At the height of his depression in the fall, Louie McCroskey’s friends – his teammates on the Syracuse basketball team – would say they couldn’t see the lights in his eyes.

They urged him to go out with them. His best friends, the three other freshmen, would try to include him in anything they did.

But the one thing – the only thing – he wanted to do with his new teammates, he couldn’t. He was banned from it. McCroskey, a freshman guard from the Bronx, was suspended from practice and games because of academics until mid-December. His friends encouraged him to chill with them, watch movies, spout off quotes from ‘Friday,’ anything to get his mind off basketball.

‘Everyone was so supportive,’ McCroskey said. ‘They would say, ‘Lou, why don’t you hang out with us.’ I tried to isolate myself from the team because I didn’t want to be in that environment. That’s all the guys talk about anyway is basketball.’

So he distanced himself. McCroskey spent a lot of days by himself, in his South Campus apartment, sleeping.

The wakeup call came Dec. 13. Suddenly, he was on the basketball court, cleared to play by Syracuse. He netted five points in his debut game against Binghamton. Since then, he’s averaging 12 minutes and is usually the first player off the bench for the 13-3 Orangemen.

Through it all, he’s learned to deal with adversity and the pressure of being, so far, the top freshman for the defending national champions. He’s guarded and soft-spoken, traits that his stepfather, Stanley Burrus, says have helped McCroskey through the suspension.

‘I pretty much stay to myself,’ McCroskey said. ‘That’s who I am. It’s nothing personal. I just try to go to class everyday, get a head start on my school work. I try not to think about basketball as much. Let the team be the team. Support them as a fan from a distance.’

‘He’s very to himself,’ Burrus said. ‘It gives him great opportunity to observe things around him more. It’s a good advantage for him. He keeps on top of things. The only way to avoid things is to be aware of them.’

Though he isolated himself, he’s not exactly cut off from the team. He now says he’s able to balance both worlds. He goes out, mostly with other freshmen Demetris Nichols, Darryl Watkins and Terrence Roberts. They’ve helped McCroskey with the transition from being stuck on the bench to being the first man off it.

He’s still behind physically. If you want to put a number to it, it’s seven weeks. For two months, he wasn’t able to practice with the Orangemen or play in games. McCroskey kept in shape, but he missed out on the team aspect. He would watch practice occasionally, but sometimes that became too hard to deal with.

Syracuse head coach Jim Boeheim, always quick to administer a verbal lashing for a player’s mistake, perhaps went easy on McCroskey at first, knowing quite well that one of his brightest stars would need the most mental support.

‘When I first came back he was kind of sympathetic,’ McCroskey said. ‘That lasted a week.’

So far, McCroskey’s averaging four points and two rebounds. Those paltry stats belie his importance to the Orangemen’s attack. He’s becoming a second reliable outside shooter to complement Gerry McNamara.

There was a time, though, when McCroskey himself didn’t think he would be playing this year. He said he expected the worst, a one-year suspension. Even one of his former high school teammates speculated that McCroskey would receive a two-year suspension and that his scholarship would be revoked.

‘I told him to stay ready,’ said sophomore guard Billy Edelin, who, much like McCroskey, faced suspension his freshman year. ‘I don’t think he thought he was going to play this year. When the news came, I was glad for him that he wouldn’t miss as many games as I did. I think he’s handled it the best way possible.’

Naturally, McCroskey has looked to Edelin for advice. In turn, Edelin sought out his backcourt teammate early in the year to help him along.

‘It’s not even like I’m just saying it,’ Edelin said. ‘I’m somebody that actually went through it two years in a row for longer periods of time. So if anybody on the team could relate, it’d be me.’

But it’s not just Edelin helping McCroskey. It’s other teammates, like Josh Pace, whose fluid style McCroskey emulates, and Craig Forth, whose hustle he tries to follow.

Most importantly, though, it’s his mother who, throughout McCroskey’s most depressing days, told him to keep his head up.

Valerie McCroskey lives in the Bronx with Burrus. There, she nurtured McCroskey, sent him to St. Raymond High School, a veritable basketball factory where such high school stars as Majestic Mapp, Julius Hodge and Allan Ray graced the hallways.

‘My mom always told me to dream high,’ McCroskey said. ‘If you work at it, anything could happen.

‘Sometimes when you’re a kid, you take your mom for granted. I’m lucky I still have my mom. Our relationship has definitely gotten better. It happens with every kid. They just see a mom as a mom, not as a friend. As you get older, you start to see your mom as a friend. I see her more as a friend.’

She told him not to get down on himself, and rely on his faith, which at the time of the suspension gave him promise. Burrus, too, knew McCroskey would pull through. His stepson wasn’t the type of kid to be down for too long.

‘A couple of guys said that they couldn’t see the lights in my eyes,’ McCroskey said. ‘It’s because basketball is what I do. To be prohibited not to play, it’s tough. I just learned to deal with it. It was tough at first watching the guys play. I remember them playing the Globetrotters and saying, ‘Wow I wish I could be out there.’

‘It was tough to believe, but I knew I was going to be on the court.’

‘He didn’t complain,’ Burrus said. ‘He didn’t cry and mope. He had to grow up fast. And he did.’

Published on January 26, 2004 at 12:00 pm