Freshman Derek Needham flies in for a layup against CCSU (Peter Caty/The Mirror).
Derek Needham has met Jon Han. He knew Jon Han. He knows the narrative: the New York product turned Fairfield phenom, the sensational freshman turned poised veteran, the senior captain turned diversion, distraction and deserter.
Derek Needham knows. Now Derek Needham wants you to know something.
“I loved Jon Han,” he said with a smile. “I’m glad he’s gone and I’m here now. Now it’s time for me to fill his shoes and be better than him.”
Needham’s response is the perfect microcosm of the man: brash and unapologetic, poised and self-assured.
Astronomical Success
Much of that stems from his stunning success at the Da La Salle Institute on the South Side of Chicago, one of the premier programs in the state. The Meteors reached the Class 4A Morton Sectional championship game his senior year, thanks in parts to Needham’s steady hand and the scoring touch of fellow teammate Mike Shaw, one of the nation’s most prized recruits. Even though Shaw was the team’s preeminent offensive threat, Needham scored the 2009 Tony Lawless Chicago Catholic League Player of the Year award at season’s end.
“He was a true leader from start to finish at De La Salle,” high school head coach Tim White said. “I believe he did everything he set out to do. He was a great role model within our program.”
That success never confined itself to just a basketball court. Needham scored a 23 on the ACT and boasted a 3.9 grade-point average that never wavered much beyond his graduation class’ upper echelon. Needham even chaired a leadership conference hosted by the Illinois Basketball Coaches Association on just two days notice after the previous emcee was asked to resign for character issues.
“The more you get to know Derek, the more you will be impressed with him,” head coach Ed Cooley said. “He is a man beyond his years.”
Still, to grasp the crux of Needham’s character, look no further than his upbringing. The Needham’s raised a home in Dalton, Ill., just a jump shot south of Chicago, and for Derek and his relatives, family wasn’t a priority; it was the priority. Both of Derek’s parents were a “fixture at half court for every game,” says White, and his father typically “sat in on almost all of our practices.”
“He really came from a class background,” White added.
In many respects, it was the idyllic American family: a tight knit, blue-collar success story from the South Side.
“Derek was a 17-year-old boy just enjoying life, his friend, and the game of basketball,” White said. “Then he suffered a roadblock.”
Becoming a Man
In December of his senior year, Needham’s father passed away after a prolonged bout with diabetes and a correlated heart condition. While the tragedy caused a season of hoops to deviate toward heartbreak, it marked a watershed moment for both Needham and his family.
“When his father passed away, I think Derek realized that he was the man of the house now,” White said. “He knew that he had to be the role model, and that he had to be there for his mom.”
He also made it a point to be there for his teammates, and ensured that one of his darkest hours led to many of the Meteors’ finer moments. With a heavy heart, Needham scored 13 points in just 19 minutes on Dec. 5 of his senior year, days after his father’s passing.
Needham’s poise was a recurring theme for the rest of the season and perhaps the best explanation of De La Salle’s run to the championship game.
“When we’d play, he always got the laughing and cheering (from his father) at center court. Senior year he didn’t have that, but I’d like to think he had inspiration from above,” White said.
Welcome to the MAAC, Kid
Now, Needham’s compelling story continues at Fairfield as the heir to the Stags’ starting point guard role. Moreover, he inherits a variety of voids previously left vacant in the absence of his predecessor. Much of that is purely basketball. The Stags sorely missed Han’s 9.1 points-per-game and his playmaking ability.
More of it, though, is the intangible elements Needham brings that the Stags have desperately lacked a season ago.
“I think he’s a spectacular young man,” Cooley said. “If you spend time with that kid … spend time with him. He’s a great, great character person. The fact that he puts the ball in the basket makes me look like I can coach.”
“You can tell I have a lot of trust in him,” he added.
Needham’s teammates echo that sentiment.
“My teammates, they trust me,” Needham said. “When I came in they didn’t say, ‘Don’t mess up.’ They said, ‘You are our point guard and handle the ball.’ I don’t feel like a freshman on the court because everyone trusts me.”
Trust was a word seldom used last winter. A year later, the Stags now place that trust, that confidence, and that extension of the coach on the floor into the hands of Needham, whose part-swagger and part-sophistication approach, family-first mindset, and maturation beyond his years may very well be the Stags’ saving grace this season.
“Coach said he was going to put the ball in my hands, and I believed him, so I really worked out (this preseason),” Needham said. “I don’t want to play like a freshman; I want to play like a senior in order to lead this team. That’s what I do on the court.”
Fast Start
That work on the court has already turned heads. Needham totaled 19 points against Fordham at Alumni Hall this past Tuesday, an impressive encore to his 14 point, six-assist effort in the team’s season-opener against Central Connecticut State just two days earlier. His range and nose for the basket already resembles shades of Joe DeSantis and the long lineage of the program’s greatest point guards.
Nonetheless, if Needham’s story illustrates anything, it is that the stat sheet is far from the first thing mentioned when his name is the topic of discussion.
“It’s not about stats with Derek,” White said. “It is about character, it is about leadership, and it is about sportsmanship and accountability. The only way you get there is hard work, and that’s what Derek is all about.”
“He is a natural leader and he really wants to be in tough positions,” Cooley said. “I am very fortunate to coach him. Right when we started coaching him, we knew we had something special.”
“He will be one of the better freshman that has come through the league in a long time,” he added
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