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“I didn’t really come into college like that,” he said. “I just came into college trying to make plays and be the best player I could be.”
The junior point guard for No. 14 Ole Miss, Warren scored 14 points in the Rebels’ 84-56 win over Central Florida on Tuesday night, becoming the school’s 31st player to score at least 1,000 points for his career.
He joins the club in little more than two full seasons, having been injured near the midway point of his sophomore campaign and surpassing the four-figure mark just past the midway point this season.
Warren, an Orlando native, needed eight points to reach 1,000 against the Golden Knights.
As the Rebels head into Saturday’s SEC opener at home against Mississippi State, Warren is averaging 16.9 points, sixth in the league.
Ole Miss coach Andy Kennedy sees the growth, though it’s not physical, in his 5-foot-10 catalyst.
“He’s much more mature. There’s one thing you can count on every day with Ole Miss basketball and that’s he’s going to come and give you an honest day’s work. At times he’ll play down to the competition, but you never have to worry about his focus.”
In playing down, Warren scored only nine points against Centenary and 11 against Jacksonville State.
But he’s shown the ability to carry the Rebels (12-2) when his 3-point shot is on. He had five 3-pointers in the first half against UTEP, a game Ole Miss eventually won 91-81 in overtime. Warren scored 32 on the night.
With a game based on the extreme outside or extreme inside – getting to the rim with a lightning-quick first step and appropriate speed to follow – Warren has scored at least 19 points six times this season.
His quickness appears fully restored after recovering from torn knee ligaments sustained in December 2008 against Louisville in Cincinnati.
A finalist for the Cousy Award, given to the nation’s top point guard, Warren averaged 22.3 points in the Rebels’ three games in Puerto Rico, wins against Indiana and Kansas State and a loss against No. 5 Villanova. That was the highest average for the tournament.
“I’ve known him since high school, and I knew what he would bring to the table. I knew he would be a big-time scorer,” said junior guard Eniel Polynice, another Florida native. “He was so explosive in high school. That’s a great player we got.”
Even greater since he’s gotten to Ole Miss, says Polynice, who describes Warren as a high school player who would grab the ball out of the net and beat a path down the floor, not one who made a living behind the 3-point line.
As an SEC player, the 3-point line has helped him join Club 1,000 in only 60 games, the fifth-fastest of 31 players to achieve the mark.
Gerald Glass was the fastest Ole Miss player to join the group, getting there in the 37th game of his two-year career.
Todd Abernethy is the group’s 30th member with 1,036 points. Former coach Rod Barnes is the 20th at 1,201.
Having joined the club, Warren is on pace to rise rapidly through its ranks. If he averages 15 a game for the remainder of the season he’ll reach the school’s top 20 scorers.
They’re just numbers, and they don’t register much with Warren, who is more comfortable listening and observing in a group than with announcing his presence.
He makes his announcements on the floor.
“I didn’t know I was close to a thousand until earlier in the day,” he said. “I was just playing regular, then during the timeout I looked up and saw the jumbo screen, and there it was.”
Contact Parrish Alford at 678-1600 or parrish.alford@djournal.com
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