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Hughes, one of the nation's top freshmen, was a recruiting coup for Saint Louis.
(Phil Huber)
| Larry Hughes,
Saint
Louis
Class: Freshman
Position:
Guard
Height: 6'5"
Weight: 185
DOB: Jan. 23,
1979
Hometown: St.
Louis
High
School: Christian Brothers
Academy
Vital
Stats: 21.4 points per game, 5.1 rebounds, 2.4 assists,
2.1 steals
by David
Seigerman
The first rule of recruiting is to harvest your own
backyard. That's especially the case when the would-be
beneficiary is a mid-major program that may be one player
away from making a peep on the national scene. Memphis kept
Anfernee Hardaway at home and came within one game of the
Final Four. Shea Seals stayed in Tulsa and took his
hometown Hurricanes to back-to-back Sweet 16
showings.
After allowing outsiders to pluck Chris Carrawell, Loren
Woods and Jahidi White in recent years (from a single high
school, nontheless), Saint Louis University simply
had to land Larry Hughes. Truth is, it was probably the
easiest recruiting effort of Charlie Spoonhour's
career.
Hughes, a McDonald's All America and top 10 point guard
prospect, never thought much about leaving St. Louis. He
spurned overtures from Syracuse and Michigan because he
refused to leave his single mother, Vanessa, alone to care
for his 11-year-old brother, Justin. Born with a defective
heart valve, Justin went into cardiac arrest the last week
of 1996. On Jan. 2, 1997, Hughes waited at his mother's
side while Justin received a heart transplant, the gift of
life from a 16-year-old girl who had been killed in a car
accident.
Though he suffered brain damage after the transplant,
Justin has recovered enough to become a regular around the
Saint Louis basketball program. He didn't miss a single
home game as his older brother emerged as the leading
scorer in Conference USA and the primary reason the
Billikens are back in the NCAA Tournament for the first
time since 1995—and for only the fifth time in school
history. "I liked the idea of [my family] being able
to see every one of my games and be at the locker room
afterward," Hughes
says.
Spoonhour, of course, is ecstatic about the way his
cornerstone recruit has blossomed despite the family
turmoil and the media scrutiny afforded hometown heroes.
"He brings a maturity most people don't associate with
freshmen," Spoonhour says. "He's pretty
comfortable with himself."
Hughes made the transition to college basketball with such
comfort that he now faces a barrage of questions regarding
his NBA plans. "It's a question that's asked so many
times a day by everybody you can think of—friends,
classmates, professors, everybody who recognizes me,"
Hughes says. "I tell them I don't know, which is the
only answer I can give them right now. Our focus is on this
team, this season and how many games we can
win."
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