GUARD OPTIMISM : SDSU’s Bryan Williams Looking More Like the Point Man Brandenburg Needs

Something about the relationship between a basketball coach and his point guard often brings out the stubbornness in the both of them.

The coach knows how he wants the team run; the guard knows how he can run it best. What often results is a season-long struggle to find common ground.

Few probably understand the ups and downs of this relationship better than Bryan Williams, the San Diego State senior point guard who has had plenty of practice adjusting.

In four seasons of college basketball, Williams has played at three schools for three coaches.

He was the same person at each place, but each coach wanted something different. And none wanted the undisciplined style he loved to play during those wide-open summertime playground games.

The result was confusion, tension and sometimes dissension.

“Being the point guard, you have to think like the coach,” Williams said this week. “You have to do what he wants, when he wants you to do it. It’s not that easy. But I’m learning.”

Tonight, Williams will have an unusual opportunity to show just how far he has come when the Aztecs (2-0) play UC Irvine (1-2) at the San Diego Sports Arena at 7:30.

The last time these teams met--an 86-77 SDSU victory in the 1984-85--Williams was on the other side. It was his freshman season at Irvine, the start of his winding college career. The Anteaters’ Bill Mulligan was his first college coach, the first to find that life with Bryan could have its testy moments.

“I always liked Bryan,” Mulligan said. “But he was kind of stubborn.”

Williams started 10 games that first season, averaging 4.1 points and recording 115 assists, including a single-game, school-record 16 against Pepperdine. But his Irvine career ended abruptly the next season.

Williams found himself the team’s fourth guard behind Scott Brooks, Joe Buchanan and Mike Hess, three newly eligible transfers. After not playing in the team’s first two games, Williams quit the team but remained in school. That made for some awkward moments, especially because Buchanan was his roommate.

“I went to all the games and sat up in the stands,” Williams said. “Everyone was asking me questions about what I was going to do next.”

Williams considered transferring directly to another 4-year school, but that would have meant the loss of a year of eligibility.

“I didn’t want to be out of basketball for 2 years,” Williams said. “I wanted to go somewhere and play right away.”

So Williams opted to attend a community college, Cerritos College in Norwalk. He thrived there under a system that allowed him more freedom than he had at Irvine or would enjoy at SDSU.

“Bryan is a very talented player,” Cerritos Coach Jack Bogdanovich said, “and because I only had him for one season, rather than try to mold the team around the player, I tried to mold the player around the team.”

Williams averaged 14.5 points and 6.4 assists as Cerritos finished the 1986-87 season 29-5. His play earned him the attention of Jim Brandenburg, then coaching at Wyoming. When Brandenburg moved to SDSU, he convinced Williams to join him.

Their first season had its rough moments. Brandenburg was adjusting to coaching a losing team (12-17) for the first time in his 12-year career. And Williams was learning to play in a more disciplined system, for a more disciplined coach who demanded much more of his point guard than Williams had been called upon to deliver in the past.

Brandenburg spent much of the year trying to convince Williams that, at 5-feet 10-inches, he could no longer expect to be the scoring force he had been in community college.

“At first, it was like night and day,” said Williams, who attended St. Bernard High School in Playa del Rey. “I came here thinking of myself as a scorer. The other team had to stop me. But it was just the opposite. I had to run the offense, run the break, keep the team disciplined.

“We all had a difficult time last year. We got frustrated because, he was a new coach, and we were new players, and nobody really knew what he wanted.”

Despite those first-year troubles, Williams averaged 9.7 points and finished second in the Western Athletic Conference in assists (5.3 per game) and third in steals (1.86 per game).

He became the player Brandenburg turned to when he needed a clutch shot late and was the team’s best penetrator. That ability opened several offensive possibilities but also caused the two some of their most trying moments.

“Bryan had to learn that when he penetrated, he just couldn’t expect to create something,” Brandenburg said. “He to be able to finish off his shot.”

Williams would sometimes find himself hanging in the air in the lane with no available shot. His frequent reaction would be to hurriedly dump the ball off underneath. The common result was a startled teammate, an angry Brandenburg and a turnover. It was not a new problem for Williams.

“That was the biggest thing we tried to work with him on,” Bogdanovich said. “He would get 3 feet from the basket and throw a dart to someone underneath.”

Though these lessons sometimes were harsh, Williams has listened and learned.

“I like to play a lot of street ball, and you tend to get wild and do a lot of crazy things,” Williams said. “I’m working to take those things out of my game--to settle down and run the team.”

Brandenburg is encouraged by the early the improvement.

“Bryan is a much more disciplined player than he was a year ago,” Brandenburg said. “He has worked hard to accomplish what we have asked him to learn.”

It also has helped that Brandenburg has a motivational option that did not exist last season. The addition of Michael Best and Rodney Jones, both junior transfers, has allowed Brandenburg more flexibility at guard than he had when Williams and Tony Ross were the only scholarship guards left on the team.

Look no further than minutes played for the change. Williams has averaged 23 minutes in the Aztecs’ first two games, down 9.5 from his average last season.

“You start the game, and you get warmed up, and then you sit down on the bench and get cold,” Williams said. “It’s not something I like, but if it helps the team, then it is good.”

It is the latest, but probably not the last, adjustment for Williams. His nomadic life as a college point guard should have taught him at least that much.

Aztec Notes

This will be San Diego State’s last home game until they play Hardin-Simmons in the first round of the McDonald’s tournament Dec. 20. That will be the start of 7-game home stand, ending Jan. 7 against Air Force. The Aztecs play at Texas Tech Monday, then take a break for final examinations before playing at Arizona State Dec. 17 . . . The Aztecs lead the series with Irvine, 6-5. Tonight’s game is the first of a 4-year revival of the series that began in 1967-68.