Despite loss in translation, Iudica sounds like a winner

Halftime is not usually a time for a lot of laughs.

Coaches talk about adjustments and improvements. Players are expected to devote their complete attention.

So, Federico Iudica wasn't trying to be a smart aleck last Friday during intermission of Buffalo Grove's Thanksgiving boys basketball tournament game with Lakes.

But Iudica left his new Bison teammates rolling in the aisles.

"I was all geared up and I told the guys, 'We've got to pound it in the lane, pound it in the lane,'" said BG coach Ryan O'Connor with a smile. "At the end, Federico raised his hand said, 'What is the lane?'

"Everybody cracked up, and that was the end of the motivational speech."

Some things may get lost in translation since Iudica just arrived at BG in mid-August as a foreign exchange student from Italy.

But it's been a smooth transition as the 6-foot-3 Iudica clearly knows what he's doing. Iudica, who is from Rome, averaged 10½ points a game as the Bison went 3-1 and won their third straight tournament title on a tiebreaker.

"I'm working on adjusting and every day I learn something," Iudica said as he showed a good command for the English language after last Saturday's 46-40 loss to Stevenson. "Every single game of this Thanksgiving tournament -- they're not conference games, they're for learning."

And his new teammates are glad to give Iudica help in playing the game the American way.

"He's starting to get it now and get our defense now," senior Mike Ricciardi said of the switch from mostly zone in Italy to primarily man-to-man with BG. "As time goes on he'll get into it more.

"He's got that aggressive feeling to him."

Iudica didn't exactly explode on the scene with 2 points in his debut against Elgin. But his teammates weren't going to let him stay down for long.

"I have to thank a lot of the team -- after that first game I was kind of upset and sad," Iudica said. "All my teammates gave me a lot of trust.

"They said, 'We trust you' and that was great. I started to trust myself and I have to thank all the team for this."

Iudica scored 8 points in his next game. And in the final two, he led the Bison in scoring with 20 and 12 points.

"You never know," O'Connor said of taking a low-key approach to Iudica in the preseason. "But in just 4 games he's come so far in terms of confidence and the way he feels comfortable.

"He's got a lot of moxie and he's a charismatic kid. Obviously, being halfway around the world and away from your family, you have to have some self-confidence to tackle that adjustment.

"He's beginning to carry that on the floor now. He's doing what we hoped he'd do."

Iudica is used to playing for age-group teams in Italy. The defenses here are more physical.

He learned just before his first game in a BG uniform that he'd be playing a 32-minute game rather than the 40 minutes with a shot clock he's accustomed to in Italy.

And Iudica learned just how passionate people are about the BG-Stevenson rivalry when he nailed a 3-pointer with 2:16 to play Saturday night to cut his team's deficit to 2 points.

"You've got the crowd and it's a big show here," Iudica said of the eruption by BG's fans after his shot. "The crowd is a new thing for me."

Some of the basics of the game such as shooting are not. Iudica hopes some American refinements will pay off when he returns to Italy next summer for another year of club ball before he goes to play for a college in Italy.

"I'm doing things here in Italy I never do," Iudica said. "When I come back, all this experience will help a lot."

The early indications are this will be a favorable and memorable year for Iudica and his BG teammates.

"I love him, I love him," Ricciardi said. "So far he's been so much fun."

Even when he isn't trying to be funny.