Nebraska's White III has strong connection to pet turtles
LINCOLN, Neb. -- Andrew White III, the hot-shooting wing and one-time top 50 recruit who transferred from Kansas to Nebraska a year ago, collects turtles.
Back home at his parents' home in Virginia, the 22-year-old has three pet box turtles. Turtles are easy pets: You feed them, they walk around a little, they drink some water, then they go back to sleep. In a way, White is like a turtle himself. He's a low-key, reserved dude who tends to stay in his own lane. He moves a little slowly. He talks a little slowly. He kind of just stays in his shell.
"There's a story behind all of them," White told me recently of his turtles, just before Nebraska began a season in which the Huskers were coming off a hugely disappointing 12th-place finish in the Big Ten. "One of them was left in an apartment, in an aquarium. My dad picked that up and brought it home. This was 10 years ago now. They live forever."
That one is named Turtle-A. The second turtle is named Miller; White's parents were on the way back from dropping their son off at his first day at a new middle school when they found a turtle on the side of the road. The school was Miller School.
The third turtle, White found a year ago. He had just taken his official visit to Notre Dame during his transfer process. When he got back to the airport in Richmond, his mom's car was near a stoplight when White saw a turtle on the side of the road. "Stop the car!" he shouted. White jumped out, picked it up and put it in the floor of the car. That turtle is named Dame.
Andrew White III transferred to Nebraska from Kansas to get more opportunities for playing time.
As Nebraska heads toward a crucial set of non-conference games against ranked teams — Cincinnati in Brooklyn on Friday and then Miami at home next week as part of the Big Ten/ACC Challenge — White's turtle obsession will play a crucial part in determining whether these Huskers will be like the surprise NCAA tournament team from two years ago, or like the disappointing team from a year ago that was one of the nation's worst-shooting groups.
Here's why: Ever since the 6-foot-7 guard was a kid learning basketball from his dad, a former Division II player in Atlanta, he saw himself as a shooter. That's why White was recruited out of high school to play at one of nation's bluebloods. His role was to get open and make shots.
But after hardly playing his first two years at Kansas, White transferred to Nebraska, wanting to go to a place where he had an opportunity to make an impact. When he got to Lincoln, it became unacceptable to stand in the corner and wait for the ball. Coaches told him he was no longer just a spot-up shooter. He needed to become a complete basketball player; to create, to make plays off the dribble, to become a two-way player who was no longer a liability on the defensive end.
In other words: Be aggressive. Get out of your shell.
"That's what coaches preach to me: 'Get out of your shell!' 'Play with a different pace!' " White said. "The coaches tell me I'm not a jump shooter. Be a complete player. Drive it. Work on your moves."
"Nobody here is holding me in a box," he said. "Everybody is saying do more, do more."
It's early, but there's a cautious optimism around White's team this season. Two highly recruited freshmen — power forward Ed Morrow and point guard Glynn Watson — join 6-foot-8 Australian wing Jack McVeigh to fill in holes for a group that last year ranked 340th in the nation in three-point percentage and 285th in offensive efficiency, per KenPom.com.
The team had one of the most imbalanced offense-defense mixes in college basketball a year ago, with its top-25 pack-line defense made obsolete by a complete lack of scoring ability.
White's skill from beyond the arc ought to ease some of the pressure off the smooth and tough-nosed senior Shavon Shields.
"Andrew can make shots," head coach Tim Miles told me. "He's a guy who can catch a bad pass and make a shot. He can look like he's a little bit out of rhythm and make a shot. And he can catch and shoot and make a shot. He can really get it going."
"And he's really worked harder at doing more off the dribble," Miles continued. "He's really worked harder at being a better rebounder. And he's really a powerful player when he goes to the boards. He can do a lot of different things. When we recruited him, we wanted him to be more than a spot-up shooter."
So far, the shooting is there. After five games, White shoots on nearly a third of the possessions when he's on the floor. His hitting threes at a 45 percent clip. Opponents know he can shoot, so they close out on him quickly; White has become more proficient at taking a couple dribbles and scoring on a suddenly efficient mid-range game.
"Just the opportunity to play in a big league — that's all I wanted on my second go-around," White said. "It's kind of a humbling experience. You go from a national powerhouse, and now you're in a different tier of schools. You really have to change your mentality, just be open and figure what the best opportunity for yourself will be, and take all the hype and glamour away from it."
That's what he's done, in his redshirt season and so far this year: Come out of his shell.
The only thing missing is his own turtle in Lincoln. His three pet turtles stay with his parents back in Virginia.
"I haven't found one on the road yet to pick up and take home," White said. "I'll definitely have one here. But it's not the same experience if you buy it. I gotta find it on the road somewhere."
Follow Reid Forgrave on Twitter @reidforgrave or email him at ReidForgrave@gmail.com.
