Edmonds-Woodway boys basketball coach Robert Brown likes his team to play a fast-paced style and put up a lot of points.
Adding a player who averages more than 27 points per game makes that task easy.
Senior David Woodard transferred to Edmonds-Woodway from O’Dea midway through his junior year and is in his first year of athletic competition at the school.
To say it’s gone well would be an understatement.
Woodard started the school year by becoming the football team’s best receiver and earning first-team all-league honors.
He’s carried that success over into basketball season, averaging 27. 5 points, 4.5 rebounds and 2.5 assists per game.
“He’s the real deal,” Mountlake Terrace head coach Nalin Sood said. “He’s as advertised.”
Mountlake Terrace is one of just two teams to get the better of Woodard and the Warriors this season. Through eight games the Warriors are 6-2, with their only losses coming to the 5-2 Hawks and the 8-0 Cascade Bruins.
The Warriors two losses have come by a combined seven points.
“He makes me a better coach,” Brown said of Woodard. “Every time you get good players they make us better coaches.”
Woodard also makes his teammates better, which may be his most important quality.
“He’s a great practice player. He’s a competitive player and he’s a great team player,” Brown said. “You wouldn’t know it if you looked at his stats, but he really knows that everyone has to be successful for him to be successful. He pushes that on guys all the time in practice. He wants everybody to be better. It’s not just about him.”
Junior point guard Tre’var Holland, junior forwards Ali Gaye and Ryan Peterson and seniors Jordan Rice and Brady Edwards all have played crucial roles in the team’s early-season success.
But when the Warriors need a bucket, Woodard is the go-to-guy.
“You can go to him and you know he’s going to get you a bucket or he’s going to make a play to get you a bucket,” Brown said. “He’s not one of those kids that’s just going to shoot the ball. If it comes up where he can make a play and pass the ball to somebody else and he has confidence in his teammates, he’ll make that pass.”
Sood’s Hawks did a good job of defending Woodard in their 74-72 win over the Warriors Dec. 17, but Woodard still managed to get 18 points.
“Our gameplan wasn’t to stop Woodard, just to make him work as hard as he can,” Sood said. “He’s such a good shooter. I guess you can compare him to some of the guys that play in college or the NBA where you have to have a short-term memory. You can work and work and work and he’s going to hit something and it’s either going to crush you and you’re done, or you just have to keep making him working for everything, but you’re not going to stop a kid like that.”
Brown said the 6-foot-3 Woodard averaged around 15 points per game as a junior at O’Dea. He’s significantly raised that average this season in large part due to his athleticism and physicality.
“He’s great size on him,” Brown said. “He’s very physical when he goes to the basket. He gets a lot of continuation calls when he’s going to the basket. The fact that he can shoot the basketball, which makes you have to defend him, just enhances the fact that he’s so physical going to the basket.”
Woodward said much of his offensive success comes from being patient.
“I’m just letting the game come to me and taking what’s open,” he said. “I’m really working hard on defense trying to get easy baskets in transition and trying to get to the free-throw line. Once I get open 3s, just make them. Once I make a few, two or three can turn into five or six.”
Woodard has just as much value on defense. His size and strength allow him to guard almost any position on the floor. When the Warriors played the Cascade earlier in the season, Woodard guarded 6-foot-5 center Isaiah Gotell, who is one of Wesco’s premier big men, and 6-foot-2 guard Drew Magaoay, who is one of the best perimeter players in the league.
With Woodard and a cast of characters who can all score, Brown’s biggest concern is his team not staying focused defensively. In both of the Warriors’ losses they’ve given up 74 points or more.
“It’s a blessing and curse,” Brown said. “The guys sometimes get to a point where they think outscoring is the way to go instead of playing defense.”
The Warriors have proven so far this season they will be a tough team to beat, Woodard hopes that results in a trip to Tacoma in March.
“I thought we would have a good chance of winning almost every single game,” Woodard said. “We lost two tough games so far that honestly came down to only one possession. I expected to be undefeated, but I think we have a good chance of winning a lot of the rest of our games and hopefully going far.”
Aaron Lommers covers prep sports for The Herald. Follow him on Twitter at @aaronlommers and contact him at alommers@heraldnet.com.
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