SUAVE HOUSE

They came from all over -- driving layups, jumpers from the baseline and around the key, high-arcing bombs from three-point country, and a whole bunch of free throws.

A shot chart in the local newspaper following Eddie House's 61-point smackdown on Cal Berkeley illustrated just how dominant the Arizona State guard was on the night of January 8.  And how dangerous he is every night he steps on the floor.

"I don't want to sound like I'm arrogant or anything like that," the 21-year-old says, "but I always had felt that once I get going it's pretty hard to stop me."

House's unstoppable outburst in the double-OT thriller tied to a 33-year-old Pac-10 record set by Lew Alcindor in '67.  That's Kareem Abdul-Jabbar for you younger readers out there.  But the game itself was not nearly as meaningful to his season and his pro aspirations as the BYU game was a month earlier.  A game in which the 6-1 senior went a John Starks-like 0-for-16.

"It made me take a step in the right direction as far as my work ethic," House explains of that forgettable December outing.  "I started working a lot harder in practice.  I started running a lot harder when we were running sprints; I was trying to win every race...I started doing stuff like that."

That extra stuff, combined with a challenge from his coach Rob Evans "about not wallowing in mediocrity," has driven House ever since.  In the month following his "0-fer" in Provo, Utah, Eddie earned three consecutive Pac-10 Player-of-the-Week honors, and recorded 46 and 42-point performances to go with his 61.

But House isn't just about scoring.  In fact, two of his main goals this season were to break ASU's career record for steals and to hold anyone he was assigned to guard to 10 points or less.

"I think Milwaukee Bucks coach George Karl said it best, 'Don't be a scorer, be a basketball player,'" says House, whose biggest goal is to lead the Sun Devils back to the NC2A Tourney, "and that's what I'm trying to do, be a complete basketball player."

Jeramie McPeek
SLAM magazine April '00