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Aug. 8, 2009
Myron Strong and Jeremy Williams, newcomers to the UTEP basketball team, have some adjusting to do in the coming months. They'll be adjusting to a new city, a new culture, a new school, new classes, a new coach and new teammates. One adjustment they won't have to make, however, is to each other. Strong and Williams have known each other for six years and played together for four. Now they're teammates for the third time. "We're like brothers," Strong said. "Jeremy is around me all the time." They first met when Strong was a freshman and Williams was a sophomore at Hamilton High School in their hometown of Memphis. They led Hamilton to a 39-0 record, a no. 7 national ranking by USA Today and Class 3A state championship two years later. They charted different courses, however, when it came to picking colleges. Williams, a 6-7 forward, landed at the University of Colorado. He had a solid freshman season, averaging 7.7 points and 4.6 rebounds. He started 18 games for the Buffaloes. Strong, a 6-2 guard, played his freshman year at the University of San Francisco. He started 26 games and also made an immediate impact, contributing 10 points, 3.1 assists and 1.7 steals per contest. While Strong and Williams were separated by over 900 miles, very similar circumstances would soon bring them together again. "There was a lot of stuff going on with the athletic director at San Francisco that affected everybody, and pretty much the whole team split," Strong said. "It was pretty much the same situation for me," Williams said. "The athletic director was skeptical about keeping the coach [Ricardo Patton] that recruited me. Coach Patton decided to leave, which gave me no choice but to leave too. I stayed for another year to get my grades up, and decided to take the junior college route." Strong and Williams would rendezvous at Southwest Tennessee Community College, back where it all started - in Memphis.
They picked up right where they had left off as a tandem at Hamilton High, directing the Salukis to a 27-3 mark, including a perfect 13-0 in the Tennessee Community College Athletic Association. Southwest Tennessee placed eighth at the NJCAA Tournament. Williams was the team's leading scorer (15.1 ppg) and a TCCAA All-Western Division pick. Strong was appointed a second team NJCAA All-American and the TCCAA Player of the Year after collecting 14.2 points per outing. The choice to keep playing together at UTEP was a simple one. "I've always been a fan of up-tempo ball," Williams said. "I knew what I was getting into with coach [Tony] Barbee and [assistant coach Tony] Madlock. They had been recruiting me since high school." Strong and Williams represent a small piece of UTEP's 11-man junior class for the 2009-10 season. They join holdovers Claude Britten, Randy Culpepper, Isaac Gordon, Gabriel McCulley, Eric Munoz, Wayne Portalatin and Julyan Stone, and fellow transfers Derrick Caracter and Christian Polk. "Last year, if we lost a game it was on our shoulders," Strong said. "This year we are surrounded by talented players. We won't feel as much pressure. We'll just be able to play ball." Both Strong and Williams describe themselves as all-around players. "I can pretty much do it all - dribble, shoot, jump, I have quick feet and I'm quick with my hands," Strong said. "I'm a good team defender, and I can set people up [with the pass]. I'm pretty comfortable at either 1 or 2 guard. Last year I played the 2, and I pretty much had the ball in my hands at San Francisco." "I'm a winner," Williams said. "I'm going to do whatever it takes to win, whether it's scoring or rebounding or on the defensive end of the floor. If you need me to defend a big man or a guard or you need me to score off mismatches, I'm going to do it. I wouldn't say I have a strong point ... I just do everything." Strong and Williams hope to lead UTEP to its first NCAA Tournament bid in five years next spring. "We have a lot of experienced players," Strong said. "We're loaded at every position. Somebody needs to lead by example, but I feel comfortable saying we're the most talented team in Conference USA." "Everything can fall into place with everybody being juniors," Williams said. "If we all do our jobs, stay focused and have our eye on the prize, I think we can be as successful as we want to be." 
 
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