High School boys’ basketball: A scoring machine that learned to distribute
CARMEL – The early morning shootarounds before school, prior to the sun coming up – before anyone was up. Sometimes Warren Blut was the only player in the Carmel High gym honing his craft weeks before the start of the season.
It didn’t stop there. The off-season consisted of speed and agility workouts on the track where Blut pushed himself to the point of exhaustion, attempting to run faster than his previous mark.
“No one outworks him,” Carmel basketball coach Kurt Grahl said. “There were times he worked so hard, he made himself sick. If I said 6 a.m., he was there at 5:55. He’s a true gym rat.”
Blut led by example, providing the Padres with a playmaker who was a score-first point guard, yet unselfishly distributed the ball.
“From the moment I met him, he was all in on basketball,” Grahl said. “Everything we ever did, he was there. I know he wasn’t comfortable being a vocal leader. He’s more ‘watch what I do.’”
Dropping in just over 20 points a game, while leading Carmel in assists catapulted the 6-foot-2 senior to The Herald’s Player of the Year honor.
Carmel’s Warren Blut was a high-scoring point guard. (Courtesy photo)“My role changed this year,” Blut said. “I had to take on more of a leadership role. For me, it’s more by example. A lot of times, people follow my actions.”
With last year’s Pacific Coast Athletic League Gabilan Division Player of the Year Jackson Lloyd and his 6-foot-7 frame having enrolled at Alabama on a football scholarship, Grahl needed to find a different avenue to generate points.
Blut, the lone full-time starter who didn’t play football last year, became the focal point of Carmel’s attack as a penetrator to the paint to go along with a perimeter game.
“This was the first time I’ve had a scorer in the point guard position,” Grahl said. “Our offense is predicated on moving the basketball around. Warren can create his own shot. He had to learn it the other way.”
Grahl didn’t want Blut to give up his aggressiveness in driving to the basket. Instead, he asked him to do both, with an eye on finding the open teammate when defenses collapsed on him.
“I talked to him about distributing more,” Grahl said. “We talked about what was the better shot. Yeah, I know I can make this shot. But is there a better shot with a pass? It was a growth process. To his credit, he bought in.”
The results were evident as the Padres defended their Gabilan Division title, running off eight straight wins during one stretch.
“I worked a lot in the off-season on my decision making,” said Blut, who also plays tennis. “I have to know when to score and when to get my teammates involved.”
Which was more of a challenge than even Blut envisioned, in part because six of the Padres’ players didn’t arrive until the season was six weeks old – four of whom were starters.
The Padres run to a state divisional football title meant Carmel had 25 basketball practices and three games before the core of the team arrived.
Blut found himself working with players who wouldn’t be a part of the varsity program once football season ended.
“We couldn’t get anything done,” Blut said. “We worked on the basics for so long. It was getting stale. I was happy for those guys in football. Mentally I had to stay focused.”
Surrounded by a cast of junior varsity prospects, Blut erupted for 33 points in the Padres’ win over playoff-bound Saratoga the same night the football team was winning a state title.
“We had to reconnect,” Blut said. “It took longer than I thought it would. It delayed our process of flowing together. When league started, the cohesiveness still wasn’t there.”
That was evident in Carmel’s Gabilan Division opening loss to defending Central Coast Section Division V champion Oakwood of Morgan Hill.
“I knew I was going to have to score a little more,” Blut said. “When the guys came back. I tried so hard to get them involved. It was hard to balance that. I felt I got better at it.”
An eight-game winning streak following that league opening loss pointed the Padres in the right direction, before it fell to Pacific Grove in what was viewed as a wake-up call.
“We were down, what, 20-3 in the first quarter,” Blut said. “It was one bad quarter. If you look at the rest of the game, we outplayed them. You hate losing to a rival. But we had to move on. It didn’t define our season. It reignited us.”
While Blut became more confident in kicking the ball out to his shooters, he didn’t lose his edge as a shooter, shooting 47.8 percent from the field.
The 18-year-old knocked down 51 shots from beyond the 3-point arc, scoring 558 points as the Padres reached the Northern California Division III quarterfinals for the fourth time in the last six full seasons.
“I’ve always had a perimeter shot,” Blut said. “But if the defense plays me up, I’ll find a way to get downhill. When I suck the ‘D’ in, it opens a teammate. I’ll pass up a good shot for a better shot.”
Blut distributed the ball with flair, finishing second in the county in assists with 88. Somewhat overshadowed was his effort on defense, collecting 53 steals, turning some into easy layups.
“No one talks about my defense too much,” Blut said. “But I always guarded someone that seemed faster, quicker. I’ve had to work extremely hard on that aspect of the game. I know how important it is at the next level.”
Where Blut lands next year is open for debate. He’s scheduled for a handful of tryouts with colleges who have expressed interest.
“We’ll see how the workouts go,” Blut said. “I know anything can happened. I know I will be playing somewhere next year.”
Five days after his season ended, Blut was already playing in his first tennis match, one he had hoped to postpone for one more week of basketball.
Rather than focus on one game or one moment, Blut talked about the camaraderie that was built over the last three years with his fellow senior teammates.
“It’s a group that hangs out away from the basketball court,” Blut said. “We had chemistry. The friendships, togetherness and continued growth throughout the season is what I’ll take with me.”
