“My dad always says this,” Kylan Boswell told me the other day. “Basketball is a game of ebbs and flows.”
Brandon Boswell couldn’t be more right — especially when it comes to his son and his sophomore season.
Michael Lev is a senior writer/columnist for the Arizona Daily Star, Tucson.com and The Wildcaster.
Fifteen games into Year 2 with Arizona, which visits Washington State on Saturday, the Wildcats guard has experienced ebbs and flows, ups and downs, highs and lows.
His overall stats suggest a sophomore surge.
At times, it appears he’s enduring a sophomore slump.
Either way, he’s facing sophomore scrutiny.
No one on the team gets dissected on social media and message boards to the degree that Boswell does. Such is life when you’re the starting point guard for a premier program in a basketball-crazy town.
It’s basically like being a quarterback — which just so h appened to be Boswell’s offensive position in football when he played the sport as a youth.
Arizona guard Kylan Boswell shows emotion during the first half of the Wildcats' 74-68 win over Michigan State on Thanksgiving Day, Nov. 23, in Palm Desert, California.
Boswell knew what he was getting himself into when he reclassified and came to the UA a year early. He knew what he’d be facing when he became a starter this season and his minutes almost doubled.
“A bigger role comes with bigger responsibility,” Boswell said. “People are gonna say something about it. It comes with the game of basketball.
“I just know who I am, the type of work I put in. I know what I want from this game and how much it’s gonna take (to get) that. So I don’t really listen to what people be saying back and forth.”
The only people whose opinions truly matter are UA coach Tommy Lloyd and Boswell himself. So what does he think about his sophomore campaign?
“Definitely progression,” Boswell said. “That’s maybe the best word I can put on it.”
Arizona guard Kylan Boswell dishes a pass during the Wildcats’ win over then-No. 2 Duke at Cameron Indoor Stadium in Durham, North Carolina, on Nov. 10.
Boswell is averaging more points, 3-point field goals, assists and steals per 40 minutes this season than last. His 3-point and free-throw percentages also have improved.
It was at this point in the conversation that Boswell brought up his dad and his lesson. Those ebbs and flows? They’re all right there in Boswell’s game log.
He started out hot — building off a strong finish to his freshman campaign and raising expectations to perhaps unreachable levels.
Through Arizona’s first five games, Boswell shot the ball at an absurd, unsustainable rate: 64.9% from the floor, including 78.9% from 3-point range. That stretch included a masterful all-around performance at Duke: 12 points, eight rebounds, five assists, two steals and only one turnover.
Boswell was flowing like no other.
Arizona guard Kylan Boswell dives for a loose ball during the first half of the Wildcats' game against Michigan State on Nov. 23 in Palm Desert, California.
Then came an ebb. Over the next eight games, Boswell shot 32.6% from the floor, including 26.7% from 3. That stretch included a pair of four-turnover outings against Alabama and Cal — with all four against the Golden Bears coming in the first 2:23 of the game.
This is where the next lesson comes into play.
“It’s the game of opportunities,” Boswell said. “There’s always another day where you’re gonna have another game. When you have a bad game, you can’t really get too stuck on it.”
Boswell is his own biggest critic, he said. But he doesn’t wallow in the ebbs. When a certain aspect of his game is lagging, he attacks it.
“When there’s an issue, instead of getting away from it, you just try to bulldoze through it and fix it,” Boswell said. “That’s how I handle myself when the shot’s not falling or something. I can get on myself a little bit. But you can’t be too hard on yourself. You’ve got to be your biggest fan too.”
Along with every other player on the team, Boswell regularly meets with UA director of player development Rem Bakamus — “Coach Rem” — to watch film. Bakamus dubs the sessions “What’s Working/What’s Not Working.”
Michigan State guard Tyson Walker, right, shoots as Arizona guard Kylan Boswell defends during the first half of their game on Nov. 23 in Palm Desert, California.
One thing that wasn’t working for Boswell: He wasn’t contesting enough shots. It was a teamwide problem in the losses to Purdue and Stanford.
“I was being lazy sometimes off the pick-and-roll,” Boswell said. “I wouldn’t get a contest. I’d fight hard through the screen, but I just wouldn’t contest the jump shot.”
That was one issue. Boswell detected another on his own: He was leaning back on his jumper. As a result, a lot of his shots were coming up short.
So Boswell took a ton of reps that were focused on form. Against Colorado and Utah last week, he shot 47.1% from the floor, including a blistering 58.3% from 3. He was back in the flow.
Boswell also posted a 10-to-2 assist-to-turnover ratio in those two games. That’s the only stat, besides winning percentage, that matters to him.
Even though he doesn’t need to score much for the loaded Wildcats to win, Boswell conceded that it’s frustrating when his shot isn’t falling. In that way, he’s like every basketball player who’s ever laced up a pair of Nikes.
Arizona head coach Tommy Lloyd chats with UA guard Kylan Boswel before the start of the second half of Arizona's 100-68 win over Belmont on Nov. 17 at McKale Center.
In other ways, Boswell is extraordinary.
That side-spinning, left-handed, two-bounce feed to Pelle Larsson vs. Colorado was an all-timer. Boswell followed it up with a no-look bullet from beyond halfcourt to Keshad Johnson vs. Utah.
I’d never seen a pass like the one Boswell finessed to Larsson. Boswell’s description of it reveals his beautiful mind for basketball.
“I got the steal and then I just looked up,” Boswell said. “I saw (Julian) Hammond, the back of his head was to me. I saw Pelle was about two steps behind him getting ready to full-speed sprint. I practice with Pelle every day, so I know how hard he works and how hard he runs the court. I knew I could just throw the ball ahead of him and Pelle would get it. ... I put a little bit of English on it, and it just got there.”
Boswell even said he planned for the pass to bounce twice.
“No one believes me,” he said. “But I really did.”
Boswell clearly possesses a high basketball IQ. He has the talent to be an NBA first-round pick. But everyone progresses at different rates. It’s seldom a smooth, steady ascent.
For those expecting Boswell — at age 18 — to be a sophomore superstar, maybe that was always unrealistic. Maybe it’s OK if he just continues to trend in that direction, ebbing and flowing along the way.
