It’s 2 a.m., and John Bowie cannot locate his son. On this summer night, John made the short drive from his Greenbelt home to the university to deliver Adrian Bowie leftover food and spending money, but the 6-foot-2 Terrapin guard is nowhere to be found.
Adrian is not in his Old Leonardtown dorm room, and he is not picking up his cell phone. But he is not in any sort of trouble, either. He is just occupied.
Adrian may be a self-described “mama’s boy” and devoted family man, but this night, another activity takes precedence over his mother’s cooking and some spare cash.
Adrian is busy shooting jump shot after jump shot after jump shot, alone in an empty Comcast Center, receiving passes from a machine called the Terp Gun. It’s a thankless, repetitive process, but one that Adrian knows will help him once the season begins.
“As a kid, he always had the basketball in his hands,” Adrian’s mother, Marsha Bowie, said. “He was always shooting something.”
But never like this. Never with this type of concentration or purpose. Throughout the summer, Bowie spent at least two hours each day shooting hundreds of jumpers, abolishing the little hitch he had in his stroke as a freshman and squeezing in attempts whenever he had time – even if that meant sessions at 2 a.m.
“Since I took summer classes this summer, I pretty much stayed on campus,” Bowie said. “There was no reason to stay in my room, so I just came over here in the morning and at night and put some shots up.”
Unlike many of his teammates who stayed on the campus for just one summer session, Bowie stayed for both, taking four total classes, including his favorite: CPR training.
“I had a lot of fun trying to save people’s lives,” the soft-spoken sophomore said. “I hope [I don’t need to use it though], because if that’s the case, they might end up dying. I got a good grade, but I don’t remember it.”
While Bowie may not be the best candidate to resuscitate a struggling victim, he has breathed new life into the Terps. Bowie began the season as a substitute, but after six games of instant offense coming off the bench, coach Gary Williams couldn’t resist starting his sparkplug.
Bowie posted 3.7 points per game during an inconsistent freshman season, but with his summer improvements on feature display, he is now averaging 10.4 points through eight games as a sophomore.
Last season, as one of seven Terps freshmen, Bowie was forced into playing time he wasn’t necessarily ready for. He wasn’t yet confident in his shot, and playing primarily shooting guard, he attempted only 12 3-pointers.
Even with the 3-point arc extended a foot back this season, Bowie has already attempted 17 this season and made seven – a 41.2 percent clip good for second-best on the Terps, behind only Dave Neal.
“Adrian Bowie – everybody here who saw him play last year, they see a better stroke this year,” Williams said. “I think he is more confident, but he’s stronger and he’s a better shooter.”
His confidence as a shooter has trickled down to the other facets of his game, as well.
Bowie had his worst game of the season in his first start against Michigan on Wednesday, as he shot 1-7 from the field and was 0-3 from 3-point range. While that substandard effort may have dissuaded him from shooting in the past, Bowie mentally jettisoned the cold game and bounced back against George Washington on Sunday for a career-high tying 17-point night.
“He realized that he needed to improve ball handling, shooting his jump shot and getting his confidence level up,” Bowie’s father, John, said, “and that’s what he did.”
It was John Bowie who got his son Adrian involved with Maryland basketball in the first place. John – who used to be an equipment manager for the men’s basketball team, but now works for the other Terp sports – was able to get little Adrian to serve as the Terps’ ballboy at age 7. As a ballboy, Adrian used to play one-on-one matches against Terps players such as Johnny Rhodes and opponents such as Jerry Stackhouse before games.
“It was a great experience, because it made me realize that’s where I want to be when I’m older,” Bowie said. “And it made me work harder as a basketball player.”
John would also take Adrian and older brother, Darrin, to Terp practices so they could pick up the nuances of basketball firsthand.
“He sat there, and he would watch practice, or I would bring home game tapes, and he would sit there with me and watch game tapes,” John said.
These days, John watches games from the stands and offers post-game evaluations to his son.
“I definitely ask him [for advice],” Adrian said “And I don’t have to ask my mom, because she’s going to tell me anyways.”
Sometimes mom’s advice is basketball-related. Other times, it’s a more motherly directive such as, “put ChapStick on your lips.” Marsha, a school secretary at District Heights Elementary, refuses to fly on airplanes, but she and John drive to every single game, whether it’s at Comcast Center or down in Orlando, Fla.
Ironically enough, even with the team on the road, Adrian’s parents have gotten to see their son more often than they did this past summer, when they were within shooting distance of one another.
“We live 10 minutes away in Greenbelt, and he came home once all summer,” his father said. “He just stayed and worked.”
“I talked to him everyday, but I didn’t see him,” mother Marsha added. “He stayed on campus, worked on his shot and did what he had to do.”
Doing what he had to do has made Adrian an immensely better player as a sophomore. Always a great penetrator, Bowie now keeps defenders honest by also drilling long-distance shots. With a more multi-faceted attack, he has been the team’s second most consistent offensive option.
“Everybody knows he can get to the basket, pretty much whenever he wants, but when he hits that outside shot, it makes him a lot more effective,” guard Eric Hayes said.
So far this season, the soft-spoken “mama’s boy” has found his game. And although John and Marsha didn’t get to see their youngest son at home over the summer, they get to see a much better Bowie on the court this year because of it.
“That’s amazing – that is amazing,” Marsha said of his son’s progress. “He is doing so well. I just hope he continues to play well.”
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