John Blanchette: Cougars’ Clark bears it, then grins

SACRAMENTO, Calif. – What is it in a smile that can offend?

Ivory Clark can’t explain it, exactly. But he is a serious man, not outwardly light of heart and especially not here in March, when his minutes on the court for the Washington State Cougars had been choked to a trickle.

And maybe that was it. Maybe seeing his own participation ebb was enough to make him chafe at any expression or suggestion that opportunity is a lark.

Which is apparently what Caleb Green’s smile suggested to Ivory Clark.

“This is business,” he said. “We’re in the NCAA tournament. This is no time to be smiling.”

So on Thursday, Ivory Clark took care of business.

He put aside his hurt over his diminished role. He made himself ready. He knocked down needed jumpers, got himself to the free-throw line, rebounded with purpose and transfused the Cougars with energy and, yes, leadership – becoming the central character in Wazzu’s first NCAA tournament victory in 24 years, a 70-54 beatdown of Green’s team, Oral Roberts University.

And he swatted Caleb Green’s smile into the cheap seats.

“He had five blocks,” marveled ORU coach Scott Sutton, “but it seemed like 10.”

And when the all the serious business was done, Clark allowed himself a smile.

“In a way,” he said, “a weight has been lifted.”

From the Cougs, too, although they would never confess to ever feeling burdened, even if they seemed to be upset-special-victim-of-choice of nine out of 10 national commentators. Now the East Region’s No. 3 seed can sally forth to Saturday’s second-round game against Vanderbilt as a, gulp, favorite.

“Us?” snorted Clark. “From what I heard, we were supposed to lose to Oral Roberts.”

He heard right, but the Cougs listened wrong.

True, they at first responded to their first NCAA invitation since 1994 by playing as if they were trying not to get invited back, But they got themselves righted with two baskets in the last 5 seconds of the first half and a 9-0 run to start the second – and after staying close with their defense on the gifted Green, they then used it to break the game open. They gave up double-teaming the 6-foot-8, 255-pound forward – a 20-point, nine-rebound machine all year – in the post and chose to play him straight up with Robbie Cowgill, with Clark coming from the backside to help.

Well, help might be underselling it.

“He owned the paint on defense,” Cowgill corrected. “I could tell Green was getting frustrated. He’d think, ‘I beat skinny little Cowgill and got around him and that was easy.’ Then he’d put up a shot and Ivory would send it.”

This led to Green’s 4-of-16 shooting performance – the single defining statistic of the game, unless you count Clark’s 19 points, six rebounds and five blocks in 29 minutes as a single stat.

Surely it was a defining performance for Clark, a fixture in the starting lineup until March when his own indifferent play and the emergence of big Aron Baynes limited his contributions. The low point: a scoreless, 7-minute stint on Senior Night with his mother on hand from New Orleans.

He didn’t hide his bitterness. But he did try not to let it consume him. He stayed after practice to work on his own, and he and teammate Mac Hopson ventured into Bohler Gym after midnight earlier this week for extra shooting.

And he was always able to lean on his teammates.

“He’s a quiet guy and you know he takes it hard,” said Kyle Weaver. “I just tried to talk to him and keep him positive. It’s so easy to get down on yourself and in doing so you don’t realize that you’re hurting the team – because it’s all about us. I think he did a great job of pulling through it to have a game like this is special.

“He deserves this game.”

Clark wouldn’t disagree.

“I never got the big head or on the high horse,” he said. “Definitely, not getting the minutes I would have liked was hard. But it’s always a good experience to go through something like that.”

Humility is one of the cornerstones of coach Tony Bennett’s program, but Clark’s recent trials provided an especially cruel lesson.

“Ivory wears his emotions on his sleeve,” Bennett said, “but I knew he was fine.”

Well, with everything but Green’s smile, which was probably harmless enough and maybe just a reflection of Oral’s early success.

“I just didn’t like him smiling,” Clark explained. “I respect him as a player, but that got to me. Maybe that’s just the type of guy he is. He just kept smiling like everything was all sweet and I wanted to wipe that smile off his face.

“Then sometime in the middle of the second half, we were shooting free throws and I looked over and he wasn’t smiling any more. I knew we were in good shape.”

Seriously good. Like Ivory Clark’s state of mind.