Tulsa World: ORU basketball: Eagles sign guard

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ORU basketball: Eagles sign guard

By MIKE BROWN World Sports Writer
Published: 4/16/2009 1:32 PM
Last Modified: 4/16/2009 1:34 PM

The Oral Roberts basketball team played without a true point guard last season. As things stand now, the Golden Eagles will play with two in 2009-10.

Hunter McClintock, a 6-foot-2, 180-pound, left-handed guard from Burlington, N.C., signed to play for ORU on Thursday.

“I love passing the ball,” McClintock said. “It makes me feel like I’ve scored when somebody else scores after I’ve passed them the ball.”

McClintock averaged 11.2 points and 5.3 assists last season at The Patterson School, a prep school in Lenoir, N.C. He also shot 58 percent from 3-point range. Patterson went 34-3 and was the No. 1 seed in the national prep school tournament, but lost its first-round game.

Before Patterson, McClintock played three years at Burlington before transferring to Durham (N.C.) Northern High as a senior. At Northern, he led the state’s top divisions in scoring (27.2), received All-State honors from various outlets and was named the Durham Herald-Sun’s all-area player of the year.

ORU head coach Scott Sutton said McClintock’s playing style reminded him of North Dakota State guard Ben Woodside, the 2008-09 Summit League player of the year. Sutton predicted McClintock would be an ORU “fan favorite” from the first time people saw him play.

“He’s a little like (Woodside), the way he changes speeds, how he plays with the basketball, how he makes his teammates better, and how easily he gets to the basket, for a kid his size,” Sutton said.

Junior point guard Rod Pearson also becomes eligible for the Golden Eagles after sitting out his transfer year from Southeast Missouri State, where he averaged 9.1 points and 2.5 assists over two seasons.

ORU struggled offensively in 2008-09 while senior Robert Jarvis was forced to shuttle between point guard and shooting guard and never seemed to get entirely comfortable at either spot. Sutton signed a junior college transfer to help at the point, but Reggie Guyton was hampered by injuries and later suspended.

“I thought playing without a true point guard hurt us so much this year,” Sutton said. “Robert did the best he could, but I think it affected his game. Having two guys that are gonna make their teammates better gets me excited.”

Taped highlights on Youtube.com show McClintock weaving in and out of traffic, faking out defenders and passing to open teammates.

But McClintock does more than pass. During his high school career before Patterson, he scored over 2,200 points, finishing No. 2 in North Carolina high school history in 3-pointers (366) and made free throws (534).

With McClintock, ORU has two signees for 2009-10 and will probably add two more before the signing period ends later this month. The Eagles signed 6-foot-9, 270-pound center Damen Bell-Holter in November.

By MIKE BROWN World Sports Writer

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Reader comments for this story have been moved to the most updated version of the story, now under the headline "Golden Eagles sign true point guard," which was published on 4/17/2009. So far, 5 comments have been made.