It takes a certain type of player to be a point guard.
They have to be unselfish, but also control the ball most of the game.
They have to remember the ins and outs of every play in the playbook, but also have a short memory.
They have know where every teammate likes to get the ball, and when, but also know exactly when it’s time to call their own number.
It’s perhaps the biggest, most demanding job in high school boys basketball, and yet it’s usually handled by the smallest person on the court.
As Port Angeles head coach Wes Armstrong said, there’s a reason why so many players opt out of the point guard position if given the chance.
The amount of responsibility rarely matches the level of credit given.
And the pressure? It’s omnipresent, especially when a player takes over the job for the first time at the varsity level.
“It’s a huge step,” said Armstrong, himself a point guard during his playing days.
“You’re going to make a lot of mistakes. The game is a lot quicker. You’re playing against better people.
“There’s a lot of growing pains that come your first year. It’s baptism by fire.”
Loaded with veterans
Luckily for several teams on the North Olympic Peninsula, they won’t have to go looking for any volunteers this winter.
Four of the five A schools in the area are starting a senior point guard with varsity experience.
Cameron Braithwaite will start at the position for the second straight season in Port Angeles.
Meanwhile, Jonah Penn is entering his third year at the point for Forks, and Quinn Eldridge his fourth with Chimacum.
And while Sequim’s Evan Hill is starting for the first time, he was the first or second player off the bench last year.
“It’s important to have a returning point guard. Everybody needs it,” Forks head coach Scott Justus said. “It’s hard to be good without somebody that can run the show.”
‘Combo’ vs. ‘Pure’
Few know better than Justus.
Both of his state-level Spartan teams were built upon superb point guard play, albeit from opposing styles of play in Kasey Ulin in 1999-2000 and his son, Jordan, in 2004-20 06.
Ulin was the do-it-all “combo” guard who scored in bunches, then made plays for his teammates.
Jordan, on the other hand, was a traditional “true” point guard who looked to get his team into its offensive sets first. Scoring came second.
Each style works — the Spartans went to state five times with those two players — yet coaches often differ on which one they prefer if given the choice.
Count Sequim head coach Greg Glasser in the category that prefers the latter, which is perfect since he’ll likely get exactly that from Evan Hill.
“One of the first things I talked to him about was just being able to get the ball into our offense and get it moving, scoring is secondary,” Glasser said.
“We talked about not only knowing your strengths and weaknesses but your teammates’ too, where they like the ball and who should be getting the shots at certain times.
“That’s what I’m going to challenge him to do.”
As easy as that might sound, it most certainly isn’t, especially at the varsity level.
Not only is the speed of the game intensified, so, too, is the pressure.
Varsity ball-handlers often get checked five to 10 feet above the 3-point line, and rarely do they get room to breath when looking to set up their teammates.
Thus, a task as simple as getting the offense moving can be quite a challenge.
Setting up shooters with passes where they can catch and shoot in rhythm is another thing all-together.
“You have to be a lot better at ball handling at the varsity level,” said Braithwaite, who had a 1-to-1 assist-to-turnover ratio last winter.
“You can’t just bring the ball down, and you’ve got to be controlled with it, and you’ve got to know when to pass it and when to jump stop and what not.
“It was a big step up [last year]. I wasn’t really ready for it at first. In the first game, I didn’t realize how good everyone would be at the varsity level.
“But you get used to it and you start playing at that higher level.”
Supreme athlete
If there is a definitive pure point guard mold, Braithwaite certainly fits it.
The 5-foot-9 senior is often the best athlete on the floor.
He was the Rider football team’s leading receiver before he tore his MCL in October. As a junior last spring, he went to state in four events — high jump, long jump, triple jump and javelin — in track and field.
Yet rarely, if ever, does he use that athleticism to look for his own shot.
Rather, he focuses on setting up his teammates on offense and locking down the other team’s point guard on the other end.
In fact, Armstrong and his coaches often find themselves prodding Braithwaite to shoot more than he does.
“He’s so doggone unselfish and we’re telling him at times that he needs to be a little more selfish,” Armstrong said. “I like my point guard to be a threat as well, especially with his quickness and penetrating ability.
“He also understands that his primary role is to get the offense set up and be the quarterback on the basketball floor.”
It’s a fine balance for point guards, knowing when to set others up and when to attack.
Those who saw Port Townsend’s Dakotah Pine pilot the Redskins’ ship during their run to third place in Class 1A in 2009 witnessed a player who had mastered the art.
Of course, that took three years of varsity experience to refine.
“I don’t think there’s anything you can substitute for experience,” Pine said back in 2009.
“For a point guard, what you really need is experience to be able to run the team and be effective.”
The intangibles
There is one other thing as well.
It’s something that can’t necessarily be calculated or put in a boxscore; a competitive intangible and mental toughness that Armstrong said he always wants from his points.
“I always look at how they handle adversity, if they can handle when things aren’t going so well, how they handle it,” Armstrong said.
“Are they going to make sure that the bleeding stops?
“The bad things that are happening, is he going to be the calming presence on the floor to making sure that we get that good possession on the offensive end?
“To me that is one of the most important things a point guard has to have, is be able to overcome that adversity.
“That’s why there’s a lot of people that don’t want to be a point guard. They’d rather be the two- or three-guard shooting 3s.”
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Sports reporter Matt Schubert can be reached at 360-417-3526 or matt.schubert@peninsuladailynews.com.