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JASON HUNT / AP Micah Downs of Gonzaga gets past the defense of Jamie Jones of Portland. After transferring from Kansas, Downs has become an key part of the Zags' run to the postseason. |
Seattle Times staff reporter
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Micah Downs a rock of stability during troubled times?
The same Micah Downs known best for attending seven different high schools in four years (a journey that ended at Juanita), then bolting Kansas after 13 games?
At Gonzaga, they had heard about that Micah Downs when he arrived last winter, and they were admittedly a little wary.
Downs was allowed on the team as a walk-on at first, forced to take out loans his first semester that he says he's still paying off, before a scholarship opened up. Some college basketball observers figured that was a smart move on Gonzaga's part, that he wouldn't be there that long, anyway.
But here it is, 15 months later, and Downs is not only still around, but regarded as a key reason Gonzaga was able to survive the loss of Josh Heytvelt and qualify for a ninth straight NCAA tournament appearance. Gonzaga will play Indiana at approximately 7 p.m. Thursday in Sacramento.
"He's really stepped up as a player and really stepped up as a person and become a good teammate and someone we can really depend on on the floor," said Gonzaga junior forward David Pendergraft.
When things loomed darkest for the Zags this season, after Heytvelt was arrested for possession of hallucinogenic mushrooms and then suspended indefinitely, the kid who once complained after the McDonald's All-American Game that he didn't play enough became one of Gonzaga's guiding lights.
The versatile 6-foot-8 swingman averaged almost 16 points in Gonzaga's last five games — after never scoring more than nine. He grabbed an average of seven rebounds and made 12 of 30 three-pointers in those games, as the Bulldogs clinched the West Coast Conference regular-season title then won the conference tournament.
"He's been huge," said Gonzaga coach Mark Few. "Through adversity comes opportunity, and he has seized it."
Along the way, Downs said, he's found a home.
"I'm settling in really well," he said. "I love it here. I feel like I'm in a family here, so it's nice."
Family, of course, has always been a big part of Downs' story.
His father, Steven, is a carpenter who moved around a lot to support the family, part of the reason Micah earned a reputation as a basketball vagabond, attending two schools in Las Vegas as a freshman and three in Nevada and Montana as a sophomore before enrolling at Bothell as a junior and Juanita as a senior. Basketball, however, seemed at the root of several of the moves.
The reputation was enhanced when Downs then left Kansas two months into his freshman season. When Downs left Kansas, Steven Downs released a statement saying Micah needed to "resolve some of his issues" which could best be done "being closer to home."
Since then, however, Downs and his father have had what Micah describes as "a tough go," reportedly not speaking for months.
Steven Downs still hasn't been to any of Micah's Gonzaga games, and Micah said being on his own "has definitely been a good thing for me. I'm not depending on anybody. It's helping me mature and grow as a person and really understand what type of person I am and what I can do out here."
He said that kind of opportunity was what he was looking for when he sought out Gonzaga after leaving Kansas. He left the Jayhawks, he said vaguely, "because it just wasn't a fit for me."
Though his father told one local newspaper at the time that Micah was considering transferring to UW, that was apparently never an option on either end, and Downs said he immediately thought only of Gonzaga, which he said was his second choice out of high school.
"They've had a lot of transfers come here and be successful and that helped my decision," he said.
He showed his eagerness to come to Gonzaga by paying his own way at the start. But the transition wasn't easy. He admittedly struggled with what he said are "a little tougher" classes at Gonzaga than he found at Kansas. And he told the Spokesman-Review recently that he was close to being ineligible and was at "a low point in my life" due to the struggles with the change. He said he has since begun to get comfortable with his course work, majoring in sports management and with a minor in journalism.
Few and Pendergraft each said it didn't help Downs that he came in at mid-semester, a time of the season when the rest of the team was more worried about winning games than accepting a new teammate.
"It was hard for him trying to fit in with an established group," Few said.
His on-court arrival was further delayed when he had surgery in November to repair a stress fracture in his foot, an injury of unknown origin.
Downs didn't make his Gonzaga debut until Jan. 13 and saw limited action for a while, including a five-minute, two-foul outing in a loss at Loyola Marymount on Feb. 5, the last game Heytvelt played. Since then, he has averaged 22 minutes.
"They are asking me to score, rebound and defend and I really like it that way," Downs said.
Though 15 months isn't a lifetime, even encompassing two Spokane winters, Downs appears to be quieting some of the skeptics. But he said that isn't important.
"I've moved around a lot, but I don't feel I have to prove anything to anybody, that I have to stay somewhere," Downs said. "It's just that Gonzaga is the perfect fit for me. I wouldn't want to go anywhere else."
And for now, that means even the NBA. Two months after signing with Kansas, Downs told the Times he intended to declare for the NBA draft, a proclamation that caught the Jayhawks off guard and seemed to set in motion his rocky tenure.
"That's always been a dream of mine," Downs said. "Hopefully, someday. But I'm going to be here for a while."