominant.
“He is the most athletic high school player I’ve ever seen,” said Cox. “He absolutely took over that game with us. He was good the whole game but in the fourth quarter, when it was a close game, he took over. He was unstoppable.”
That’s the kind of difference-maker Mississippi State’s basketball program landed when Newman chose to continue his career with the Bulldogs, a decision that was made public by Newman on Friday.
The addition of Newman, a 6-foot-3 guard who averaged 29.7 points per game as a senior, was the biggest splash yet made by new MSU coach Ben Howland, who was hired on March 21 and charged with resurrecting the program after a six-year absence from NCAA Tournament play. Signing Newman was Howland’s biggest step thus far in that direction.
“It gives us a huge shot in the arm as far as perception of the program,” said Howland, who has won 401 career games after stops at Northern Arizona, Pittsburgh and UCLA. “It’s a great day for our program because it shows that we can recruit and compete for great players.”
While Newman is projected as a one-and-done player, the term used to describe players who play one season of college basketball before declaring for the NBA Draft, his signature could serve as a catalyst for Howland, who vowed on March 22 to “Go out and get the best players in the state, the best players in the South.”
He did that on Friday.
So what does it mean for the Bulldogs, who return four starters from a team that won 13 games in 2014-15?
Plenty, according to national observers.
“We talk a lot about long-term potential in this business, but Malik’s short-term potential may be the best in this class,” said Rob Harrington, National Recruiting Analyst for Scout.com. “He projects as a dynamic freshman scorer who has all the tools to post big numbers immediately.”
Newman has scored at every level. He nearly averaged 30 points per game as a senior, and he averaged more than 25 per game for the duration of his high school career. He also averaged 24.3 points per game last summer for the Jackson Tigers, the AAU squad he played with for four years.
According to Eric Bossi, national recruiting analyst for Rivals.com, scoring just comes naturally for the ultra-gifted Newman.
“He’s as pure a scorer as there is this year,” said Bossi. “He’s great in the open floor, knows how to use his body. H’s very good with the pull-up jumper and he understands how to score.”
Scoring is one area where MSU needs immediate help. The Bulldogs averaged 61.2 points per game last season, good for 13th in the Southeastern Conference. Enter Newman, and his 37-percent shooting from three-point range over the past four seasons.
For his part, Newman believes he can make an impact early in Starkville.
“I think they’ve been a good team,” said Newman, adding “They just need one player to put them over the top. I watched them last year and they were close in a lot of games. I think I can help them get some of those wins.”
His father, former Bulldogs’ star and All-SEC standout Horatio Webster, agrees.
“He opens the game up for everybody else,” said Webster. “We watched MSU closely and they were in a lot of games. They were right there, they just didn’t have that closer to finish games out. I think he can mean a lot to that team. They have a lot of seniors, he’s stepping into a good situation.”
Back for MSU are four starters, including leading scorer Craig Sword, who Newman says “Is a great player. I think he and I will be hard to guard for a lot of teams.”
Watching from a distance, 247sports.com Director of Scouting Jerry Meyer believes the arrival of Newman and Howland will result in a different brand of MSU basketball that starts this fall.
“He is such a great overall player. On top of his offense, he defends and rebounds and does everything,” said Meyer of Newman. “I don’t see why MSU can’t be good this season and put a good product on the court. Howland can coach, and he has had a lot of success during his career.”
Hard work pays off
To a man, each observer close to Newman’s recruitment kep coming back to one factor in the guard’s development; his work ethic.
Of that, Webster couldn’t say enough.
“He has a dream,” said Webster of his son. “His dream is bigger than just going to college. He has a dream of playing at the professional level. I don’t know if he will ever get there but I know he’s going to die trying to get there. That being said, he dreams big. And when you dream big, you have to work that much harder.”
According to Webster, Newman wakes up each day at 4:30 a.m. in order to by in the gym by 5 a.m. What follows is a hectic schedule that includes “Working out, then school, then working out, then supper, then he’ll sneak off and work out. He’d do it all night if I let him.”
Newman’s propensity to work hasn’t been lost on his new coach.
“What I love about him is that he’s a gym rat,” said Howland. “He’s the kind of guy you’re going to have to say ‘please stop working out so much.’ ”
Howland isn’t the only coach with MSU ties impressed by Newman. Richard Williams recruited Webster 19 years ago, and he sees flashes of Webster’s next-level ability in Newman. He also knows where it comes from.
“What most people don’t get is how hard he works,” said Williams. “People assume all of this is just natural talent and he does have plenty of that. But what people don’t realize is that he is up at 5 a.m. every single day, he’s in the gym working on his game. He’s talented, but he has also recognized that talent and he has worked as hard as he could to turn that talent into what it is today.”
Follow Dispatch sports writer Brandon Walker on Twitter @BWonStateBeat
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