Syracuse, N.Y. — The story of Syracuse's season is largely the tale of Tyler Ennis' emergence.
He is the freshman who replaced NBA-bound Michael Carter-Williams, the only player capable of playing the point guard position on the Orange roster.
He fared better than expected by most, and so did the Orange, winners of 25 straight games and, at one point, the No. 1 team in the country.
The team planned a preseason trip to Canada partially to groom him, then watched him bloom into a national name. He led the team in win shares and the ACC in assists, and he produced one of the season's most memorable moments against Pittsburgh.
To gauge Ennis' first season at Syracuse, we spoke with nine people familiar with his life and his game, asking them reflect back on what it's been like to watch from afar.
They discussed his past, present and future, aspects that will converge in the biggest moment of his young career this week in Buffalo, when Syracuse will open its NCAA tournament less than two hours from Ennis' childhood home.
Ennis' past
Wayne Parrish (CEO of Canada basketball): It starts with his family. They're very involved. They're a part of everything he does. His dad is very, very much a cornerstone in his development.
Tony McIntyre (father): I started coaching when I was 20. I spent 10 years with a club program and wanted to get a team of kids together to play in the U.S. They didn't want to do it. I went back, re-worked my plan. They still didn't want to do it. I resigned and started (The Brampton Bounce). Tyler was on the first team with (his brother) Dylan and Tristan Thompson (of the Cleveland Cavaliers).
Brandon Ennis (older brother): He was always playing up (multiple age groups). He was always playing against older kids. I was about 15 or 16, so Tyler would have been 10 or 11. He came up and played with us. The first time was maybe in Buffalo. It was a small tournament. We were a small team, maybe seven guys, so a lot of times they would put him in at the end of games. We'd help him get shots. He knew his place. He knew not to try to do too much.
McIntyre: Being around older kids, you have to have a little maturity about you. You can't act your age, so I think that's where that started. His brothers toughened him up.
Brandon Ennis: My mom used to get popsicles, and they'd be gone in like two days. I was going into the refrigerator one time, getting some fries or something to eat, and I move the bag and all of a sudden there's these popsicles back there. He was hiding his food from us, like a secret stash or something. We didn't go easy on him. We never let him win.
Syracuse, and those that have grown to know Tyler Ennis, have gotten a lot of joy out of the point guard's first year with the Orange.
McIntyre: He wasn't always (stoic) like people describe him now. He used to cry all the time. He used to throw his controllers when he played video games. One year we got them controllers for Christmas and we had to get different colors, get them color-coded, because the kids would fight over them. Tyler lost and I think he broke his the first day. I think it changed when he went to high school. He had to take the bus to Toronto, get on the Toronto bus to go to school. It took maybe an hour-and-a-half. He had to get himself there, do his homework on the bus. He wanted to go to (prep school) in the U.S. (like his brother) but we wouldn't let him until he could show me he could get straight A's. I think he had a 4.0 in high school. He had to decide what he wanted to focus on.
Bob Farrell (assistant coach, St. Benedict's High School): The school is located in Newark, N.J., which isn't the greatest location in the world. They're in the dorms all weekend unless someone signs them out. There's some ping-ping tables and television, but you're really stuck in there for safety reasons. How much music and television can you watch?
McIntyre: He'd seen his brothers go off to play. The question wasn't really if he'd go but how we kept him home so long? He wanted to challenge himself.
Farrell: I try to get the kids out so a lot of weekends, I'd take him to my home in Point Pleasant, N.J. My wife fell in love with him. He's just such a great kid. We had to tell him, 'Tyler, if you need anything you need to speak up. If you want food, you just go and take it.' My son looks up to him as a role model. I've never said this about a kid ever, but if I had a daughter — I don't, I have two sons — but if I had a daughter, I would want her to marry someone like Tyler Ennis. He's humble. He's not full of himself. He couldn't have worked harder. Every day he was on the VertiMax, using the shooting gun. We had a wrestling coach who had his guys doing P90X at 6 a.m. He was in there doing that.
Matt Farrell (Bob's son and a point guard commit at Notre Dame): He was the most quiet kid you've ever been around. I came home the first time and I recognized him and said, 'Hey Tyler,' and he just didn't say anything. For like two weeks we begged him to talk. You'd ask him to shoot. He'd say yes, and he'd always be smiling, but you didn't know if he was actually excited about it. Then, after two weeks, it was like he was another person. He was like a brother.
Parrish: I say this half-facetiously, but part of that is the self-effacing and humility of Canadians in general. You look at Steve Nash, and that's how he is. There is a team-oriented and less ego-driven approach. I think of Tristan Thompson and how he has carried himself in Cleveland has a lot to do with why they took Anthony Bennett No. 1 overall. They saw the same quality and work ethic. As a basketball player in Canada you don't grow up as the big man on campus. And as a Canadian you're used to living in the shadow of big brother to the south.
Denzell Taylor (Old Dominion player and high school teammate): Even at recess during middle school he was always about, 'Did I get my assists?' He was never worried about scoring. He always wanted assists. He's never felt pressure. Our last game in high school we're in the (National High School Invitational) championship. He hit a go-ahead 3. We ran an out-of-bounds play with 8 seconds left. It was a shot-clock situation. He came off the screen and hit a 3 from the corner.
Farrell: (During that run to the title game) we played St. Anthony's. They'd won (83) straight games, it had been three or four years since they lost. We beat them by nine. We played Findlay Prep — you've heard of them — and they hadn't lost for 54 games. We beat them by three. We overachieved because of Tyler Ennis' IQ and because he makes the players around him better.
McIntyre: I think two things drive him. He wanted to play in college and then in the NBA, and he's pushing toward those things. He sets a lot of individual goals. And he has a fear of losing. He wants to win championships. That's why he came to Syracuse.
Ennis' present
Jonathan Givony (owner of NBADraftExpress.com): His strength would be his ability to run a team, his playmaking ability and poise. He came in from day one and runs the offense like a four-year veteran. It's funny. I've seen him play high school, AAU, Canada and in college and it's like he's four different players. He's like a chameleon. I remember asking him about it and he said, 'It depends on what my team needs.'
Rowan Barrett (assistant general manager of the Canadian national basketball team): He is a very humble kid. I think you'll get that consistently from everyone you talk to, and he's all about winning. In 2012 (with the Junior World Championship team) he played on a team with Andrew Wiggins and (Kentucky commit) Trey Lyles, who is projected as a lottery pick. He knew his job was to deliver the ball. He averaged 11 points per game. The next year, Wiggins is out, and we need to replace those points. He scores 20 points per game, leads the world in scoring and we have our best finish ever. He's a talented player. Did it surprise us that he was the best point guard at that tournament? No, we knew how good he was. Was it surprising when, as a point guard, he leads the world in scoring? We probably didn't expect that.
Brandon Ennis: I don't think we're surprised that he's been successful. I don't know if we expected it to happen this fast. I knew at the Maui Invitational Tournament. He played phenomenal. He had 28 points (against California) and nine assists (against Baylor). All of a sudden it was, man, he's going to be a problem for people. ... That shot against Pittsburgh. We were all sitting there. He crossed left, crossed right, squared his shoulders. Then everyone's phone is blowing up. That was the most I've seen him get excited. We saw he said something to the crowd like 'This is my house' so we asked, 'Tyler, what did you say?' He didn't even remember. He was so excited.
Matt Farrell: I texted him after and said, 'Man, you're cold-blooded. You knew that was going in.' He texted back, 'Yup. Haha.' Nothing fazes him at all. Even when we were working out he was totally poised. If you hit him, fouled him, he just let it go. His mental toughness is crazy. When he's out there he's in complete control of the game.
Tyler Ennis' strengths are his ability to play with poise, his lack of turnovers and his willingness to get all the other members of his team involved. One of his few weaknesses has been finishing over defenders around the rim.
Ennis' future
Jeff Goodman (ESPN analyst): Syracuse can survive losing C.J. Fair. I think it can survive losing Jerami Grant. But I don't know how they stay at this level if they lose Tyler Ennis. You're going to bring in Kaleb Joseph, but I don't think he's ready to do what Ennis is doing. Ennis was a guy that came out of nowhere as far as NBA scouts are concerned. He was supposed to be a solid three- or four-year guy. The thing that blows me away is how he delivers it. He gives it to guys on their hands, where they want it. There's no wasted motion. The NBA guys notice that. This point guard class is so weak overall. There aren't a lot of good point guards. Marcus Smart, he's not a true point guard. Andrew Harrison went from a lottery pick to a second-rounder. You have to take some point guard and after the first six or seven picks there's a big drop off.
Givony: I think he's probably safely in the top 20.
Goodman: I talked to 20 scouts three or four weeks ago and most of them had him in their top 15. Has it dropped a little late in the season? I think so. Maybe he's fallen into the latter part of the first round. I'd be surprised if it's further than that. The NCAA Tournament might help him. Maybe he uses it to push himself back up into that lottery area.
Givony: He doesn't blow you away with his physical tools. There are guys you watch and they're huge, long, tall. He's more of an acquired taste. The questions are will it translate to the next level? He struggles to some extent finishing inside, and that's without going against bigger, taller players. Then there's defense. You see sometimes in transition, when he's man-to-man, that it's not his strength. He doesn't move his feet really well. He makes up for that with tremendous anticipation and intelligence.
Farrell: I talked to a scout from Orlando the other day. He said, 'Bob, we've seen all we need to see, but I need 45 minutes to talk about him off the court.' I told him that the Tyler you see on the court is the real Tyler.
McIntryre: I've been through this before with a few guys, and if a guy is a potential lottery pick, they really, really need to think hard about it. I always explain it to people like, 'Imagine you're in law school and, after your first year, some law firm comes and offers you X million? Are you going to turn it down or are you going to take it and learn as you go?' Sure, Marcus Smart plays into it. I'd say he was a top three pick last year if he left. You see what can happen. Some of it's character questions, but you see how quickly people can turn on you for whatever reason and you can drop. Hopefully we'll be celebrating a national championship and we'll sit down with Tyler, the family and Coach (Jim) Boeheim and we'll discuss what's best for Tyler. ... He's going to be fine. He's focused. He's been really good after the losses, just figuring out what went wrong and what he has to do to fix it. He knows what they have to do to get things going. I think you can see that. He won't be nervous for the NCAA tournament. He's going to play like he always has.