On the day that Caleb Love returned to Arizona for his Ring of Honor induction, Tommy Lloyd\u2019s Wildcats could have used his shot-making the most.<\/p>\n
Love\u2019s reputation as an uninhibited shooter with a knack for making baskets in clutch moments made him a polarizing college basketball figure. Like him or loathe him, Love\u2019s game was well-suited for Arizona\u2019s style of play.<\/p>\n
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Arizona\u2019s style helped prepare Love for a career in the NBA, the Portland Trailblazers guard said Saturday upon visiting McKale Center at ALKEME Arena.<\/p>\n
\u201cI thank Tommy a lot because he kind of runs an NBA-style offense with how fast paced it is, heavy ball screens, things like that,\u201d Love said. \u201cI definitely give a lot of credit to him and the coaching staff with how they run things.\u201d<\/p>\n
Love is one of the NBA\u2019s best surprises through the first half of the season. An undrafted free agent, Love signed on with the Trailblazers with the hope of making the opening night roster.<\/p>\n
Love has since surpassed all expectations, becoming a core player in the Trailblazers\u2019 rotation. He ranks ninth among all rookies in points per game (11.3). He\u2019s made 93 three-points in 45 games, fourth-most among the rookie class.<\/p>\n
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Love has also adjusted to a different role than he was accustomed to in college.<\/p>\n
\u201c(My) welcome to the NBA moment is probably coming off the bench,\u201d Love said. \u201cI never came off the bench ever in my life. Let alone I\u2019ve got DNPs.\u201d<\/p>\n
He\u2019s getting used to not being the guy.<\/p>\n
\u201cYou got to be a pro,\u201d Love said. \u201cYou can\u2019t be looking down or being sorry for yourself or saying \u2018I deserve this or I deserve that\u2019 because it\u2019s a business at the end of the day and you got to come in and be a professional.\u201d<\/p>\n
Love was prepared for the mental side of a professional career well before he got to NBA, Lloyd said last week. The St. Louis native has been under the spotlight since he was a teenager. First as a McDonald\u2019s All-American signed to North Carolina, then as a Tarheel, and followed by his time at Arizona.<\/p>\n
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Love experienced the highest of highs as a college basketball player, both at UNC and Arizona. His lows were just as well documented, from an infamous falling out at Chapel Hill to tough stretches in Tucson.<\/p>\n
\u201cA lot of times when a young player goes to the NBA, they haven\u2019t yet experienced the lowest,\u201d Lloyd said. \u201cSo I think in order for you to ultimately be successful at that level, we have to know how you\u2019re going to respond to a struggle. And he had been through the struggle, and he had come out of it the other side. So I was really confident that he was going to earn his opportunity, and once he earned his opportunity, he was going to take advantage of it.\u201d<\/p>\n
Love\u2019s induction into the McKale Center Ring of Honor marked the first time Arizona fans have seen him in Tucson since finishing his Wildcats. It won\u2019t be the last.<\/p>\n
\u201cI\u2019ve been watching every game,\u201d Love said. \u201cEven if we we sometimes have games on the same day. I\u2019m in the locker room before the game because, you know, I\u2019m so invested in it, and I\u2019m so happy to see, you know, the start that we\u2019ve had. Halftime, I\u2019m checking my phone to see what the score is. So I\u2019m definitely invested in it. When I left for Arizona, this is always gonna be home.\u201c<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"On the day that Caleb Love returned to Arizona for his Ring of Honor induction, Tommy Lloyd\u2019s Wildcats…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":604931,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3784],"tags":[382,1982,7,601,11691,12306,6,687,471,3967,1617,13440],"class_list":["post-604930","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-portland-trail-blazers","tag-arizona","tag-arizona-wildcats","tag-basketball","tag-blazers","tag-caleb-love","tag-mckale-center","tag-nba","tag-portland","tag-portland-trail-blazers","tag-portlandtrailblazers","tag-trail-blazers","tag-tucson"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@nba\/116076030624612347","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/604930","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=604930"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/604930\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/604931"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=604930"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=604930"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=604930"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}