Melik Martin emerging as confident linchpin of Monmouth's front line

Melik Martin is on his way to becoming latest senior success story for King Rice and Monmouth. (Photo by Karlee Sell/Monmouth University Athletics)

In King Rice’s decade on the bench at Monmouth, two constants have come to define the Hawks’ program.

An uptempo, fast-breaking style, which Rice modeled after the brand of basketball he himself learned and played under the late great Dean Smith at North Carolina has always been the status quo in West Long Branch since the former point guard assumed the reins from Dave Calloway in 2011. Soon after, the expectation of each member of the current season’s senior class saving his best for last and having a career year to close out his career became the second hallmark on the Jersey Shore.

And following in the lineage of Dion Nesmith, Jesse Steele, Andrew Nicholas, Justin Robinson, Ray Salnave and Deion Hammond is a rapidly emerging option who, when reopening his recruitment from the Division II level, was not even in the stream of consciousness until then-assistant coach Duane Woodward plucked him away from Putnam Science Academy and into an environment that not only fostered his development, but enhanced it by allowing him to improve at his own pace.

At 6-foot-6, Melik Martin may not look physically imposing on paper, but in a Monmouth lineup predicated on pushing the pace and spacing the floor to create mismatches with its smaller and faster look, the native of York, Pennsylvania is all over you on both ends of the floor with boa constrictor-like defense and an offensive stroke that has gained confidence as the de facto center on a Hawk front line that is still nursing Nikkei Rutty and Jarvis Vaughan back to full health.

“Melik knows what we want from him,” Rice reflected after the senior scored a career-best 23 points as Monmouth erased a double-digit deficit to defeat Quinnipiac on January 15. “And then I give him a lot of freedom to go do it. Some nights are like tonight, some nights it’s like (it was) at Siena, but he’s so young.”

“I don’t think anything’s changed,” Martin interjected. “It was just a rough weekend at Siena and I’m happy I was able to bounce back, but every night’s going to be a battle.”

The weekend Martin described at Siena was one in which he scored a combined eight points on just 2-of-11 shooting as the Hawks opened 2021 with a pair of losses to the Metro Atlantic Athletic Conference favorite Saints. But following a resurgent week against Marist, he established himself anew against Quinnipiac, following up his career-high with a more yeomanlike nine points this past Saturday, which showcased another dimension to his game, that of a determined grinder who will stop at nothing to get results.

“We all know what Melik could do,” George Papas echoed. “He’s come in with a lot of energy to start his senior year, and we tell him, ‘If you’re open, don’t be afraid to shoot the ball.’ We’ve seen him make it countless times.”

“He’s my roommate, so we talk it about all the time,” Marcus McClary said of Martin’s evolution and upswing. “We’re always talking about just playing with confidence. We’re both in the same spot, so we know what we’re going to get, what kind of shot we’re going to get. I tell him all the time, we both know we could hoop, so I definitely try to tell him to believe in himself, to keep on being him.”

Another area in which Martin has believed in his own ability to grow has come as a leader on the floor and in the locker room, with a voice of experience serving as a guiding influence on one of the newest generation of Hawks.

“Melik is a great player, but he’s a great leader also,” said freshman Myles Ruth. “When I first got here, he was the person that guided me through this, he was the person that showed me the ropes, how everything worked, how King coached. And with his help, it helped me also. It helped me become a great Hawk and a great point guard.”

“I think earlier in his career when I would yell at him and get after him, it would make him sit back and go, ‘Whoa, Coach is crazy!’ Rice opined. “And now he’s older, and he knows that sometimes I react that way. Now he’s so comfortable around what we do, and he’s really finding himself off the court. He’s a tremendous kid, so I think positive things are going to happen for him this year, next year, whenever he gets to go out into the real world and play, or go into the business world. Melik is just that sharp of a dude that you just think great things are going to happen for him.”