SEATTLE (AP) -Charles Garcia was supposed to be one of the inside answers for Washington.
Athletically gifted and standing 6-foot-10, Garcia was a scorer who could give the Huskies a needed inside punch. Garcia’s numbers have certainly been impressive in his first season of major college basketball. He’s averaging nearly 21 points per game.
He’s just doing it across town at Seattle.
“What he is doing now is he’s honing his foundation to grow and learn and become the player that his potential says he can be,” Seattle coach Cameron Dollar said.
Garcia was supposed to be doing this at Washington, the sleeper of the Huskies’ recruiting class a year ago.
But Garcia never got onto the Washington campus. He was denied admissions at the school, despite spending part of last year focusing specifically on his academics to try and ensure enrollment at UW.
originally. The result? Garcia is one of the top scorers in the country as the Redhawks continue their reclassification back to Division I status.
And now he gets a chance to show the Huskies what they missed out on Tuesday night when Washington hosts Seattle, even though Dollar insists Garcia won’t make the matchup personal.
“I know him. Everybody else wants to make that big, but it’s not big to him,” Dollar said. “It’s an exciting game, on TV and playing against a Pac-10 team, but there is nothing more of it than that.”
Not much was known about Garcia when the season began. His college career started with a brief stop at Sacramento State, but he left the Big Sky school and enrolled at Riverside Junior College. His JC numbers weren’t overly impressive either – nearly 15 points and seven rebounds as a freshman – and he took half of last season off to shore up his academics.
Still the extra effort in the classroom wasn’t good enough for Washington’s admissions, although no one with the school has commented extensively on why Garcia was denied. Requests to speak with Garcia prior to the game with Washington were denied by Seattle.
“We always were in contact,” Dollar said. “We always talked.”
had a career best 41 points in an 84-83 loss to Wofford. The Redhawks needed every one of those points early in the season as the rest of Garcia’s teammates adjusted to playing a full Division I schedule after splitting between Division I, II and NAIA opponents a year ago.
“You play with a player like him he’s going to make you better, no doubt,” said Seattle forward Mike Boxley. “He takes a lot of attention while he is on the floor and gives you a lot of good, wide-open looks at the basket. For anybody, me, it’s going to give you confidence because you are shooting open shots while he’s out there.”
Those huge numbers early in the season brought Garcia a load of attention, both on the court and from the NBA. Scouts became regular attendees at Seattle games, trying to find out a little more about the 6-10 kid who grew up as a guard and has the ball-handling skills and outside jumper to match.
Some NBA draft pundits immediately suggested Garcia could be as high as a late first-round pick if he left Seattle after his junior season.
But struggles have followed Garcia as well. Foul trouble is a continuing problem and his scoring numbers have declined of late. He was benched for most of the second half of a game against Utah Valley recently because of defensive lapses. Garcia leads the country in free throw attempts (228) by a wide margin, but is shooting just 60 percent at the line.
Dollar says these ups and downs are to be expected and he continues to see Garcia’s raw potential as he learns more about using his size to play closer to the basket.
“He is deemed as being successful throughout the year if he does kind of like what we’re doing as a team: he handles the grind, he handles the adversity, the highs and the lows and keeps becoming a better student of the game, keeps improving his game and keeps making the necessary adjustments to help us win,” Dollar said. “If he does that regardless of the numbers he has been successful.”
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