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BY JEFF CARROLL
jcarroll@nwitimes.com
219.933.3373 | Friday, March 11, 2005 | (No comments posted.)
Robert Pogue must have been a sensitive child.
Though he possessed one of the prettiest jump shots in the Chicago school yards of his upbringing, it wasn't until he reached eighth grade that he summoned the guts to try out for his school's team.
"I knew I was good enough to go out for the team, but just didn't have enough confidence to ignore everybody," Pogue said. "They would say the only thing I could do is shoot and the coach is not gonna play nobody who can only do one thing.
"All this stuff got to me and I didn't do anything to try to step it up."
Pogue made his eighth-grade team. A year later he moved to Hammond, and on Saturday, that's the city and school he'll represent in the Class 3A Plymouth Regional.
Hammond High (16-9) hosts Plymouth (19-3) in the first semifinal at 11 a.m. It is Hammond's first regional appearance since 1998, when the then-4A Wildcats lost to Crown Point.
Pogue, a junior, has been a necessary ingredient on the offensive end for the Wildcats this season. With Jere Taylor, Chris Moore and Jermaine Brooks all adept at finding seams and attacking the basket, Pogue provides the outside threat that keeps opponents honest.
He's averaging 10.2 points per game, second-best on the team.
"Why do we need me going to the hole when we've got those three flashing most of the time?" Pogue said. "They need a safety valve for when they go in and get jammed up. If I'm going in, who do they have as a safety valve? They can penetrate and kick."
Pogue said what finally convinced him in middle school to play for his school team was his AAU summer experience after his seventh-grade year. Playing for an Indiana-based team, he competed and succeeded, he said, against players better than the ones telling him he wasn't good enough to play with them.
Hammond coach Larry Moore believes the 6-foot-3 forward has the athleticism to excel at other aspects of the game besides just lofting up shots from long distance.
"He gets up, he can put the ball down," Moore said. "He's very athletic. I'd like to see him go to the basket. I thought he did that more on the JV level last year. We'd like to see him do that on the varsity level, too.
"He's our best outside shooter and he's very unselfish. Sometimes we're telling him to shoot the ball. We need him sometimes to open things up on the inside for us. We want him to shoot a little bit more."
A year from now, with Hammond's "Big Three" of Taylor, Moore and Brooks graduating, Pogue said spectators will get to see a little bit more of everything from him.
"That's a promise," Pogue said. "Because next year I'm gonna have to be the slasher and the 3-point shooter. You're gonna see everything next year."
BOYS BASKETBALL | CLASS 3A PLYMOUTH REGIONAL PREVIEW
WHEN: 9 a.m. Saturday -- Andrean (21-2) vs. Twin Lakes (19-5); 11 a.m. -- Hammond (16-9) vs. Plymouth (19-3).
RADIO: WJOB-AM (1230), WWCA-AM (1270), WIMS-AM (1420).
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