Quincy Ballard wants production over potential for breakout year with Shocker basketball
The college career of Quincy Ballard has been more about potential than production.
In two seasons at Florida State, the 6-foot-11 center only played in a total of 147 minutes. Not much changed last season when he transferred to the Wichita State men’s basketball team, as Ballard only tallied 21 points and 101 minutes in his 10 appearances before a back injury ended his season.
If Sunday’s exhibition game, when Ballard registered a team-high 14 points, 10 rebounds and three blocks in 23 minutes, is any indication, Ballard is poised to change the narrative about his career.
“It felt pretty good to be able to show everyone what I can do,” Ballard said. “I’m not going to say too much. I’m just excited to let my play say everything for me.”
Given his size and athletic ability, Ballard has always been a sought-after player. Coming out of high school, he signed with Florida State over offers from Syracuse, Cincinnati, North Carolina State and Maryland.
Even after minimal production in his two years at FSU, Ballard was still heavily recruited by Syracuse, his hometown team, but ultimately picked the Shockers.
Ballard was one of five scholarship players to stay with the program following the coaching change and very well could be the most-improved from that group, not that first-year coach Paul Mills has much of a barometer on Ballard’s progression.
“It’s like with your children when they grow, and somebody sees them and goes, ‘They’re getting taller.’ When you’re around them every day, you’re like, ‘They are? They look the same to me,’” Mills said on his radio show on Monday. “For us, we don’t really know what Quincy was a year ago. So these incremental steps people can probably recognize who saw him a year ago.”
Ballard’s main contribution last season was his shot-blocking ability, which earned him a consistent role in the rotation near the end of nonconference play. During a four-game stretch, Ballard saw his playing time increase to 16.5 minutes per game and responded with 10 blocked shots.
Mills has routinely called Ballard one of the best shot-blockers in the country and his elite level of rim protection has seemingly earned him a starting spot. It’s hard to put much stock in WSU’s 74-53 exhibition win over Rogers State, considering the Division II opposition was playing 6-foot-7 players at center, but Ballard’s presence deterring and altering shots around the rim was a factor every minute he played.
WSU’s defense allowed just 0.68 points per possession on the 40 possessions Ballard was on the floor. Rogers State scored 0.93 points per possession when Ballard was on the bench.
“Quincy gives you confidence to pressure the ball,” WSU guard Colby Rogers said. “If a guy gets a step on you, you know he’s either getting his shot blocked or he has to finish over Quincy, which is extremely hard. So it gives you confidence on defense.”
An interesting wrinkle Mills has installed has been his willingness to play 6-foot-10 junior Kenny Pohto, last year’s starting center, alongside Ballard. The two never shared the court together last season but played 21 minutes together on Sunday. They were a plus-21 on the court.
Mills also said the Pohto-Ballard pairing finished plus-8 in about 10 minutes together in the closed scrimmage against Iowa, another promising piece of evidence the duo could work during the regular season.
“Iowa had some really mobile pieces, so you’re wondering if Quincy can keep up defensively,” Mills said on his radio show. “We know he can handle another 7-footer around the rim and do a good job there, but what happens when people start to stretch him out? How much is that going to hamper us defensively? I think he showed he has really good mobility for a guy his size and he’s in really good shape.
“We spend a lot of time on player development. I don’t have any magic plays. I don’t know any defensive schemes that are going to 100% work, but I do know if we can get players better, we can get the team better. So let’s work to get the players better and Quincy is one of those guys who has made strides.”
Spacing issues are the primary concern when playing two big men together, but the Pohto-Ballard pairing works because each player occupies different areas on the floor.
When Ballard isn’t setting screens at the top of the key, he can be found in “the porch,” which is what Mills calls the four-foot space between the baseline and the block — essentially hanging out in the dunker’s spot, waiting for dump-off or alley-oop passes to slam home.
Meanwhile, Pohto is more of a finesse player who is more comfortable working along the perimeter. Mills raved about Pohto’s decision-making in Sunday’s exhibition, as the Swedish big man excelled in posting up smaller defenders just inside the arc, forcing the defense to send help, then picking out the open shooter or cutter. He finished with just two assists, but Mills counted five more passes that could have gone for assists if the shooter had made the basket.
“Knowing how to utilize that space is important because you don’t want two guys down there demanding the porch,” Mills said. “So we have Quincy down there and then Kenny can stretch it and make the simple decision. He’s not going to be super flashy, just super effective.”
One of Pohto’s assists was a big-to-big pass to Ballard where Pohto recognized he had a size advantage on his defender, ducked into the paint, caught the entry pass deep enough to draw a second defender and dumped it off to Ballard for a dunk.
After Sunday’s game, Pohto was already cooking up better ways to feed Ballard the ball ahead of WSU’s season-opener next Monday against Lipscomb inside Koch Arena.
“I’ve got to learn to throw lobs, alley oops because Quincy can really get them high up there,” Pohto said. “I’m going to get like 10 assists every game. That’s my goal. So yeah, it’s really fun to play with two bigs like that.”
This story was originally published October 31, 2023 at 6:00 AM.
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