TALLAHASSEE, Fla. -- What fuels Jamarius Burton to be Jamarius Burton?
Upon a closer look, attention can be turned to North Carolina forward Leaky Black.
Burton moved from Champaign, Ill., to Charlotte, N.C. shortly before he began sixth grade. It was in the Midwest where he picked up the fundamentals of basketball from his mother, but it was in the South where Burton would have to cut his teeth against the best the Charlotte area had to offer.
That includes Black, who was a high-profile recruit getting looks from some of the nation's premier programs. Black and Burton played within the same AAU program, and all eyes were on the former.
It was that realization which gave Burton, as he told me in a one-on-one sitdown before Pitt's trip to Tallahassee, Fla., fuel to the fire to only get better by which ever means.
"I was pretty dominant (in Illinois)," Burton said. "My mom was teaching me the skills, so I was pretty ahead of the curve there. And then when I moved to Charlotte, North Carolina, the talent pool grew. I mean, it was tremendous talent. So, I went from being one of the best players to being on 'B' teams, 'C' teams, really being woken up by the talent. It drove me to work harder. I was the kid outside grinding and working every day, running three miles, outside on the concrete shooting in the driveway, waiting until my mom got off work, going to the YMCA.
"For me when I got to Charlotte it was a little bit of a different experience because I wasn't good compared to my peers. Leaky Black, he was on the 'A' team, I was on the 'B' team in the same AAU program. I grew up watching him. He was the biggest fish in the pond. He was a high recruit. I remember going to his high school game and watching to see what Carolina was recruiting out of him, to be honest with you. So, me playing in Charlotte, North Carolina, was a different experience. So, I just continue to run my own race and continue to grind, and it's just a blessing to be here."
Burton comes from a fully athletic family. His mother, Kimberly, played basketball at Alabama A&M, and his sisters, Kimera and Destani, played collegiately on full scholarships. He is also the nephew of Todd Peat, who played six NFL seasons, and the cousin of Andrus Peat, a three-time Pro Bowl offensive tackle for the New Orleans Saints. He said he gets his toughness from his father, Rosso, who didn't play sports beyond high school.
"I've been playing basketball for a long time," Burton said. "My mom played in college, my sisters played growing up, so I've had the basketball in my hands for a long time. I grew up in gyms. My mom either coaching, my sisters playing, or my mom refereeing it. I was in the gym for as long as I can remember, and the love grew from being in the gym watching -- it came from a lot of watching and being on the sidelines and to get those moments where you get better as you get older and be able to be out on the floor is another opportunity that I don't take for granted. ... She was a post player, and that's why a big strength of my game is interior because she taught me post moves. I was a post player before I was a guard. That's why I'm saying I know my game. My game started from in-out."
Burton's game has elevated to an All-ACC level. He is ninth in the conference in scoring at 15.9 points per game, seventh in field goal percentage (.510), tied for sixth in assists per game (4.5), and fifth in free throw percentage (.850).
He has also thrived in games that matter the most for Pitt. Per CBB Analytics, he is one of 16 players in Division I college basketball to average 16.0 points and 4.0 assists per game against Quadrant 1 opponents with respect to the NCAA NET Rankings:
The only players in College Basketball to average at least 16 points and 4 assists per game vs Quad 1 Opponents:
— CBB Analytics (@CBBAnalytics) February 8, 2023
*Min 3 games pic.twitter.com/aUXReYAJIt
Burton has had his share of his battles, which take him back to Independence High School in Charlotte. He tore his left ACL as a junior in high school, which knocked him out of the 17U circuit and the prime time for recruiting. All of that time spent in between five years of working to level up to the competition within Charlotte suddenly compounded. He rebounded to win a state championship (inside UNC's Dean E. Smith Center) and eventually landed at Wichita State and began his collegiate career there, but still experienced discomfort in that knee. Once he transferred to Pitt, he had to undergo a procedure that would keep him out for the preseason and until mid-November of last season.
"I would say that it was definitely difficult," Burton said. "It was not something that I expected coming here, because when I played at Texas Tech my knee didn't bother me the whole time I was there. My knee bothered me my two years at Wichita State, so I transferred to get to a better program with more resources, which I got at a Power Five institution. My knee didn't bother me my whole year at Texas Tech. Coming here I didn't expect to have any knee issues, because I experienced a year of knee freedom. To come here and have the surgery was definitely something that I did not plan for, but I feel like that definitely played a role in my ability to connect with my teammates and for us to play more instinctual. Obviously you get more time this year, guys can learn my tendencies, I can learn theirs, and we can develop a kind of style of play."
Burton does not want to think too far ahead into the prospects of turning pro following this season, his final one of eligibility. In the meantime, his sole focus is on getting Pitt back into the win column for its final seven games of the regular season and going forth within the ACC and likely NCAA Tournament games.
Involved in that is the culmination of the work he put into the game during his days in Charlotte. Burton knew he had to continue to level up. He knew he always had eyes from Duke and North Carolina and beyond watching his every move. As a three-star recruit, Burton wasn't going to settle.
"Being in Charlotte, I wasn't the best player," Burton said. "I had to do it a different way. Grind, learn from other guys. If I learned somebody else had a scholarship or they were a high recruit, I was going to their game, and I was watching. That's reality. I can remember it, I went to Concord High School and I watched Leaky Black play -- I don't know who it was -- but I did that on numerous occasions for other guys, too. Rayjon Tucker, he was a big guy in Charlotte at the time. Whoever. I was going. That's my experience in Charlotte, just being in the scene. There was a lot of competitive guys, and just trying to see what I can do each and every day to get better, and I knew that there was somebody else in Charlotte working because I could see it. I'm on the 'B' team. I could see that, for sure."
Burton said Black and he have a "good relationship" with "mutual respect" as the foundation, but perhaps if it were not for a player like Black, a Burton could not have been created.
At least, maybe not this version.
This version of Burton is a changed man from his early days at Wichita State and from his season at Texas Tech.
Jamarius Burton, at last, feels like Jamarius Burton.
"I would say the biggest growth point for me is really just mentally," he said. "I don't feel like I'm doing something that I haven't done before. I've displayed a lot of these skills before in numerous occasions, whether it was at Wichita State, high school, even at Tech in short spurts. I'm pretty much not doing anything I've not done before. For me it's just getting the confidence and me being with coach (Jeff Capel) again, another year and understanding him and having a great connection has definitely helped me out there on the floor, as well as the teammates we've got. This summer coach challenged me to continue to develop relationships with my guys because last year it was kind of tough on me coming in, being my first year and trying to lead and then having a knee surgery and then being out six-to-eight weeks not practicing with my teammates and then going out there on the court in live play and trying to be a leader and trying to lead by example and trying to play the best that I could, wasn't ideal."
And, that comes with the culture Capel has instilled with this extremely likable and all-around electrifying Pitt team.
"Having the time this year to be able to practice with my guys from the summer all the way up to this point has definitely helped," Burton added, "(but) the confidence level has definitely grown. My teammates empower me to be me. The coaching staff has accepted me and my game, and has really been able to put me in positions where I can be successful and really understand my skills. I've played with coaches who admitted to me that they didn't know how to coach me. To have a staff who really believes in me and my skillset and puts me in positions to be comfortable, where I can thrive at, and really empower me to be me has been tremendous and something that I don't take for granted, and I just have a great sense of appreciation for them. My love for them, I just feel like it's crazy."
I countered Burton and asked him to elaborate on his point about Pitt empowering him to be... him:
"For me, that's playing my game, that's being aggressive, that's getting up and downhill, that's making reads and plays," Burton said. "I've been in different roles, so therefore I couldn't play to the best of my ability. For me, being in those positions has definitely helped me. That's what I mean my 'me being me,' me having the freedom to be able to play in the post, be able to back somebody down, be able to get the ball and go. I've been in positions where I was asked to be in the corner or asked to not dribble the ball as much and stuff like that. That takes away from what I can really do. That's just the bottom line. They empower me, and they give me the freedom to be able to play my game."
