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Recent Features

December 9, 2005

A size surprise with Husky Barea;
NU's 5-11 star always comes up big (By Jackie MacMullan)

He doesn't look the part. Never has. When Jose Juan Barea walks into a gym, nobody's knees start knocking. He appears so unimposing, the tendency is to look straight through him.

"I'm small," conceded Northeastern's basketball star. "When you are as little as I am, you've got to be tough. If you aren't, they'll think they can run all over you."

The first time he was invited to practice with the junior national team in his native Puerto Rico, nobody would pass him the ball. He grew tired of waiting, so he crouched low in his defensive stance and stole it for himself, then streaked up the floor and dropped in a floater in the lane. The next time, he jumped in front of a pass, jetted to the hash mark, then unleashed a no-look bullet through the teeth of the defense. Guys started noticing him then, and their intent quickly shifted to knocking the skinny little kid on his rear end.

"They got physical with me," Barea explained. "So I threw a couple of elbows. When I drove to the basket, I swung my arm to get them off me. After that, everything was fine."

He thought about basketball all the time. He wanted to play for a college in the United States, but he knew the only way that would happen was if he spent his senior year of high school in America, to get noticed. He hopped a plane from Puerto Rico for Florida, leaving his friends and family behind. Miami Christian coach Art Alvarez, who had established a pipeline to Puerto Rico, told his players that a wonderful, creative guard was coming in to bolster their championship hopes.

"He walked into the gym and he was barely 5 foot 11 and bowlegged," said Alvarez. "He was so skinny, and he didn't look athletic at all. The other guys were saying, 'This is the kid that's supposed to be so great?'

"I told Jose Juan, 'You are Richie Cunningham.' He said, 'Who is Richie Cunningham?' I had to show him a clip of 'Happy Days.' I said, 'There, that's you. A kid with a sweet smile who doesn't look like a basketball player at all.' "

That all changed when Barea pulled on his Miami Christian jersey for the first time. The smile morphed into a snarl. Barea was a whirling dervish, slicing through defenses on one end and swallowing up passing lanes on the other. He was relentless, unpredictable, and incredibly entertaining. He scored 39 points and dished out eight assists in his first game. He spoke halting English at first, but when it came to his second language - basketball - he was fluent.

"The most competitive kid I've ever coached," Alvarez said. "We only lost two games that season, and he cried after both of them."

An excitable side

The dervish wears a Husky uniform now. Jose Juan Barea is a senior, coming off a season in which he was eighth in the nation in scoring (22.2 points a game) and fifth in assists (7.3). He is averaging 23.9 points and is on course to become the second-leading scorer in school history, with only the late, great Reggie Lewis out of reach. He also began the season third on Northeastern's all-time assist list.

Barea is one of the most exciting players ever to wear the Husky uniform, exhibiting passion, determination, and nerve. The pro scouts love those qualities, even as those same traits have hindered his reputation at times. Barea still has not completely harnessed his considerable skills, and the result is often an exhilarating yet maddening walk on the wild side.

"If he could ever channel all that energy into all the right places, he'd be even better than he is now," said Boston University coach Dennis Wolff. "As it is, he's very talented. And if there is some juice to the game, you can expect a passionate, intense performance."

Northeastern's hopes for an NCAA bid last spring rested in Barea's hands. The Huskies were playing Vermont in the America East final, and there was a loose ball. A scrum ensued and bodies from both teams hit the floor. An ESPN replay would later show Barea throwing two punches at Catamounts forward Martin Klimes in the pile.

"He truly is an enigma," said Tom Brennan, the former Vermont coach who retired last season. "You want to love him because he plays so hard, and he is so talented, and he's so cute he looks like he should have Lassie standing next to him.

"But then he flies off the handle like that and you say, 'Come on, man, it's 40 seconds into the game and you are your team's best player. What are you doing?' "

Northeastern coach Ron Everhart contends the Vermont debacle was a giant misunderstanding. Barea, he insists, was not trying to hit Klimes.

"When we were in the huddle, I could see the referees reviewing the film," he said. "I asked my guys, 'Did anything crazy happen?' Jose said, 'No, Coach, I was just trying to punch the ball out of the kid's hands.'

"It didn't look good on the replay. The announcers didn't help. But if you ask me today, 'Did Jose fall on that ball and intend to punch that kid?' My answer is no. No way."

Barea was not ejected, but he was later suspended for a game he would have missed anyway because of injury. He calls the incident "a mistake that won't happen again."

"It was a loose ball," Barea said. "Someone grabbed my neck and pulled it back. I just swung. I didn't hit anyone. I talked to [Klimes] after the game and he was fine. I talked to [Vermont forward] Taylor [Coppenrath] and he wasn't mad. It's part of the game."
Once the buzzer sounded, Barea did congratulate every Vermont player and wish them luck as their season continued.
"He couldn't have been any more gracious," Brennan noted.

Coming in cold

Barea desperately wants to make it to the NCAA Tournament this season. This is his last run, and he feels he owes Everhart for taking a chance on him four years ago.

"I wanted to play for Florida International University in Miami," Barea said. "I played pickup there every day. If they had said something, anything, I would have gone. But they didn't."

Because Barea had never played a single game in the AAU circuit and was a high school senior when he arrived in the States, he was a virtual unknown. He was also too late for a number of schools that had already locked up their recruits months earlier.

Everhart knew about Barea from former NU assistant Frank Martin, who had coached with Alvarez. But a call from Louisville coach Rick Pitino, whose assistant, Mick Cronin, was Everhart's good friend, was the clincher.

"Rick was sitting in the gym watching Jose play," Everhart said. "He called me up and told me, 'Ron, if I was still coaching at BU, this kid would be my No. 1 recruit.' "

Barea visited Northeastern on a cold, gray day. It was raining, sleeting, and snowing, and the kid couldn't wait to leave.

"Worst visit ever," he said. "It was spring break, so there were no kids on campus. And I was freezing."

Everhart, who had just suffered through a 7-21 season, persuaded Barea to look past the climate. Barea liked Everhart enough to overlook the meterological smorgasbord.

And so the adventures began. One night, against Baltimore-Maryland County, Barea drove full speed, crossed over to split two defenders, then continued full throttle to the free throw line. Then he whipped a behind-the-back bounce pass to the cutter on the ball side without breaking stride.

"It was amazing," Everhart said. "Sometimes I wonder, 'What if he were surrounded by great athletes and great finishers? How great would he be?' "

Saint Joseph's coach Phil Martelli, who coached a US national team against Barea and Puerto Rico in Argentina last summer, found himself wondering the same thing.

"I was impressed," Martelli said. "He has a nice pace to his game. He catches your eye with his creativity and his fearlessness. If the right [pro] team gives him a shot under the right circumstances, it could happen. He certainly deserves a hard look."

Pros and cons

NBA talent evaluators, who are not allowed to comment publicly, sounded less enthusiastic about Barea. Said one scout, "He's just not disciplined enough for the next level."

Added one Western Conference executive, "I love his energy. But I'm not sure he's a true point guard, and he's far too small to play a 2-guard in our league."

A third executive said he believes Barea could enjoy a lucrative career in Spain.

"He has tremendous guts, guile, and desire," said the executive. "He'll play professionally somewhere, but probably not in the NBA."

Barea's personal checklist of improvements includes better one-on-one defense, better leadership, and staying out of scrums. Alvarez, meanwhile, isn't buying the NBA's relative indifference. He claims Barea's biggest strength is his ability - his need - to defy the odds.

"His senior year with us, Jose Juan contracted mononucleosis," Alvarez said. "The doctor told me he should not play because if he damaged his spleen, he could die. His parents had to sign a special waiver. All this happened just as the state tournament was beginning.

"He had lost 18 pounds. He played with a white T-shirt under his uniform to hide the splotches on his body. He won eight straight games for us to win the state championship. He went up against the best players in the state of Florida and killed them all."

With NU joining the Colonial Athletic Conference this season, Barea will say goodbye to former rivals Vermont and BU and will knock heads with the likes of Old Dominion, Drexel, and Virginia Commonwealth.

"I'm excited," Barea said. "I'm tired of playing the same old teams, although I wish we could play BU in a nonconference game. It's such a great rivalry, you know?

"The fans hate each other, and the players hate each other, and the coaches hate each other. It's perfect."

Richie Cunningham, indeed.

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