Steven M. Sipple: For Maric, it's never been about him
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Doc Sadler’s most important recruiting victory since his arrival in August of 2006?
I’ll go with Aleks Maric.
Oh, sure, Maric already had played two seasons at Nebraska when Sadler came aboard. But remember that Doc had to travel to Australia right away to make sure the big man would return to the Big Red fold.
“We still have a lot of work to do — a lot of work — in this program to get it to where we want it to be,” Sadler said. “But we’ve got the type of people you want.
“Then when you’ve got your best player, who’s also your hardest worker, he builds a foundation for you,” Sadler said of Maric, a 6-foot-11, 275-pound senior, who will play his final home game Sunday against Colorado.
“People don’t understand how much ...” Sadler’s voice trails off, but my guess is he was fixing to say that a lot of people don’t understand how much Maric has meant to Nebraska basketball.
“When it’s all said and done, he’s going to be somebody we look back on and say, ‘Man, he’s the guy who gave us a chance to get this thing going,’” the second-year Husker coach said. “I’d hate to think where we’d be without him.”
Those are kind and telling words about a player who is seemingly taken for granted and arguably underappreciated. All those double-doubles, yes, absolutely, they’re easy to take for granted. But just wait until he’s gone. Maybe then we’ll notice him more. Life often works that way.
“I think it becomes easy to take someone for granted who’s been around for so long,” said former Nebraska assistant Scott Spinelli, who recruited Maric to Lincoln after being tipped off by an NBA scout.
Said Maric: “All I can do is do what I do.”
He’s done plenty. You hear people say numbers don’t lie, when in reality they can be extremely misleading. But there’s nothing misleading about Maric ranking first all-time among Big 12 players in career double-doubles in league games (25). Think about all the great players he leads in that category. Chris Mihm. Eduardo Najera. All those Kansas greats — Gooden, LaFrentz, Simien, Chenowith.
There’s nothing misleading about the fact Maric has missed only three games in his four seasons at Nebraska, and that he ranks second on the school’s career rebound list, behind Venson Hamilton, and eighth on NU’s scoring list. And on and on.
Maric shows up every day and produces, with mind-numbing consistency. Hard to beat that. Yet critics always have their say. They grouse about Maric’s bricks close to the basket, until you point out the guy is shooting 57.3 percent from the field and averages a double-double.
Here’s some good news: Maric does feel appreciated by Nebraska fans. It’s nice to hear him say that.
“But I never want it to be about me,” he said. “I think they appreciate our hard work as a team.”
The thing is, Sunday, in many ways, is all about Aleks Maric. This is it. His curtain call. He’ll be honored before the game as the team’s only senior. The standing ovation will be long and loud, because of that mind-numbing consistency and because he produces more statistically than anybody on the team yet always puts the team before himself.
Oh, sure, scoff at that. Say it’s trite. Whatever. Maric is refreshing in today’s look-at-me world. He’s genuinely uninterested in self-promotion and media exposure. He’s the ultimate team guy. He just tries to keep life simple. Work hard and have fun, he says.
Even when pondering his legacy at Nebraska, Maric thinks about the big picture more than himself.
“Coming here, I knew Nebraska was never regarded as a basketball powerhouse,” he said. “I always told myself, ‘By the time I leave, I want to have established something that future teams and players could build on to get Nebraska on track to where it needs to be, to where we can compete with teams like Kansas and Texas and Duke and North Carolina. If I can help establish that, then I’ve accomplished something.’
“It’s like you have a piece of land and want to build a house and you don’t know what to do. I mean, once you put that foundation on the land, you eventually start going forward. The hardest part is getting that foundation in.
“I want to come back here, you know, 20 or 30 years from now with my kids, and see Nebraska being ranked in the Top 25 for a number of years. That all started from hard work that past teams put in.”
How does Maric want to be remembered?
“Just as guy who was accepted in the state of Nebraska, appreciated, and has never done anything wrong.”
Make no mistake, there are plenty of people in Nebraska who appreciate Maric. He fits here well, with his reliable, no-nonsense, hard-working ways. He attributes his work ethic to his Serbian heritage (back home in Sydney, Australia, Maric plays an active role in the Serbian community), and to his mother and father, who migrated to Australia and created a great life for the family.
Stevan Maric was a construction worker who helped build a gargantuan hydroelectric dam.
“Working hard is in our family — in our genes,” Stevan Maric said. “Work, work, work. With your hard work, you will get something done.”
Aleks Maric is set to graduate in May. The NBA? Don’t know, he says, ask him in June. You get the feeling he’s not banking on it, but you have to think he has a chance. He’s a specimen. He’s developed skills around the basket. His confidence is growing. But he’ll need to find a team with a certain style, perhaps a certain type of coach.
Maybe he’ll play professionally in Europe. If not, he’ll go home to Sydney and start working, working hard, perhaps as a construction manager. Perfect. Doc will tell you the kid already has a propensity for helping build strong foundations.
Reach Steven M. Sipple at 473-7440 or ssipple@journalstar.com.
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