This is the fourth of our “Meet the Jays” segments featuring the 2009-2010 Creighton Bluejays men’s basketball players. Join us as we profile a different scholarship player each day leading up to the season opener at Dayton on November 14.
Antoine Young made his debut as the starting point guard for the Creighton Bluejays Wednesday night in the exhibition opener against Missouri Western State. As we discussed in our profile of Andrew Bock the other day, whoever plays point guard for Dana Altman has large shoes and history to fill. Young told White & Blue Review about the work he put in during the offseason to improve his condition and change his shot.
“My conditioning was pretty good, I got stronger. We are a lot stronger than we were last season. The conditioning helped out a lot. In high school we ran all the time with Coach Woodard (Bellevue West HS coach), but the lifting part has really helped. I worked on just shooting it a lot better, just a little better stroke than I had last year.”
Last season, Young was slowly introduced into some playing time behind Josh Dotzler and Cavel Witter. However as the season went along, Young was doing some nice things in the limited minutes he had and Coach Altman started working him into games more due to his defense and his driving ability building his confidence. By January, he played his most minutes in the season at 24 against Indiana State. And by mid-February, Young had his biggest game scoring going 6-of-14 from the field for 15 points against Evansville. When the season ended, he was named to the All-MVC Bench team. He learned a lot from Dotzler, his former high school and college teammate.
“I just took things game by game and day by day in practice experience and just learned the environment, how to be in that environment. How to handle it. I just watched Josh [Dotzler] while he was in and how he handled it. “
This year Young is excited to get the season started.
“I’m ready to play. I’m ready to have a good time. We are practicing right now and all we are worried about is practicing and we are trying to get better day by day. I think right now is the best time.”
Being the first high school freshman commitment to the Jays, the star from Bellevue West is very familiar with this team, as was his predecessor Dotzler. And while only a sophomore, Young’s been around Altman and the offense enough to have an upperclassman’s understanding of what the Bluejays want to do and how to do it. As the only sophomore on the roster it will be his job over the next couple of seasons to pass the traditions and expectations to his teammates. The opportunity to lead the team has Young pretty excited.
“You have got to be excited about that. It should be a fun time and if I get to do that it should make it even more exciting.”
Young’s debut went pretty well Wednesday. He dished 4 assists without a turnover in 17 minutes of action, adding 5 points and knocking down a 3-pointer. Come watch Young and the rest of the Bluejays wrap up the exhibition portion of their schedule Sunday afternoon against Nebraska-Omaha.
