Reynolds Keeping NBA Dreams Alive

Maybe it was the thought of the 30 teams that passed on him in the NBA Draft last June.

It could have been the inferior level of competition or the adjustment to foreign culture, cuisine and language that American players often struggle with when playing basketball overseas.

Or perhaps it was watching highlights and reading reports about players he constantly beat while in college that were playing in the NBA, players who had “made it” while he was bouncing around Italy playing in the second division of the country’s professional league.

Something was eating at Scottie Reynolds, and he knew it wasn’t the right time to give up on a dream. Not when he had unfinished business to attend to, more people to prove wrong, another obstacle to overcome in a career that has been packed full of them.

So after just four games with Prima Veroli, Reynolds returned to the United States in late October and was subsequently drafted 13th overall by the Tulsa 66ers in the NBA Developmental League Draft, then traded to the Springfield (MA) Armor.

“A lot of people wanted me to stay over in Italy,” said Reynolds, who averaged 12.8 points in his short stint with the Italian team. “So it was basically just my decision to come back.”

And so the saga shifted back stateside for the 6-foot-2 point guard who put Herndon High School on the national basketball map during a four-year varsity career that culminated with a school-record 2,306 points – seventh all-time in Virginia state history – and appearances in the AAA state championship game and McDonald’s All-American Game in 2006.

Reynolds was the first player since 1976 to go undrafted by the NBA after earning first-team All-America honors following a career at Villanova University that saw him score 2,222 career points, second most in school history, and lead the Wildcats to the 2009 Final Four. His full-court dash and game-winning layup to beat Pittsburgh and put Villanova in the national semifinals is already regarded as one of the most memorable plays in NCAA Tournament history, and only added to a four-year run at the Philadelphia school in which Reynolds was dubbed “the face of Villanova basketball” by Wildcats coach Jay Wright.

He’s been told his entire basketball career what he wasn’t: that he’s too short; too slow; can’t jump high enough; isn’t athletic enough. And yet all he has done is excel despite those doubters at every level of the game. That, the 23-year-old determined, was not going to change now just because some general managers and coaches didn’t think he could make the final jump to the highest level of the game.

He was going to do everything in his power to fulfill that dream of playing in the NBA, even if it meant leaving a six-figure salary on the table overseas in exchange for the “D-League”, which reportedly pays its players between $12,000-24,000 annually.

“Every time you step on the floor, you have an opportunity to showcase yourself to everybody,” Reynolds said of the league, which is littered with former NBA players, coaches and front office personnel. “But it’s a business. One year, you could be in the league. The next year, you’re out.

“Right now, I’m just happy to be playing ball somewhere. I’m going to keep working hard and keep representing Herndon as best I can.”

That work ethic grew legendary at Herndon and Villanova, a quality that was instilled in him at a young age by his parents, Rick and Pam Reynolds. Stories of his early-morning shooting sessions at Herndon’s gymnasium circulated around Northern Virginia and spread around the state, helping him develop into the player that averaged 34.7 points as a junior and 28.4 points as a senior, when the Hornets went 26-5, won the first Northern Region championship in program history and advanced to the state final before falling to Booker T. Washington, 55-51.

“He’s one of the few people I’ve ever known that has gotten the absolute maximum out of his ability,” said Gary Hall, the former Herndon coach who is now the head coach at Middleburg Academy. “It’s not a disappointment or embarrassment that he didn’t get drafted. If he was three inches taller, he’d be a millionaire right now.

“I’m far removed from the NBA, and I really have no real concept or knowledge of it. But I really have plenty of knowledge of Scottie, and I can’t imagine a young man of his talent and character not making it. It goes to show you that if Scottie Reynolds can’t make an NBA roster, how talented those guys are.”

Reynolds, who was scheduled to return home and his alma mater this week while both the NBA and the D-League are on their All-Star breaks, is averaging 13.7 points, 6.2 assists, 3.9 rebounds and 2.0 steals in 34.8 minutes through the Armor’s first 30 games. He is shooting 46 percent from the field and hitting 36 percent of his 3-point attempts and 81 percent of his free throws, but knows putting up good numbers alone won’t get him called up.

The focus now, Reynolds says, is on improving defensively and showing NBA scouts and coaches that he has the ability to facilitate an offense as a playmaker, an adjustment for someone who has been asked to play with a score-first mentality his entire life. The person charged with helping Reynolds improve those aspects of his game is Springfield’s head coach, Dee Brown, a 12-year NBA veteran who spent the majority of his career with the Boston Celtics.

“Every young player has to get better on the defensive end,” Brown said. “The point guard position has evolved so much over the last 20 years, so you have to find that balance on the offensive and defensive ends. But the main thing is that you have to be able to defend that position.”

Reynolds agrees: “Coach Wright helped prepare me very well for this level, and now Coach Brown is really helping me learn to read and see defenses, especially in the pick and roll. He’s helping me to see what other player’s defenders are doing, not just my guy.

“My role is to run the team and manufacture shots for my teammates. I guess you could say I’m directing traffic out there, putting everybody in spots where they need to be.”

Once he has proven that he’s sharpened those parts of his game, Reynolds and Brown both feel a call from an NBA team will follow. Many D-League players are given 10-day contracts by NBA teams to fill a roster spot when a player is injured, traded or released, and it’s during that short stint where players audition for permanent roster spots, be it with the team that signed them or with another team that took notice during his call-up.

“There are a lot of teams inquiring about him, especially teams looking for a young point guard who could jump right in there and run an offense,” Brown said. “Teams keep an eye on him just because of his profile. A lot of guys get called up this time of the year in February and March right around the time for the playoff push. Teams want to get an idea of who they potentially might want to invite to camp, and guys who potentially might help them.”

Brown, who is in his second year as the Armor head coach after previously coaching in the WNBA, has been impressed by the work his latest protégé has put in during their four-plus months together.

“He’s willing to get better,” Brown said. “People said when he came in, ‘Well, he may have an attitude because he was a first-team All-American and didn’t get drafted’. But he has been just the opposite. He’s a very humble kid, and I think is willing to work hard and work on his game.

“You see guys with those numbers coming out of college, and they come in and don’t work, but that hasn’t been the case.”

Hall, who keeps in touch with Reynolds regularly, thinks this latest obstacle may help his former player in the long run, serving as the last bit of motivation he needs to push him to the next level.

“Maybe this will help him to get back to his roots a little bit,” Hall said. “Not that he needs to be humbled, but he was kind of a rock star here at Herndon. And then he was on the national stage playing in the Big East and at Villanova. Maybe this is a way to humble him a little bit, but he can’t lose his edge. If he loses his edge, he’s just another player.

“I think we’ll find out in the next six months to a year how much Scottie really wants it.”

* Editor's Note: Reynolds was one of four players added to the rosters who played in Saturday's D-League All-Star Game in Los Angeles. He also participated in the event's 3-point contest on Friday night.