He plays an old man's game, one the customers remember, but the current players have never seen. When David West was a kid, his father would point at the TV screen and tell him, “Don't play like Magic. Play like James Worthy.”

        Don't be like Mike, Amos West said. Don't even try. Be like Horace Grant. You can be Horace Grant.

        David West is the best basketball player in the city, even if his game reminds you of winged-tips, canvas sneakers and cars with chrome on them. “When I was growing up, other kids were learning how to crossover dribble,” West said Sunday. “My dad was teaching me how to play defense. He'd say, "Watch your man's waist.'”

        Xavier
eased past LaSalle 81-66. West had 25 points and 14 rebounds. He made 9 of 11 shots. It was the best scoring day of his college life. He made it look like he was attending a piano recital.

Smooth and smart
               West is an anachronism. In an age of runners and dunkers, West plays smart. He's smooth. He sets screens, he moves without the ball. He rebounds not by leaping — “He's not a flying Wallendas act,” offers Skip Prosser — but by knowing angles. West is usually where he needs to be.

        “It's like he can read things before they happen. It's an understanding of the game that you can't teach,” says XU assistant Mark Schmidt, who works with the Muskies' big men.

        In the first minute Sunday, West flashed from the post to set a screen for Romain Sato. Sato rolled off the pick and drained a 3-pointer. “That's Dave,” Schmidt said. “Guys like giving him the ball because he's not the Black Hole in there.”

        Amos West's favorite player was Sam Jones. If you're not yet 40, Sam Jones was a high-scoring guard on some of the best basketball teams ever invented, the 1960s Boston Celtics. Jones could shoot, but he also recognized the importance of a well-aimed pass that wasn't choreographed for TV by the Bolshoi Ballet.

        “That's what my dad taught,” West said. “Make the fundamental play.”

Layup as good as a dunk
               Isn't it hard now, someone wondered, when athletes are “entertainers” and every game is a performance, to play basketball like Sam Jones, who wore black canvas high-tops? Don't you have an urge to style?

        “Not at all,” West said. “So what if you can dunk? I can make a layup. It's still two points.” (For the record, the 6-foot-8 West can dunk. He even has a tattoo on his arm, standard fare for the hip-hop legions, but you have to really look to find it.)

        Xavier is growing into its potential game by game. The Muskies have won six in a row, four of them on the road. In that time, West has averaged 20 points and 12 rebounds, even as teams have sagged their defenses around him.

        On Sunday, Xavier got five 3-pointers from Sato and a 12-assist floor game from Maurice McAfee. If West gets some outside scoring help, who knows how much offense he'll produce?

        XU coaches want less finesse from him. They want West taking more charges and fewer fadeaway shots. They'd like him to block more shots. These are small things, refinements for a sophomore who has improved frighteningly quickly.

        “He's very efficient,” Prosser said. Just like your father's Oldsmobile. It wasn't flashy. But it was a very nice ride.

        Paul Daugherty welcomes your comments at 768-8454.
       

Xavier Stories

Xavier 81, LaSalle 66 DAUGHERTY: XU's West no flash in the pan McAfee is winning the battle

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