Kiwi's Night

Whenever someone refers to me as a journalist, I cringe. I know what real journalists have to do; I did it myself for a year in grad school. It could mean spending six hours on the phone making 43 calls just to get one quote for an article that turns out to be absolute crap, but you gotta hand your editor something. It could mean roaming the streets of random neighborhoods you’ve never been in before looking for man-on-the-street interviews. That’s real work; that’s “it doesn’t matter how hard you work, you’re still depending on other people to do your work for you” kinda work; that’s the toughest kinda work. I don’t do that kinda work right now, nor do I wanna do that kind of work. Your mind is always on the job; you’re on call 24-7-365. I have the utmost respect for real journalists; I am not one of them.

More than that, though, journalism is about telling stories. The first draft of history, as I’m sure a million journalism professors have said in their opening remarks to a 101 class. When it comes to sports, sure, journalists are there to cover the game: who won, by how much, who scored the most points/goals and so on.  But more than that, sports reporters are intrigued by the storylines: How is an ankle injury affecting the star athlete? Who is the unsung hero? Can David slay Goliath?

I’m not interested in that. I mean I am, but I care more about calling games. It’s why I love the D-League Showcase so much – not because I might be getting a glimpse at the next Jeremy Lin or Danny Green, but because I have been able to call 10 games in four days in each of the last two Showcases. I love being able to watch and talk basketball. I love tracking how a team’s shooting percentage rises and dives throughout the course of a game. I love calculating a team’s defensive rebounding percentage at the end of quarters (getting a little Vinnie Paz here with the repetition of the opening phrase of a sentence). Basketball is my favorite sport; I love the way they dribble it up and down the court.

Journalists love stories. I love reading stories, but I love the actual games more. While I enjoy reading players’ backstories when I prepare for a game, I love the fact that all of that takes a backseat when the ball is tipped. It’s all about what you’re doing right now in a game, background be damned. The rock doesn’t discriminate.

All that said (how about that for an extremely long intro- welcome to Backpack Basketball, baby!), what happened on the night of December 12, 2013, at the Dignity Health Event Center in Bakersfield, Calif., deserves to be told.

The play-by-play guy in me will tell you that Kiwi Gardner came off the Santa Cruz Warriors’ bench with his team trailing the Bakersfield Jam 88-71 with 9:15 remaining in the fourth quarter to score 23 points and lead the Warriors to a 112-106 victory. The play-by-play guy in me would tell you that Gardner went 9-10 from the floor and 2-2 from beyond the arc. The play-by-play guy in me would tell you that the Santa Cruz Warriors improved to 6-2 as a result, winning their second of three games on a five-game road trip.

But Kiwi’s night deserves more than that. This game – and Kiwi’s performance – was so good and so memorable that I’ve known from the moment that game ended that I would write a story on it. I’ll do my best.

I’m not going to give you Kiwi’s whole background story- that’s not my story to tell (but for reference, Sam Laird’s Mashable piece on Gardner at the beginning of the season – before this game against Bakersfield happened – is a pretty damn good starting point). So this is where and how I’ll start it:

I can’t honestly say I thought something like this was going to happen the first time I saw Kiwi play in person; I didn’t think he was going to make the Santa Cruz Warriors. Not because I had insider info or anything – I clearly didn’t – but because my snap judgment of a guy who shrugged his shoulders after a teammate messed up one of his dimes at a local tryout as he was playing with dudes he was a million times better than was completely off. After watching two minutes of this local Santa Cruz tryout on Oct. 6, 2013, I sent a text to PR director Matt De Nesnera: No way Kiwi makes the team, IMO. He hasn’t contested one shot (It was either one or two jump shots in question, far from a realistic sample size. I guess I was just trying to be Hot Take Kev. Also, De Nesnera did not respond and is not culpable in any sense). I regret a lot of things I have said and done in my life, but not so much from a professional standpoint. That text I sent to Matty Q (our affectionate nickname for De Nesnera), however, is something I definitely wish I could take back. I wish I could say I was on the Gardner hype train from minute one, but that would be a lie. If Kiwi ever reads this article, my response to him would be, “my bad, bruh.” I judged a book by a false cover, and boy was I wrong.

Because the first thing you learned about Kiwi Gardner in the locker room is that he’s one helluva teammate. From the first preseason game, he was the first one off the bench to side-bump Seth Curry after one of his three-pointers or high-five Cameron Jones after nailing a pull-up jumper from 18 feet. The second thing you learned about Kiwi Gardner is that he plays his ass off on defense. If you have the ball, he’ll crowd you so hard that Catholic school teachers would tell him to make room for Jesus. Some guys might not be happy that they’re in the D-League, thinking that they should be in the NBA; Kiwi was THRILLED to be on the Santa Cruz Warriors, like nobody I had seen before.

And, although he hadn’t seen the court a whole lot in the first couple of weeks of the season, Kiwi had shown signs in the limited minutes he had been out there that he could produce at the D-League level. Kiwi’s first-ever field goal in a regular season D-League game came when he successfully challenged the Reno Bighorns’ DeQuan Jones – a guy with 63 games of NBA experience with the Orlando Magic in 2012-13 – at the rim and finished over him for an and-1 layup. Yes, it was garbage time and the bucket was meaningless, but it was still an impressive display of athleticism that let people know Kiwi could do exceptional things athletically beyond the high school level.

More meaningful minutes for Kiwi came in Santa Cruz’s next game against Reno – in Nevada on the first game of that five-game road trip that would later take the Sea Dubs to Bakersfield. The Bighorns could not miss in their home-opener, exploding for 48 points in the second quarter and 76 in the first half. Down large late in the fourth quarter, Santa Cruz head coach Casey Hill inserted Kiwi into the lineup. The Sea Dubs didn’t really come close to winning, but Kiwi scored eight points and dished out two assists in five minutes off the bench and Santa Cruz ended up only losing by seven points in a game that the ‘Horns thoroughly dominated. While Santa Cruz lost, the Warriors outscored Reno 20-9 over the final three minutes while Kiwi was on the floor. Hey, this Kiwi Gardner kid could be a real firestarter off the bench.

As the team was getting ready to head to Bakersfield a couple of days later, word got out that the Memphis Grizzlies wanted to work out Seth Curry. While this could mean more playing time for Kiwi as the No. 3 point guard option behind Curry and the veteran Moe Baker, the Oakland kid appeared a little uneasy. As we all trudged out of the Lakers’ practice facility (the team decided to stay a night in the LA area before driving to Bakersfield), the team found out about the news.

“Hey man, Kiwi’s shook!” then-Santa Cruz big man Dewayne Dedmon joked to Curry. “You gotta give him a pump-up speech or something!” (this quotation, along with the following ones, is not 100 percent accurate, but it went something like this).

“Yeah man, give me some words of encouragement!” Kiwi said to Steph’s younger brother, I think only half-kidding.

“You’re good man, just do you,” Seth said and smiled before heading into a different van to be taken to LAX.

That little vignette aside, any questions that may have lingered about Kiwi’s confidence and readiness to step into a bigger role (Seth ended up returning before the next game, so it didn’t matter a whole lot at the moment anyways) were quickly answered the next day at practice in Bakersfield when he brazenly challenged Cameron Jones, one of the best shooters on the team, to a three-point shooting contest.

Apparently he had enough of his teammates’ playful ribbing that his outside jumper wasn’t a strength of his, so it was time to prove the guys wrong.

It was a pretty simple contest: Take five threes from the right wing. Whoever makes more wins 50 bucks. Kiwi was first to bat.

He hit all five. Guys were going crazy with each ensuing triple that Kiwi drilled.

Cam hit his first two shots before missing the third. Kiwi subsequently ripped off his practice jersey and aimlessly ran full speed around the Dignity Health Event Center in pure joy, shouting at the top of his lungs.

“Y’all thought I couldn’t shoot! What now?!” was more or less the rallying cry from Camp Gardner.

Dedmon was egging him on all the whole time, as he had become known to do in those days before he earned his spot in the NBA. “Yeah, do you Kiwi!”

The rest of the team was doubled over in laughter, watching Kiwi bounce around the place talking trash to nobody in particular. Hilton Armstrong could hardly breathe he was laughing so hard before finally saying, “Man I love having Kiwi on this team!”

The next night, the Santa Cruz Warriors erased a 15-point first-quarter deficit by halftime en route to a 111-103 victory on my 27^th birthday. Kiwi Gardner did not see the court. After the game, Hilton Armstrong got word that he was getting called up by the Golden State Warriors, marking the first time he’d be on an NBA regular-season roster in three seasons.

As is D-League custom, the Warriors weren’t done with the Jam on this trip yet, having one more game in Bakersfield two nights later (in fact, Santa Cruz played five in Bakersfield in a span of 20 days in December, and never returned again that season). In the Thursday night game on Dec. 12, the Bakersfield Jam again got out to a double-digit lead. Only this time, Bakersfield was putting the pressure on in the second half. Up one at the break, the Jam outscored Santa Cruz 31-18 in the third quarter to take an 80-66 lead heading into the fourth. Seth Curry, Will Buford and Dewayne Dedmon were having solid games, but that was about it. Santa Cruz was shooting 37 percent as a team entering the fourth quarter and just 6-27 (22 percent) outside of the aforementioned three. The Jam were dominating many stat categories and appeared to have the game well in hand.

Even though the Jam were 3-5 entering Dec. 12, they were still considered the big, bad wolf in the West Division, at least in the eyes of Santa Cruz. The Jam had the best record in the D-League the year before, going 36-14 and clinching the West with a victory over the Sea Dubs (nickname for the Santa Cruz Warriors, in case ya didn’t know) in Bakersfield on the penultimate day of the 2012-13 regular season. Up until Dec. 10 when the Warriors won by eight, Santa Cruz had never won in Bakersfield (albeit the Warriors were just 0-2 in Bakersfield before 2013-14). And, since Santa Cruz won the first game in Bakersfield, odds were that the Jam would take the second: Bakersfield had not lost both or all games in a multi-game home set to the same team since the end of the 2009-10 season, a span of 21 two or three-game homestands against the same team without being swept.

Bakersfield was also loaded with talent that week, having two guys on assignment from the Atlanta Hawks: Dennis Schroder and John Jenkins. Also new to the squad was NBA veteran Ike Diogu, who was still getting his feet underneath him. All this, combined with the fact that Bakersfield was only growing its lead to start the fourth, made it seem like this was going to be an L for the road team. One out of two in Bakersfield ain’t bad. Nothing to hang your head about.

Of course, Kiwi Gardner wasn’t thinking about all that historical mumbo-jumbo. After all, historical trends don’t mean a whole lot in a league where player and franchise turnover is the norm. All he must have been thinking about was that his team was getting beat by a significant margin, and he couldn’t stand it.

*I’m going to break voice here for a bit to say that the following sequence comes partly from what Dewayne Dedmon told me and partly from what head coach Casey Hill told me (I’m mostly going with Dewayne’s version). Since I was busy calling the game, I can’t independently confirm that this is how it went down, but I have no reason to think Dewayne or coach were exaggerating. Alright, resume voice.*

“I’m ready!” Kiwi shouted to nobody in particular.

Casey Hill didn’t do anything.

A little while passed. Hill walked to the end of the bench to get a cup of water, passing right by Kiwi in the process.

“I’m ready!” Kiwi shouted again, this time ripping off his warm-up pants.

Hill gave in, sending Kiwi and Dedmon to the scorer’s table.

*And back to what I saw with my own eyes, and upon review of the game tape.*

Entering the game with Bakersfield leading 88-71 with 9:15 left in the fourth, Kiwi immediately turned the ball over on the next possession, looking for Daniel Nwaelele on a backdoor cut. Two defensive possessions later, he committed a foul. To recap his first 45 seconds on the court, Kiwi had given the ball away on his only touch and fouled the only ballhandler he guarded. Not only that, but his foul put Bakersfield in the bonus with 8:30 to go in the quarter.

Then Kiwi turned it on. After the Bakersfield free throws, Kiwi turned Santa Cruz’s next trip down the court into a #nopasspossession, bringing the ball up the floor, blowing by Aaron Johnson on the left wing and finishing around Ike Diogu with a second-side layup to cut it to 90-75. Then, after allowing Schroder to drive past him, Gardner forced the Hawk assignee into a palming violation. On the ensuing play, Kiwi took matters into his own hands again, powering through Aaron Johnson with a Eurostep to draw the contact and score on a layup. The accompanying free throw cut the Jam lead down to 92-78 with 7:44 left.

While things were looking good, Gardner was having trouble with Schroder defensively, fouling him again to send him to the line. Eventually, Bakersfield pushed its lead up to 96-78 after the Schroder free throws and an Ike Diogu dunk. Santa Cruz called timeout.

But, as we would come to learn throughout the season, an 18-point lead with seven minutes to go is nothing in the D-League; not with the pace at which games are played (the average pace for a team in the D-League this year was about 103 possessions per 48 minutes. By comparison, not one NBA team had eclipsed that mark since the NBA kept track of that stat dating back to the 1996-97. The following statement would need all sorts of statistical research to back up, but I would venture to guess that the 2013-14 D-League season is the fastest-paced pro basketball season in the history of the game).

Coming out of the timeout, Kiwi quickly struck with a nice flip down low to Dewayne Dedmon for a dunk. Baseline drive and finish over Ike Diogu. Threeball over Johnson from the same spot which he had won $50 off Cam Jones.  It was his first made triple of the season. Kiwi had now scored 10 points in the last two and a half minutes, and it started to feel like something special was a-brewin’. A Santa Cruz comeback still wasn’t at the forefront of the mind (it was 98-85 Bakersfield with about six to go), but hey, this kid was killin’.

It didn’t stop. The smallest guy on the court (though Aaron Johnson gave him a run for his money), an unguarded Kiwi got an offensive rebound putback from the weak side to cut it to 10, giving himself 12 points on 5-5 shooting. Then he stole an inbounds pass (and would later miss his only shot of the game on that possession, a left baseline jumper).

Bakersfield coach Will Voigt had seen enough. It was time to bring Schroder back into the game and put him on Kiwi to slow The Dreadlocked One down. First possession with Schroder on him? Kiwi sped past him (with the help of a Dedmon screen), barreled down the left side of the lane and finished at the rim over big man Brian Butch. Next possession with Schroder on him? Killer crossover at the right wing leading to another layup in traffic. Just like that, it was a five-point game with 3:45 to go.

Someone get Disney on the line, just in case. Wanna talk about David vs. Goliath? Dennis Schroder was the 17^th overall selection of the 2013 NBA Draft. Kiwi Gardner was the 112^th overall selection of the 2013 NBA D-League Draft. Schroder had played in 11 NBA games up to that point, getting double-digit minutes in eight of those contests. Kiwi had played in four D-League games heading into that night and was the last guy off the Santa Cruz bench, having never played more than 5:06 in any game. Yet Kiwi had just undressed Schroder two times in a row, and he had more pebbles to load in that slingshot (by no means am I trying to disparage Schroder; he has a bright professional future. Also a very nice kid; I had the chance to speak with him at In-N-Out after the previous game and he was delightful to talk to. I wish him the best of luck).

The game was hanging in the balance. After a Schroder free throw, Bakersfield led 103-102 with 1:33 remaining. Receiving a pass from Cam Jones, Kiwi held the ball out near mid-court on the left side of the floor, waited for Dedmon to set an on-ball screen, and then made his move on Schroder.

As I’m sure Will Voigt told him to, Schroder went under the screen. That’s what you do when guarding a guy who isn’t considered a long-range threat, especially when he’s repeatedly beat your guards off the dribble from the perimeter.

But this was Kiwi’s night. He came to a stop a good foot behind the three-point line and let it fly.

Swish. 105-103 Santa Cruz. All Schroder could do was throw his hands up in disgust.

Brian Butch misses a straightaway three. As Kiwi brings it up, he sees that Schroder is playing off of him and isn’t in much of a guarding position, so he attacks.

Lays it in underneath Schroder’s outstretched arm. 107-103 Santa Cruz. Timeout Bakersfield.

As Kiwi had done for him so many times in the young season, Seth Curry ran to midcourt to give Kiwi a huge side-bump in mid-air. There were still 55.9 seconds left, but this game was over.

Kiwi would hit a couple of free throws to finish the night off with 23 points on 9-10 shooting, 2-2 from beyond the arc and 3-3 at the line. He also contributed two rebounds, one assist, two steals and was a +23… all in 9:15. To cap it off, Kiwi stole the ensuing inbounds pass off his made free throws and ran out the clock. Final score: Santa Cruz 112, Bakersfield 106; Kiwi Gardner 23, Bakersfield 18 over the final 9:15.

As a one-man band on the road, I sent it as quickly to break as I could, ripped off my headsets, and yelled over to athletic trainer Michael Douglas and sports performance coach Kyle Barbour to grab Kiwi for me so we could do a postgame interview.

I’m not sure I’ve cherished any moment in my two years calling D-League games as I do for those 20-30 seconds that Kiwi and I were just chillin’ by the scorer’s table – he right behind and it and me a row removed (close quarters at the Dignity Health Event Center) -- waiting to come back from break. Something spectacular had just happened – the wildest thing I had seen in my short career calling games or covering sports, and I had the first interview on the night that jumpstarted his career. This was tight.

As you’d expect, the team was hyped. Kiwi would later tell his Twitter followers that the team dogpiled on him when he returned to the locker room after our postgame interview. Assistant coach Phil Hubbard, who has spent more than two decades playing and coaching in the NBA, said he had never seen anything like it before. That sentiment was shared by just about everybody (Joe Alexander would later say there was nothing quite like watching Brandon Jennings drop 55 in a game in his rookie year, but loved Kiwi’s outburst in Bakersfield all the same). Dewayne Dedmon, Kyle Barbour and myself couldn’t stop talking about Kiwi’s performance as we pulled into an In-N-Out on the drive to El Segundo (up next was a back-to-back against the Los Angeles D-Fenders; the grind doesn’t stop for greatness).

Hell, Kiwi's game made me feel like a superstar. About three weeks later, an attractive young woman I didn’t know came up to me and said she had heard me on NPR earlier in the day, because NPR did a story on Kiwi’s performance and used my radio calls for natural sound. The two of us made quick acquaintances and went on a date two weeks later (that’s as far as it went, to no fault of either party. Just one of those things, ya know?).

Kiwi’s minutes ebbed and flowed throughout the year, but by the end of the season, he had solidly become the No. 2 point guard behind Seth Curry when Nemanja Nedovic wasn’t on assignment. His game against Bakersfield was far from his last shining moment of the season: 18 points against Pierre Jackson and the Idaho Stampede, 20 points against Peyton Siva and the Fort Wayne Mad Ants, the game-sealing dunk at Reno in late March and the game-winning assist to Daniel Nwaelele against Bakersfield at the end of the year immediately come to mind. Also, he continued being the enthusiastic teammate who was the first to dap a player up for his quality efforts.

If Kiwi decides to return to the D-League, he’d be welcomed back with open arms. He’s only 21; he’ll be playing pro ball for a while. If he has it his way, he’ll be in the NBA someday. I’m no talent evaluator (as evidenced earlier by stating I didn’t think Kiwi would make the team initially), but I don’t doubt him. Especially after that night. Why not make it to the NBA? Kiwi’s on the right path.

On the drive from Bakersfield to El Segundo that night after the game, my longtime broadcasting partner and friend Ros Gold-Onwude hit me up to talk about Kiwi. Like everyone else involved with the Santa Cruz Warriors, she was pumped.

“That’s epic. This is what we do it for. The stories, the special nights, the great players and the unexpected heroes…” Ros texted.

I’d normally disagree with that assessment on why I’m in the business, but she was right. This was better than a Hollywood movie script. Kiwi’s night was a story worth telling.