D.J. Augustin says he'll stay with Longhorns ... and time will tell
Monday, March 10, 2008
We always know who is leaving on Senior Day.
Teams all over the country give flowers to veteran players before their final home game. Cool gesture. Feel-good stuff, especially after Texas earned a share of the Big 12 regular-season title Sunday with a 62-57 win over Oklahoma State.
Earlier in the day, outgoing seniors J.D. Lewis and Ian Mooney received a nice ovation in pregame ceremonies — and they deserved it.
In big-time college basketball, the magnitude of Senior Day doesn't really impact next season's roster, because today's seniors are rarely All-Americans.
With the exception of Wake Forest's Tim Duncan, recent All-America teams have been loaded with freshmen and sophomores who ended up flocking to the pros for big bucks.
Senior Day is cool, but it's not about the seniors anymore.
At Texas, it's a certainty Lewis and Mooney will never play another game at the Erwin Center. We can't be so sure about sophomore D.J. Augustin, who's a long way from being a senior but a person who carries grad-school cachet on this team.
Augustin said last month he would return for his junior year — great news for Longhorn fans but hardly a comfort, given the recent history of superstar underclassmen at Texas.
After watching him will a sluggish Longhorn team to its 26th win Sunday — to retain the unlikely hope of earning a No. 1 seed for the NCAA tournament — we must ask ourselves: Did we just witness Augustin's final 20 points at the Erwin Center?
"I'm not looking at that,'' he said. "Right now, I'm just looking at winning this Big 12 championship and trying to win a national championship. Whatever happens at the end of the season is between me and my family. But I'm not even thinking about that right now."
I get it. We shouldn't bombard Augustin with questions about a decision he won't have to make until after the season. Still, it's a decision that can very well change the scope of UT basketball history.
Speaking of history, three past Senior Days at Texas come to mind, and their importance went far beyond the departures of players who spent the required four-year minimum on campus:
March 4, 2003: Chris Ogden, Deginald Erskin and Terrell Ross receive some Senior Day love and Texas beats Kansas State 74-60 to finish the season 13-0 at home. Sophomore guard and eventual Wooden Award winner T.J. Ford, who has told reporters he was 110 percent sure he would return for his junior season, scores 11 points and dishes out eight assists. It turns out to be his final home game. He changes his mind and turns pro following a Final Four appearance.
Nov. 12, 2005: Texas' senior class celebrates a Big 12 football title with a 66-14 win over Kansas. Heisman Trophy candidate Vince Young tosses a career-high four touchdown passes. Young has assured Mack Brown that he's coming back for one more year and Mack believes him — that is, until V.Y. rolls onto campus in a stretch limo, armed with the most anti-climactic announcement since he lost the Heisman to Reggie Bush.
Feb. 28, 2007: In arguably the most electrifying college game in the history of the Erwin Center, freshman phenom Kevin Durant scores 30 points and grabs 16 rebounds in a 98-96, double-overtime win over Texas A&M, a great sendoff for senior guard Craig Winder. Durant, who has told coach Rick Barnes and reporters of his intent to come back for another year, changes course after the season and becomes the second player picked in the 2007 NBA draft.
I won't blame Augustin one iota if he decides to leave. Fans sometimes don't realize that when a player says he's coming back, he really means it at the time he says it. But he reserves the right to change his mind.
Augustin should be given the same courtesy. Some fans bashed Young for leaving but embraced Roy Williams for staying. I've said it before: Education is important — Augustin grew up with a teacher for a mom, so he knows this — but in America, a chance to make millions is a chance to make millions.
NBA first-round is much bigger than the NFL second- or third-round money that UT early departee Jamaal Charles will likely sign for, so the financials will be a larger part of the Augustin family discussion. Add in his 5-11 height (he's generously listed at 6-0 and well past a growth spurt), and you realize the risk of injury may speed up the professional clock in his head.
Sure it's a tough decision, but the college basketball fan in me would love to see him come back. He's listed as the fourth point guard on NBAdraft.net's 2008 mock draft and could slip into the latter part of the first round, though his first-year salary would still be mounds more than most college grads will command when they enter the work force.
All said, we realize Augustin will be long gone for his class' Senior Day.
But Junior Day 2009 would be nice.
