Grown Man's Game: Derron Wooten Is Millikin's Leader

As you get older, you get wiser. Same can be said about Millikin University's Derron Wooten.

Wooten, a third-year player, is ready to take a leadership role and unlike most players realizes there is a life outside of basketball.

I was able to talk with Wooten, who has no regrets on anything he does, including playing at a smaller school. 

Summertime

Q: You were busy this summer. What exactly all did you do to improve your game?

A: "Coming off the summer I feel really good about myself. I worked out five days a week on conditioning, strength, and agility so I feel I will be fine when preseason begins."

Q: So when preseason comes around, what can we expect? 

A: "Going into preseason workouts, I feel that I will be fine since I am training on a constant basis. As far as our team, we should be fine, as long as they worked hard, which I know they did."

Expectations and modifications

Q: There will be a new team with some losses to players from last year's team. What will be the biggest goal for the team this year? 

A: "As far as a team, we need to bond together and get our chemistry together this preseason since we lost five seniors, so we will be a young team. It's important for me as well as our other two seniors to take a leadership role with the many underclassmen we have."

Improvement

Q: What is one significant improvement you made throughout the summer?

A: "I was getting my quickness and agility better. I also added some muscle to my frame, which is always a good thing heading into a season. During the summer it felt good to be around family and still stay in the swing of school and basketball."

In-depth rundown

Q: Leave us something for everyone out there. What should they know about the program? 

A: "We will be young as a group but will be very exciting to watch since our style of play is a run and gun type system. Hopefully we score a lot of points, but the backbone of our program is our defense, so we will be pressing teams most of the game to try and take advantage of our quickness.

"Overall it should be a good season for us as long as we keep working hard in every area of our individual game and as a team trying to work in a lot of underclassmen."

Take notice, college basketball, and take notice, underclassmen: Derron Wooten is here to work. His game will be the loudest speaker on the team, not his mouth. The best players go to work and improve daily. With that being said, Derron Wooten is one of the best players in college basketball.