Trigger happy Purple Eagle
Fisher?s gunning elevates Niagara
The mind of a gunner operates along the lines of: ?Double team? I?m open. Two steps past the halfcourt line? That?s my range.? That shoot-the-balland- damn-the-consequences mentality has always flowed through the blood of Niagara?s Charron Fisher.
Sometimes you need binoculars to see where Fisher launches, other times he?s spinning along the baseline shielding defenders with his left hand and putting the ball in the hole with his right. ?People have always had problems matching up with me because of my height and because of my body,? said Fisher, who once poured in 75 points in a middle school game. ?Smaller guys I can take them on the block and bigger guys I can go around them. As a scorer, once the basket gets wide you feel like there?s nothing anybody can do.?
And basket keeps getting wider and wider these days for Fisher.
Fisher was the nation?s 16th-leading scorer last season, averaging 20.6 points per game, and his 8.0 rebound average was second on a 23-12 team that advanced to its second NCAA Tournament berth in three seasons.
This year, Fisher continues to flourish in coach Joe Mihalich?s wideopen system. Fisher is leading the nation in scoring with a 27.9 average and is Niagara?s leading rebounder at 9.3 per game. When Niagara renews its rivalry tonight (7, ESPNU, Radio 710 AM, 105.1 FM) against Canisius (2-14, 0-6 Metro Atlantic Athletic Conference), the 8-year-old Koessler Center scoring record of 41 points ? held by Manhattan?s Bruce Seals ? could be in jeopardy.
Tonight is Brian Dux Night at Canisius. The school has pledged to make a donation for each assist its men?s and women?s teams register in their doubleheader, and Dux T-shirts will be on sale. Proceeds will go toward the former Golden Griffins player who is recuperating from injuries he suffered in a car accident in England.
The Purple Eagles are 11-4 overall, 5-1 in the MAAC, and Fisher has led the way.
?The play of Fisher is outstanding, he really carries them at certain points of the game,? said Manhattan coach Barry Rohrssen. ?He?s done it all season.?
Said senior Stanley Hodge: ?He?s fun to play with. He stole a couple of my moves so his perimeter game has gotten better, but he?s always been tough to stop in the low post. We just follow his lead.?
Of course, each new season brings stories of one gunner or another. What makes Fisher unusual is his ability to rebound at his size. He?s listed at 6-foot-3, but admits he?s probably closer to 6-1z.
?His scoring makes us win,? Mihalich said. ?He?s competitive, tough, fearless and really wants to win.?
Looking back, it?s amazing that Niagara even landed Fisher. He was heavily recruited as a two-sport athlete in football and basketball out of Roman Catholic High in Philadelphia, a school whose alumni include NFL receiver Marvin Harrison. As a first-team pick at outside linebacker/ wide receiver, Fisher received 13 Division I-A and AA scholarship offers, including ones from Penn State, Virginia and Rutgers, but selected Niagara because it didn?t have football.
?I didn?t want to go to a school where the coach would come and say, ?Why don?t you play football?? ? Fisher said. ?Football was something I never enjoyed playing but it was something to stay in shape for basketball. I felt good when I came up here to visit, and it only had basketball.?
It also helped that Mihalich, a Philly native, played a wide-open offense and by his sophomore year he made Fisher its throttle. While many of today?s coaches want to milk each possession or work toward the allbut- foolproof shot, Fisher is free to squeeze the trigger.
?We have a mutual trust in each other,? Mihalich said. ?I trust him to score because it?s making us win and he trusts me because he knows that I let him score because it?s making us win.?
What is motivating Fisher this season is not so much the need to let the nation know who he is, or lead the country in scoring, but the idea of leading Niagara to back-to-back NCAA Tournament berths.
?Leading the nation in scoring,? he said, ?is only a bonus.?
As for life beyond Niagara, Fisher plans to graduate this spring with a tourism/sports management degree and then take his game to the pros. As an undersized power forward, Fisher is a long shot for the NBA, but there?s always a market for dauntless scorers overseas.
?If it?s meant to be, it will happen, but that?s not my focus,? Fisher said. ?Right now, I?m having fun in college.?
