Not every ride in an Uber can be a five-star experience, but in the case of a particular Uber ride that James Banks took this week, well … let’s just say a three-star Uber ride can make for a hysterical and slightly stressful story.
In every form of the word, Banks’ entire Tuesday was as crazy as the Uber ride he took that day.
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His day didn’t start out that way. It started out like any other Tuesday. He got up, went to class and then went to a workout. But around 2 p.m., his phone started buzzing. While Banks wasn’t around to answer it, the phone rang on with calls and texts flying in. Once Banks finally retrieved his phone after he ended his workout, many of the messages were from Georgia Tech head coach Josh Pastner.
Once Banks returned Pastner’s call, the conversation, according to Banks, went a little something like this:
“James, you are cleared. Do you want to play?” Banks recalled Pastner saying.
“Do I want to play?” Banks replied, his voice rising in excitement. “Is that even an option? Yeah. Coach, let’s get the wheels moving.”
After much deliberation, the NCAA cleared Banks to begin playing immediately for the Yellow Jackets. Banks is a transfer from Texas and had petitioned to the NCAA to have his required year off waved. It was actually the Yellow Jackets’ second attempt to have Banks see time on the floor this season after the first petition was denied.
“It came back to us the first time, and they weren’t going to let me play, and basically the guys in compliance said, ‘You know what? That’s not right. We feel like we have a lot of stuff that we can emphasize and bring to their attention,’ ” Banks said. “We knew that around Tuesday would be the time when we would be hearing back.”
And like clockwork, Tuesday it was.
From the moment Banks finished his conversation with Pastner, the day started moving at a much quicker pace because the team was already in Knoxville, Tennessee, after leaving Atlanta on Monday afternoon for a game against No. 5 Tennessee on Tuesday night.
“After that it was boom, boom, boom,” Banks said. “I had to hightail it over here to Zelnak (Basketball Center) to get my actual stuff to play — my jersey, my shoes, my tights. I had to get all of that stuff together, and I had to do all of that stuff on my own. I was FaceTiming guys, going through the checklist. ‘Do I have this? Do I have that?’ ‘See if you can find those. Hopefully we have some socks here.’ ”
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Then, Banks hopped in a car with Bret Cowley (quite possibly the unsung hero of the day) from the compliance office, and the two made the trek to the airport — an actual trek considering the amount of traffic that day.Banks joked that he was the final person to board the plane because of the traffic on I-85.
But much to his relief, the flight from Atlanta to Knoxville took less than an hour. Hopping off the plane, he jumped in an Uber to get from the airport to the team’s hotel, and he had an hour to get there before the team left for the arena.
Enter Banks’ Uber driver— and if Banks is the hero of this tale, the Uber driver is the jester. As much as Banks was in a rush to get to his team, his Uber driver, well, … wasn’t, stopping at a Sonic drive-thru on the wayto grab some food for himself.
“I guess this is the life we are living right now,” Banks remembered thinking from the backseat of the Uber.
But through all the twists and turns of that day (and stops at Sonic), Banks made it in time. Against Tennessee, Banks played 16 minutes, scored five points and grabbed seven rebounds before fouling out.
Now with the events of Tuesday behind him, Banks again played 16 minutes Friday night in Georgia Tech’s 79-54 rout of East Carolina. He finished the night much like Tuesday, with five points and six rebounds. Only on Friday night, he didn’t foul out.
The addition of Banks to this Georgia Tech roster is one that presents Pastner with many new opportunities. Along with fellow bigs Abdoulaye Gueye, Moses Wright, Sylvester Ogbonda and (when he returns from an ankle injury) Evan Cole, the Yellow Jackets aren’t hurting for size down low.
Pastner said that Banks is going to be a shot-altering presence. He already has shown that with multiple blocked shots in his two games with the Yellow Jackets, but the key for him moving forward goes hand-in-hand with becoming more comfortable on the floor.
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“James does a lot for us defensively,” Pastner said. “He has to be better offensively, and that is just going to take some more skill work, but I thought he did a lot of good and affected a lot of the game (against Tennessee). He has to stay clean, crisp, and he has to play mature. He doesn’t need to play sloppy, and we are constantly on him that he needs to remain clean, crisp and mature.”
On Friday night, there were glimpses of that sloppy play, a ball batted away here, a pesky foul there. But Friday night also showed what Banks’ presence could add to this roster in 2018: a beauty of a blocked shot in the second half and a nice assist from the elbow to a cutting Jose Alvarado, who put in a contested layup. For even a few minutes in the second half, Pastner had Banks, Wright and Gueye in the game at once, creating a much larger presence in the lane for shot-blocking and rebounding. When that specific group was in, there was very little the Pirates could do in the paint on offense.
The 6-foot-9 Banks, who is a junior, adds even more size and athleticism to a group of post players that is already poised with both, but Pastner said there is still a long way to go for Banks and this Yellow Jackets offense. Pastner, however, believes that offensive production will come as the season progresses, but right now, at least for Banks, the focus is on what he can do defensively.
“He’s more productive by the basket, but he will be all over the floor,” Pastner said of how he plans to use Banks. “The main thing for us right now is him defensively. It’s shot-blocking and rebounding.”
Those are things Banks has shown he has the ability to do consistently with three blocks and six rebounds Friday night. At the end of the day and at the beginning of his career at Georgia Tech, Banks’ play isn’t perfect and at times, yes, a little out of control, but the potential is there. Now, all Banks needs is time to nurture that potential.
As long as another Uber ride doesn’t stand in his way.
(Photo ofJames Banks: Danny Karnik/Georgia Tech Athletics)
