Rob Edwards stood near the baseline of ASU’s Weatherup Center in his socks. His white shoes were clasped, soles together, in front of him. It represents, too, what Edwards wants to do with the information he’s acquired about ASU’s six newcomers -- keep it close to the vest.
Edwards missed most of the Sun Devils summer and preseason practices with a lingering back injury that dates back to the beginning of last season. Nonetheless, it gave him time to scout … his new teammates.
ASU’s senior guard isn’t one for highlight tapes. “It’s just highlights. It’s all the good stuff.” Instead of scouring YouTube for tape on ASU’s 2019 Signing Class, he waited until they arrived in Tempe until he could stand right next to them and actually see what they were about -- both on and off the court.
He admitted there was one unnamed player he “wanted to find the background” of but other than that, he learned from the court. When the six newcomers finally started practicing, Edwards said, things got chippy. Not physical, but chippy.
The Sun Devils didn’t understand each other. Weren’t sure about each other’s personalities, tendencies, or emotions. In the beginning, it showed.
“(The practices were) competitive but less of competing. Chippy, that’s a great word I would use for it,” Edwards said, before explaining how things have changed. “Now it’s more so competitive, like all basketball.
“We had to understand people. Some people will bark and that gets them going and some people just play hard.”
Edwards describes it as almost like an interview. Not that the six ASU newcomers were asked for the resume or needed specific qualifications. But they were asked questions that helped their more experienced teammates figure them out.
Call it interviewing, call it vetting, call it whatever. But ASU’s veteran brass wanted to understand who their new teammates -- Alonzo Verge, Khalid Thomas, Jaelen House, Jalen Graham, Caleb Christopher, and Andre Allen -- were.
“We did have a lot of new guys come in and we just have to figure them out and figure out their why, like why they do it and why they’re here and what they want from it,” Edwards said. “Little things like that that will help us understand them better so if we get on the court, it’s like I trust you.”
Kimani Lawrence also declined to share his scouting report on ASU’s newest sextet of scholarship players. All he would say is Thomas is a really good shooter. House is really quick. Verge is a good scorer. And Allen plays really hard.
“They all bring something different to the court,” he said.
But unlike Edwards, Lawrence has had time to practice alongside them. In that period, he’s tried to become acutely aware of the intricacies of each’s game. Where they like to score from. Where they want the ball. How hard they play. What’s their intensity like on defense.
He’s been impressed so far -- as most expected. Coach Bobby Hurley’s 2019 class, headlined by four-star prospects Verge, Thomas, and House, ranked 21st in the nation. And with the offseason departures of Zylan Cheatham, Luguentz Dort and De’Quan Lake, they will likely forge important roles on a squad looking to return to the NCAA Tournament for the third straight year.
The competitiveness, Edwards, and Lawrence said, is already there. It’s become a tradition around the second week of September that the basketball players do a one-mile hike around a mountain adjacent to Hurley’s house.
“It’s a hike,” Lawrence said. “But you have the option to run.”
House ran. Hurley said the 6-foot-2 freshman finished in 5 minutes and 15 seconds “and hardly took a deep breath,” the Sun Devil coach joked.
For junior forward Romello White, the newcomers have been a blessing. The fresh faces and his now veteran status has forced him to step away from his soft-spoken personality. He’s had to become vocal. Not necessarily the rah-rah-guy, but rather someone who everyone could talk to.
As White quickly pointed out why he’s good in the role: “I’m just chill.”
Perhaps he is. But in 2019, White tried to know his teammates as brothers and part of that brotherhood is understanding who they are, what they’ve gone through and what some of their life stories are.
If the Sun Devils were hiring, White would be in charge of the interviews. After speaking with all the newcomers, here’s what the 6-foot-8, 235-pound forward said of each:
PF Jalen Graham (6-foot-9, Mountain Pointe HS (AZ), Three-star)
“He’s real quiet. He told me he’s real quiet and is kind of shy in person and doesn’t like all the extra attention. But he’s been joking with us now. He switched all that.”
PF Khalid Thomas (6-foot-9, College of Southern Idaho, Four-star)
“I don’t know much about him but we’re still cool. I go to his house all the time. It’s him, Kimani, Tae (Taeshon Cherry), they all live in the same complex. I go over there all the time. I’m probably going to go over there after this.”
PG Jaelen House (6-foot-1, Shadow Mountain HS (AZ), Four-star)
“Just about what he went through growing up. His dad being Eddie House and he was like, ‘People have been saying that the only reason he got here is because of his dad and I was like, ‘Yeah, bro, that’s not true.’ He’s been coming out here and trying to prove himself and I feel like he’s really going to prove that, that he belongs here.”
PF Andre Allen (6-foot-9, Arizona Western CC, Three-star)
“Andre has been doing great.”
SG Alonzo Verge (6-foot-3, Moberly Area CC (Missouri), Four-star)
“He told me that he’s trying to come in and really dominate this year and show people what he’s really about. He’s been doing his thing, passing great.”
SG Caleb Christopher (6-foot-0, Hillcrest Prep (AZ), Two-star):
“He’s been telling me that he and his brother (Josh Christopher, a five-star prospect being recruited by ASU) are really, really close. Like it’s hard sometimes not being with him because he says that’s his best friend. And he’s just been telling me about Cali.”
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