Ex-Falcon waits for his turn at OSU
COLUMBUS - Five months after blowing out of Bowling Green and transferring to Ohio State to better prepare himself for an NBA career, Ron Lewis hasn't readjusted his goal.
He is still focused on playing pro basketball, although the 6-4 guard won't even take the court for the Buckeyes until next season.
"That's the main reason I'm playing basketball, to get to the NBA," Lewis said recently.
Ironically, it was that same "me-first" attitude that forced Lewis to leave - or get run out of - Bowling Green in mid-August.
Lewis was a better-than-average player for the Falcons, no doubt. He scored 877 points in two years (14.6 per game) while starting 55 of 60 games. And he was a second-team All-Mid-American Conference pick last season after making the all-freshman team the year before.
But Lewis, BG's leading scorer a year ago, was more concerned with pumping up his own stats - perhaps for the minuscule number of NBA scouts who attend MAC games - than he was with winning. That did not sit well with coach Dan Dakich, whose Falcons are flourishing in the MAC (11-4, 5-2) this year, despite not having the talented but temperamental Lewis in their nest.
"I have no interest in talking about somebody that isn't helping us now," Dakich said yesterday.
Dakich prefers to leave the talking to Lewis, for now. However, Lewis had a few things to say about Dakich, the guy who recruited him and Brookhaven High School teammate Raheem Moss, who also has since left the BG program and transferred to Cleveland State.
"Me and Dakich, we never got into it - it was nothing like that," Lewis said. "It was just me and my decision of trying to get somewhere as a point guard. The way he was, I really didn't like his style of coaching. It wasn't fitting my game.
"He let me do so many things with the basketball, but he wasn't letting me do it to my maximum abilities."
Dakich, a no-nonsense guy who played and coached for Bob Knight at Indiana, chuckled when Lewis' words were relayed to him.
"If a certain guy or person doesn't like your style of basketball, you know you're doing it right," he said.
Lewis, a junior with two years of eligibility remaining, said Dakich wished him good luck when he asked for his release from Bowling Green last summer, but the two have not talked since. Lewis also said that Dakich "taught me discipline while I was there."
Well, if both of those statements are true, you have to wonder why Lewis high-tailed it out of town so quickly.
"It was just a spur-of-the-moment thing where I thought it was the best move for me," he said. "It was just my mind-set. I didn't want to be somewhere where I was not going to be happy and not loving everything about the game. And it was tougher to get to the NBA from there."
Tough, but not impossible.
Antonio Daniels and Keith McLeod have both proved in the last 10 years that you can get to the NBA from Bowling Green. And McLeod proved that you can excel under Dakich's direction as a shooting guard and make it to the pros, as long as you have mental toughness and are a team player.
Lewis is hoping for a fresh start at Ohio State, which is counting on him to run its offense next season. He has been practicing with the Buckeyes for three months now, but on game nights, he sits on the end of the bench in a well-tailored suit. Lewis has become the best cheerleader money can't buy at Ohio State, which has an ongoing NCAA basketball investigation hanging over its head, as well as this season's self-imposed, one-year postseason ban.
"It's odd not playing this year, but I'm loving the atmosphere here," Lewis said. "It's a joyous atmosphere. The coaches are good to me.
"The players are fun. I love the players. It's just been a good feeling coming back home."
Lewis grew up less than 15 minutes from Ohio State's campus. He helped lead Brookhaven to the state title as a senior in 2002, when he averaged 19 points and 10 rebounds a game.
He is the first recruit signed by new coach Thad Matta at Ohio State.
"I like coach Matta's up-tempo style of basketball," Lewis said. "The team plays together and they run the floor a lot. Nobody's clogged up. I like that style of basketball a lot.
"I also like that we're playing in an NBA-like arena and we're playing in the Big Ten. It's a better conference than the MAC because you're playing against some of the best competition in the country every night." Ironically, that might just make Lewis' path to the NBA even tougher.
