Beside the Point

It was during a recent coaches’ meeting that Henry Bibby took exception with the play of his starting point guard.

The USC coach wasted no words or time in ripping Brandon Granville, who, on occasion, has been called everything from too short to too slow to too strong-willed.

But Bibby’s staff, used to his brutal honesty and his drill sergeant-like tendency to break down his players before rebuilding them in his image, just smirked.

“They told me, ‘Oh yeah, sure, you like him the best,’” Bibby said with a grin. “They’re probably right. He’s a point guard just like I was and he’s just so smart.”

The love-hate relationship between Bibby and Granville is now mostly love. The amiable Granville now respects the curmudgeon that Bibby can be, and the old-school taskmaster sees a lot of himself in Granville.

One can almost imagine Bibby, with his Dr. Evil-like bald pate and narrow eyes, ensconced in his Heritage Hall lair, looking over the 5-foot-9 Granville with his shaved head and proclaiming: “I shall call him, Mini-Me.”

It’s around that vibrant bond that the 22nd-ranked Trojans’ fortunes revolve as they begin postseason play today at Staples Center against No. 16 Stanford in the reborn Pacific 10 Conference tournament.

“There’s been times when I’ve been on the court and we’ll both call the same play at the same time,” Granville said. “That’s when we knew we were on the same page.”

But it wasn’t always that way. There was a time when they weren’t even reading from the same book.

Almost from the moment Granville arrived at USC from Westchester High, he became the object of Bibby’s scorn. Bibby chastised and challenged Granville on a seemingly daily basis. Nothing the high school all-star selection did was ever good enough.

The browbeating made Granville question whether he wanted to continue playing for Bibby and follow the trail blazed by Kevin Augustine, the point guard Granville replaced when Augustine transferred out after he could no longer stand Bibby’s methods.

The Oregon fans’ chants of “Oompa Loompa,” which are aimed at Granville with a nod to the little orange people from the movie “Willy Wonka & the Chocolate Factory,” paled in comparison to how hard Bibby was riding him.

But the mental smackdowns began arriving with less frequency toward the middle of Granville’s junior season.

And there was a revelation on the player’s part.

“It was a kind of a tough love,” Granville said. “I had to tell myself and realize that he’s just trying to get the best out of me and trying to win, just like I am. Last year, I could sense that there was more of a respect for my game. He’s kind of handed the team over to me.”

While not spectacular, Granville has been steady enough to notch some personal bests and etch his name all over the USC record book, a fact Bibby proudly points out.

Granville owns school career records for assists (749), steals (221), three-point baskets (211) and games played (120).

And with 3,900 minutes played, Granville is 79 minutes away from breaking Wayne Carlander’s school mark for durability. Granville is also on course to join Carlander as the lone four-year Trojans to have played in every possible USC game during a career.

The 1,366 points Granville has scored rank ninth in USC annals and he’s fifth in Pac-10 history in assists.

This season, he is committing a career-low 2.2 turnovers a game and his 2.48 assist/turnover ratio leads the Pac-10. His free-throw percentage of 79.5% is a career high.

“Brandon Granville is a little cocky guy,” Bibby said admiringly. “He knows a lot but sometimes he knows too much. He might not be the quickest guy or the best shooter or have the most talent. But boy, he knows the game.”

This year, though, Granville’s offensive stats are suffering in comparison to previous years.

He’s the Trojans’ third-leading scorer with a 12.0 average, the lowest since averaging 7.7 as a freshman, and his three-point shooting percentage of 34.3% is also the second-lowest of his career, as is his 5.5 assist average.

And he has hit a slump of late, scoring four points against Oregon last week before going scoreless against Oregon State while shooting a combined one for 13.

“My concern is he’s lost a lot of confidence and I don’t know why,” Bibby said. “I attribute Thursday [against the Ducks] to him being sick [with flu] but he should be fine now.”

A Bibby excuse for Granville’s poor performance would have been unheard of in years past, and none of Granville’s accomplishments would have seemed probable when the freshman joined the team four years ago. But none of them would been possible, either, without Bibby gaining trust in Granville.

Still, Bibby spent the early part of this year knocking his team, his seniors in particular, for a seeming lack of leadership.

Tuesday, he proclaimed the search over, anointing himself as Trojan leader, though he did give a wink to Granville, saying the diminutive one was the closest thing to a vocal on-court leader USC has. So is this a thawing in the iceberg formerly known as Bibby?

Could be. Bibby used warm and fuzzy words to describe his bringing his seniors together Monday to “join hands” for a “heart-to-heart” with them “to show my love for them and their love for me” as well as to “remind them to have fun.”

For Granville, his decision to play for a notoriously tough coach has been validated.

“When I was choosing a college, you see that special bond or relationship between some players and their coaches and I had hoped to have that,” Granville said. “It’s evolved over time. You just know that he’s there and he has the life experiences and of playing in the NBA.”

Granville also intimated that, with all of Bibby’s mind games and button-pushing, the respect is reciprocal.

“I think he has an appreciation of us [seniors] in that we helped turned the program around from winning nine, 15 games and losing in the first round of the NIT to getting to the Elite Eight last year. I think he’s thankful for that.”

Bibby can continue to defend his strong-arm coaching tactics, which fall short of Bob Knight’s antics, by pointing to the success of Granville, who is contemplating going immediately into coaching after his eligibility expires.

“A coach is like a parent,” Bibby said. “You want your kids to do well and you punish them when [they’re bad]. That’s not abusive. That’s love.”

Walking through Heritage Hall on Tuesday afternoon, Bibby spotted Granville across the way and without saying a word, made his feeling clear.

Bibby thumped his chest twice with his right fist and extended an olive branch of an arm toward him, and went on his way.

*

(BEGIN TEXT OF INFOBOX)

Pac-10 Tournament

(text of infobox not included)