By Jerry Hill
Baylor Bear Foundation
Everyone from Scott Drew and Isaiah Austin to teammates Rico Gathers, Taurean Prince, Royce O'Neale and Kenny Chery kept telling Terry Maston, "Your time's going to come."
But when you have a permanent place on the end of the bench ÃÆ' ¢Ãƒ ¢' ¬" the 6-foot-7 forward played a total of 36 minutes in 11 games and scored just 19 points as a freshman ÃÆ' ¢Ãƒ ¢' ¬" it's easy to see why doubts start creeping in.
"It's hard going from being 'the man' to being just someone on the bench that nobody knows," Maston said. "Isaiah kept telling me, 'Don't get your head down, work hard every day, stay in the gym and your time's going to come.' . . . When I did doubt myself, I just tried to keep in the back of my head, 'There's I reason I'm here.' They don't have me here for no reason. I know I'm going to be used eventually." His time is now.
Through non-conference play, the sophomore forward was only marginally more productive than he was during his mop-up duty last year. He did have double-figure games against Jackson State, Prairie View and Texas Southern, but also logged minimal minutes against Oregon, Texas A&M, Vanderbilt and Northwestern State.
But his surprising emergence in conference play is a big reason why the Bears (15-3, 5-1) are ranked 13th in the nation and sitting atop the Big 12 standings going into Saturday's 11 a.m. showdown with top-ranked Oklahoma (15-2, 4-2).
"It's all about opportunity, and he's been shining," Gathers said of Maston, who is averaging 10.3 points and shooting 60 percent from the field in conference play. "When he comes into the game, he's able to hit anything within the 3-point line. That's one of the best things about TJ is he's consistent."
Maston's breakout performance came in an 82-54 win over TCU, when he was 8-of-11 from the field and scored a career-high 17 points to go with six rebounds, three assists, one block and a steal. But just as key was his eight points and four rebounds in a 79-62 win over Oklahoma State the week before, when he had "some really key buckets and Coach Drew really trusted me to stay out there and finish the game."
"Coach Drew always says that it's not how you start, it's how you finish," Maston said. "When the starters don't have a great game, we can come in and provide energy to boost them up and make them play better. When we sub in, we have to match that energy and bring more."
DID YOU KNOW? The reason that Maston switched from TJ to Terry this season is because "my mom always said she wanted people to call me by my real name. When they say TJ, some people are like, 'Who are they talking about?' TJ just means Terry Junior. So, I just changed it on the roster this year to my real name. It's still TJ, but it's Terry on the roster."
That's something he picked up from his uncle, Derrick Battie, a 6-9 power forward who played four seasons (1993-97) at Temple University.
While Maston is more of a finesse player with a soft touch on floaters and hook shots, he compares Battie to the 6-8, 275-pound Gathers. "He would hit you with a hook and then he would come down the next play and hit you in the chest and break the rim on you," Maston said. "I get my aggressive side from him."
Tony Battie, his other uncle, was an athletic 6-11 power forward and center who played 15 years in the NBA after a standout career at Texas Tech (1994-97).
"I had this Fisher Price Little Tikes basketball goal that my Uncle Tony bought for me, and I used to play on it all the time," Maston said. "My mom said I would never leave it alone. I always had a basketball in my hand. When I was like 4 feet (tall), I would raise (the goal) up to eight feet and pretend I was my uncle."
It was Derrick, though, that helped Maston develop the finesse hook that's such a big part of his arsenal. Having to shoot over his 6-9 uncle, who was also holding up a big broomstick, he would make 50 shots over his right shoulder and 50 over his left from each block, then move to the middle and make another 100 shots.
"That's kind of my go-to shot," he said. "I worked on that during my sophomore year when I really started to take basketball more seriously."
In a way, Maston followed in his uncle's footsteps. Before his freshman year in high school, he transferred from Cedar Hill Trinity Christian to DeSoto to play for Chris Dyer, the same basketball coach that led South Oak Cliff to state tournament appearances in the 1990s with the Battie brothers.
More than two decades later, Maston was an all-tournament selection when a 31-4 DeSoto team lost to eventual state champion Galena Park North Shore in the 5A state semifinals. He averaged 13.7 points, 7.8 rebounds and 1.4 blocks that season, earning all-state and all-region honors.
"That was the year that I matured the most," he said. "It was a grind-it-out year. I used to come in in the mornings with my coach at 6, and we would work out then and work out afterwards, just doing individual stuff. My coach was so smart about the game, and I learned a lot from him, too, just my fundamentals and my footwork."
Three years earlier, Maston wasn't sure if he would ever even make the DeSoto team.
"Coming into Coach Dyer's program, it was like night and day from where I was coming from," he said. "I remember that first day having to run a mile, and it nearly killed me. And the worst part was they told me I had to run it in under six minutes to make the team. That first day, my mile time was 9 minutes, 30 seconds. It was horrible. They were like, "What were you doing? Were you walking?' I might as well have been. But I kept coming back, I would never quit. And it paid off."
Maybe that's what got him through last season. Instead of quitting and walking away, he just kept coming back.
"I was just coming in every day in practice, proving that I could be counted on, trying to earn Coach Drew's trust," he said.
And along the way, he's eaten more than his share of humble pie.
"I remember my first day, the jump hook, (Taurean Prince) came on the back side and blocked it four times in a row," he said. "It woke me up, and I was like, 'OK, this is serious. This is a man's game.' And with Rico, if you don't dive on the ground for loose balls or you try to pick it up, your legs are gone. You've either got to come 110 percent or just get out of the way. Don't even go out there with him."
Now, he's not only out there with him, Maston is holding his own. His time has come.
"He's always been a skilled player and always had a lot of potential," Drew said. "Credit the upperclassmen for helping to bring him along. They're impressing on him how much they need him and how good he can be."
