ISU Finds A Diamond In Hamilton

AMES, Iowa- The thought of Justin Hamilton starting in his freshman season at a Big 12 school is downright mind-boggling. He didn't even pick up a basketball until he was 15 years old. After some conversations with his father, Larry, Hamilton decided to give basketball a try prior to his sophomore season in high school. Three years later, Hamilton is starting at Iowa State, providing a positive glimpse into the future of Cyclone basketball.

The Cyclone big man from Alpine, Utah was in the midst of major growth spurt in his freshman season in high school. With no basketball experience whatsoever, Hamilton made an important decision to try out for the basketball team. It didn't go smooth at first. He sat on the bench on the junior varsity team as a sophomore, receiving virtually no playing time. As a junior, he played entirely on the junior varsity and dressed for varsity games, but didn't play much.

“My dad decided since I was 6-7 that I should just try out for the team and I felt like I could be good at it, so I just decided to try out,” Hamilton said. “I grew and I just kept on growing. I kept working on my game and just kept playing. I knew if I worked as hard as I could, I would reach the highest possibilities. I knew if I kept on working I would get better.”

Hamilton's prophecy was proving to be accurate, as things changed prior to his senior season. After sprouting to 6-11 and 220 pounds, Hamilton played in various summer AAU tournaments with his high school teammates. College coaches started to notice the raw recruit and were intrigued by his potential despite his lack of experience. One of those coaches was ISU head coach Greg McDermott.

“We were in a situation at the time where we thought we could roll the dice with him,” McDermott said. “When you're going to roll the dice with a scholarship, you might as well do it with someone that's 6-11. He was a guy that had size, a great work ethic, could run the floor and seemed to have good hands. I thought we'd take a chance, thinking he was a likely redshirt, and if he was going to play, it would be in his third year. Because his recruitment was only with low and mid-majors, there weren't any high-major schools that were overly involved besides us. It's just one of those recruiting stories that happens to you every once and awhile.”

So with a letter-intent to ISU in hand, Hamilton entered his senior season at Lone Peak High School (Highland, Utah) with virtually zero minutes of varsity playing time. Lone Peak is one of the best high school programs in the state of Utah and it had a loaded roster for the 2007-08 season. Three of his teammates received Division I offers and were the preseason favorites to win the state title.

Hamilton fit right in with the talented team, starting every game his senior season. He wasn't a role player, either. His size and skills helped him average 10.1 points, 6.9 rebounds and 3.2 blocks, as Lone Peak entered the Class 5A (large schools) state championship game with an impressive 22-2 record. On his biggest stage to date, Hamilton scored 10 points, grabbed six boards and blocked a school-record 10 shots to pace his squad to the state championship title with a victory over Bingham. Hamilton, who swatted a school-record 77 shots during the year, was named first-team all-state at season's end.

“His improvement was tremendous and he is a kid that will continue to get better,” said Quincy Lewis, Hamilton's high school coach at Lone Peak. “What people don't see is how smart he is. You tell him something once, and he quickly understands what you want done and how he's going to do it.”

McDermott instantly witnessed Hamilton's work ethic as soon as his senior season ended. McDermott was concerned he was probably a little too skinny to handle the rigors of big-time college basketball, so he suggested he needed to add some weight before preseason drills began. Hamilton listened, increasing his weight to 255 pounds when he arrived on campus primarily on a high-calorie, peanut butter and jelly diet.

“His work ethic is amazing,” McDermott added. “He understood that if he's going to bang with some of the bodies that we are going to play against, he was going to really need to gain some weight. And that was going to be a goal in year one. My hope was after his first year, he's either 235 or 240 and he shows up here at 255. He's really exceeding our expectations and then some.”

His progress on the court has exceeded expectations as well. Playing as reserve in ISU's first 11 games, Hamilton provided the Cyclones with quality minutes in the post. As the Cyclones were preparing to play at Houston on Dec. 28, Cyclone senior forward starter Alex Thompson rolled his ankle in practice. McDermott tabbed Hamilton as his replacement, and the rookie responded in a big way, scoring eight points, blocking two shots and grabbing a career-high 12 boards in ISU's 71-67 win over the Cougars.

Hamilton has been in the starting lineup ever since, averaging 8.0 points, 6.3 rebounds, 1.3 blocks and shooting 70 percent from the field in his last four games as a starter. Hamilton is 28-of-42 from the field (66.7 percent) to lead the Cyclones in field goal percentage.

“I'm not sure I expected him to be at where he is at now,” McDermott said. “It is a surprise what he's done to this point. Obviously, he's proven he can go out and defend on the block and he can be an efficient rebounder. He's not going to rebound a lot out of his area right now, but he's really solid technique-wise with his block-outs. Offensively, anytime you can score over your right shoulder or your left shoulder on the block you got a chance to be an effective offensive player. Now we've got to continue to teach him more counters to some of those moves that will come over time. His ability to score and to catch the basketball is certainly going to be a big plus for us going down the road.”

It looks like ISU had a lucky pair of dice.

Getting To Know Justin Hamilton:
Favorite Movie: Blood Diamond
Favorite TV show: That 70's Show
Favorite Actor: Will Smith
Athlete I Most Admire: Lance Armstrong
The Best Basketball Player I Have Played Against: Adam Morrison
Best Book I Have Ever Read: Into Thin Air
Why Did I Choose Iowa State?: The main reason was because of the environment and the fan support around ISU.
Fun Facts: Father, Larry, played football at Brigham Young, starting on the Cougars' 1984 national championship team...his father also wrestled at BYU, making the national tournament as a heavyweight in 1982 and 1983...he wrestled at the 1982 NCAA Championships in Hilton Coliseum...his mother, Tami, was a two-time all-conference volleyball player at BYU (1984 and 1985)...is an Eagle Scout...graduated from high school with a cumulative 3.87 GPA.

Players Mentioned

Justin Hamilton

Justin Hamilton

Alex Thompson

Alex Thompson

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