Rookie Diary: Sixth Installment, Armstrong Shines vs. Magic

January 18, 2007

Periodically throughout the 2006-07 season, Hornets.com is chatting with Hornets first-round draft picks Hilton Armstrong and Cedric Simmons, to get their thoughts on what life is like as an NBA rookie, both on and off the floor.

In this edition of Rookie Diary, Armstrong discusses his performance in Tuesday’s 84-78 overtime victory vs. the Orlando Magic. After going 3 1/2 weeks without playing more than 15 minutes in a game, the Connecticut product logged 16 minutes Tuesday and grabbed six rebounds. His one blocked shot against the Magic proved to be the defensive play of the game: Armstrong rejected Dwight Howard’s dunk attempt in OT to preserve a four-point lead for the hosts. Orlando did not score in the extra period until a Keyon Dooling three-pointer with 7.7 seconds left.

The 6-foot-11 forward/center also described to Hornets.com the adjustments he has been making and how he has approached his recent lack of playing time.

Hilton Armstrong grabbed six rebounds and made a critical blocked shot on Dwight Howard’s overtime dunk attempt, helping the Hornets prevail 84-78 over the Magic.

Throughout this season, I’ve learned to watch everyone on the court when I’m playing defense, and not just whoever has the ball or the man I’m guarding. You have to watch everything, especially on the weakside. Sometimes you get caught helping out too much and you leave your man open for a shot. You have to be alert at all times.

The way I look at my situation is that like a lot of rookies, everybody’s not going to play a lot right away. People have been telling me that just like when I was at UConn, I’ve got to fight for playing time. It wasn’t easy for me to get playing time in college, especially coming from that kind of program. I feel like I have to work hard and nothing is going to come easy. If I do that, better things will happen for me and it will pay off.

The experience I had of not playing a lot right away at Connecticut [Armstrong averaged 10.8, 9.1 and 12.4 minutes in his first three college seasons, respectively] definitely helps me mentally adjust. If I played 30 minutes a game throughout my whole career in college, I might get really upset right now. It would really bother me. But since I’ve been through it before, I’m prepared and I’m not going to just give up.

People have been telling me to keep playing hard and to be solid on defense. The harder I play, the better things will work out for me. I am working in the weight room on trying to get stronger, so that I can hold people off better (in the paint). Being stronger is important.

After games where I don’t get to play much, the next day in practice I will do more sprints. I come in early before practice, get some shots up and do running to make sure my conditioning is good. If I get less than 15 minutes in the game, I will usually do that.