The Rams have their leader back at last
KINGSTON, R.I. – Dawan Robinson feels a little different than he did a year ago. That may be putting it mildly, but talk to him for even a couple of minutes and you can sense that what he said after Saturday’s 77-69 win over in-state rival Providence is genuine.
Robinson scored 18 points, all in the second half, while handing out five assists and getting four steals to key the victory. He scored some of those points at just the right time as well, scoring 11 straight Ram points in the final minutes to take them from a 67-65 deficit to a 76-69 lead. For good measure, he drew a key charge at the defensive end and got the rebound that led to the possession where he gave the Rams the lead for good. It all sounds like the Dawan Robinson of two years ago, when he blossomed into one of the Atlantic 10’s best guards.
“This is one of the best feelings I’ve ever had,” said the senior guard. “It’s my breakout game, and we got a big win against a big team, so it’s just a great feeling right now.”
Those words may seem hard to believe coming from someone who has played in the NIT twice in his career. Sure, it was a rivalry game, but the NIT is still the postseason. But there’s a reason why it’s easy to believe him when he says that.
In between his team’s second NIT trip and Saturday was a time period that seemed longer than it was for the native of Philadelphia. Saturday was his third game back from a 60-day suspension resulting from an incident at a bar in September, an incident that is comparatively quite minor in his comeback story. The crux of it would be his struggles of last year, when a foot injury limited him to just one minute. He missed the first eight games with a stress fracture, then re-injured it a minute into his first game back. The pain was so bad, he knew it meant the end of the season right after it happened.
But the injury was only part of the difficulty. He also lost his grandmother and grandfather three weeks apart early in the season, which naturally took quite a toll on him. It’s easy to figure that he was at a low point, and he describes last year as “ridiculous” in terms of what was thrown at him. Add that to being away from the game he loves, and the feeling he had is unmistakable.
“It’s depressing,” Robinson said of last year. “You see your team lose game after game to teams that you know you would usually destroy.”
He didn’t have to look far for support during the hard times. His parents and siblings were instrumental in helping him through the hard times, and his teammates and coaches played no small role as well. Baron could see the effects of everything on him, and knows how hard he had to work to get back to this point. Robinson also spoke of the support of students at the school, where they know he’s been through a lot just in the past year.
Amidst the tough times, he kept working in the classroom, and he graduated in May with a bachelor’s degree in communications studies. He is now pursuing a masters degree and hopes to one day get into sports broadcasting. The degree certainly shined a bright light on an otherwise difficult year.
“It felt good because the one thing that I always wanted to provide for my family is a college degree,” he reflected. “I feel as though I fulfilled one of my other dreams that I had coming into college.”
There was no doubt he would be back. Robinson’s work ethic isn’t questionable; he’s been known to shoot a thousand jumpers a day. Watch him play, and his competitiveness is unmistakable. He also understands the importance of working hard; evidence is his constant shooting paying off, as he shot just over 26 percent from three-point land as a sophomore and improved to over 40 percent as a junior. So he wasn’t going away; the only question was how long it would be before he would look like the Dawan Robinson of 2003-04.
The comeback from the injury hasn’t been all rosy, and that’s not simply because he didn’t play his best basketball in his first two games back. After the injury, he figured to be able to work out in the spring at full speed to start preparing for this season, but while conditioning, he fractured the foot again. That held him back until late in the summer, when he was finally able to go at full speed.
In his first game back against Brown, he clearly looked a little overeager. He tried to do too much at times, and the results weren’t there at all as he often got bottled up trying to drive to the basket. Though he played 31 minutes, he wasn’t himself at all in terms of overall effectiveness. He was excited to be back on the court – a little too excited, he said after the game. Being the competitor that he is, he knew he didn’t play well and it weighed on him afterwards.
“Ever since that game, I’ve been killing myself, waking up in the middle of the night like, ‘come on, I gotta get back at it’,” he reflected after his second game back.
He was better against Boston University, but in his first two games back he missed all four of his three-point attempts and had four assists and 12 turnovers. So when he came up with his big game on Saturday, the natural inclination to think it just happened to be the time when it all came together for him may not suffice. Apparently, there was another explanation after all.
“I just talked to my grandparents,” he said after the game. “I lost two very important people in my life last year, so I just prayed to my grandparents, asked them to touch me and lead me, and I feel as though they did.
“It was tough and real personal for me today. With me losing two important people in my life, it was just a personal thing for me today.”
The engaging and charismatic guard is clearly happy to be back on the court and in a different place now. His confidence is clearly there, his knowledge of the game shows, and he’s leading the team almost as if he was never gone in the first place. Further evidence was his guarantee of a win on Saturday, one he backed up with his play.
Now that the Rams have their leader back, it looks like they could be in a better place than they were last year as well. After struggling mightily last season, they are currently 4-1 on the season and look to be coming together more each game. The team is ecstatic to have its leader back in action, and after Saturday’s game, it’s not hard to see why.
“The difference in the second half was Dawan Robinson,” Baron said after the game. “He’s our quarterback, he’s been our leader and the guy that’s really stepped up on the defensive end, as well as the offensive end, he got us going. He won that game for us.”
