He shares the same name with Georgetown basketball’s most important alum — his father — but Patrick Ewing Jr. has never been entitled to a thing.
He’s always been saddled with the expectations of being his father’s son, and the endless grief it’s engendered from fans at away games is hardly a new experience. He also had to prove himself to head coach John Thompson III, who made him no promises when he joined the Hoyas three seasons ago after transferring from Indiana.
Ewing has had to earn every minute, and he wouldn’t have it any other way.
“Coach showed it early in my junior year, I wasn’t really playing that much,” said Ewing. “I didn’t even take my warm-up [jersey] off in the Duke game. The biggest game, at that time, of my career, and I didn’t even take my warm-up off. But the situation’s changed.”
As one of four Georgetown seniors preparing for their final home game Saturday, when the 11th-ranked Hoyas (24-4, 14-3 Big East) host No. 12 Louisville (24-6, 14-3), Ewing’s finding his own way to leave a lasting impact on the program where it is only appropriate that he finish his college career.
“A lot of people have given him a lot of trouble for stuff that his dad has done, and things like that, just having the same name,” said Hoyas senior guard Jonathan Wallace. “Pat’s been good about that, he doesn’t try to imitate what his dad has done, he’s his own man. He brings an added dimension to this team that a lot of people didn’t have when we first came here, and we’re thankful for that.”
Ewing’s energy is relentless — Wallace said he forces his will upon people — but he’s also become a student of the game under Thompson’s stewardship. Ewing said earlier this season that the one-handed backdoor bounce pass is his favorite move, but he didn’t even know what a bounce pass was before he was a Hoya. His three second-half assists were crucial in last week’s overtime win at Marquette.
“Before coming here, basketball was always a game of my athletic ability, and not so much the thinking aspect, the learning the different strategies at different times and stuff like that,” said Ewing. “That’s how I’ve grown here a lot on the court. If you play in the Princeton offense, you’ve got to be smart.”
