TIGER BASKETBALL

Memphis' Jeremiah Martin answered Tubby Smith's leadership question in home opener

Mark Giannotto
Memphis Commercial Appeal

Memphis men’s basketball coach Tubby Smith pulled aside junior Jeremiah Martin earlier this week during practice and wanted to know what answer his team captain would give to a blunt question.

Memphis guard Jeremiah Martin (right) drives the lane against Little Rock defender Jaizec Lottie during first half action at the FedExForum in Memphis, Tenn., Tuesday, November 14, 2017.

“Do you want to be the leader or not?”

Martin was coming off a disappointing performance in the Tigers’ season-opening loss to Alabama on Friday, and Smith had “been pounding me ever since,” Martin said Tuesday night from the podium at FedExForum after a 70-62 win over Little Rock.

Initially, Martin chafed at Smith’s strategy. He didn’t understand why the coach was being so much harder on him than anyone else on the team.

But then Martin answered “I do” to Smith’s question, and what Smith said next paved the way for a career-best performance.

“Well, I’m going to be on you because everybody on the team is going to look up to you at some point every time we get on the court, and you have to be almost perfect,” Martin said, describing Smith's response back. “Just shout out to him because he’s a great coach, and he just challenged me.”

More:Memphis Tigers beat Little Rock, 70-62, in home opener

Martin’s bounce-back effort and leadership were at the core of how Memphis recovered from an awful start and avoided an embarrassing loss to Little Rock in its home opener. He set career highs for points (26) and 3-pointers (four), and he scored 10-straight points once the Tigers fell behind 21-7 in the opening 12 minutes of action.

The point guard also led the team in rebounds (six) and steals (three) while committing no turnovers. But it was his shot-making, particularly when Memphis appeared incapable of generating a positive offensive outcome in the first half, that proved most crucial  

“I felt like if I got going, the whole team would get going,” Martin said.

That is exactly what happened, a welcome sign considering Memphis still is trying to figure out roles for the eight new scholarship players on the roster this season. Their unquestioned leader, however, is very clearly Martin already.

He accepted this position in the offseason almost by default as one of two returning contributors from last year’s team. Before all of the Tigers’ new players arrived on campus in June, Martin even attended a leadership retreat at the suggestion of Smith.

But this past week was the first real test of what the previously soft-spoken left-hander had learned. Against Alabama, he missed seven of his first nine shots, didn't have an assist until the final three minutes of action and committed four turnovers.

More:Top Memphis basketball target Robert Woodard commits to Mississippi State

On Tuesday night, however, Martin “wasn’t just scoring points,” Smith said.

As forward Kyvon Davenport detailed after the game, it was Martin “telling us what to do, getting us in the right spot. … We were just following behind him. He was picking everybody up.”

“He was just giving it all he had, so we just went behind him,” added junior Malik Rhodes, whose contributions as a point guard off the bench (nine points, four assists) allowed Martin to move off the ball more frequently against Little Rock. “Just seeing how hard he was going, how much he was into it, we was just going out for him. He’s the leader of this team. We went behind our leader basically.”

That’s an important distinction on a team that’s “still learning to play together and where the shots are going to come from,” Smith said.

But Martin’s role as captain appears to be entrenched at this point, now that Smith got the answer he was hoping for in the Tigers’ home opener.    

“I’m glad he responded the way he did,” Smith said. “We needed every point, and certainly we needed his leadership. He kept it together and kept me together, too.”