Open competition is just fine with Iowa's Eric May

NORTH LIBERTY - There's open competition for starts and minutes next year for the Iowa basketball team. Junior Eric May said that's a good thing.

"(The competition) has increased a lot since last year," May said. "It's a lot more options for players and there's a lot more guys who can play, so it's good. The competition has gone up tremendously."

May, a 6-foot-5 guard/forward, started 25 of Iowa's first 26 games last season but a nagging groin injury limited his mobility throughout the season. After scoring at least nine points in 12 of Iowa's first 14 games, he notched double digits just four times over the rest of the season. He struggled to make shots, which sent his confidence spiralling downward. Freshman Devyn Marble eventually replaced May in the starting lineup, a move Coach Fran McCaffery said was necessary to keep the pressure off May at the tip-off.

Instead of sulking about the benching, May went to work. He maintained his strong, but sleek frame and worked specifically on ball-handling and shooting this off-season. May has drawn kudos for his effort and performance since March from McCaffery.

"You had players that really understood the specific areas they had to improve on and they were really getting after it. Eric May is a great example," McCaffery said last month. "He had a terrific spring. He really did. I know I've said that before. I was really impressed with him, doing things off the dribble, pull-up jump shots, driving and getting rid of the ball at the appropriate times and then still making a 3-ball like he's always done. He's a guy that can really be somebody next year that has great impact on our team.

"When you're consistently making shots in practice and then you're doing things off the dribble and when you start playing games and it starts happening for you, you get better and better."

May is an athletic marvel. Before McCaffery arrived, May could bench press 300 pounds. But McCaffery wanted him to build leaner muscle, so May dropped his own weight by 10 pounds to 220 and worked on less bulk.

May also may be Iowa's best pure athlete. He can accelerate toward the basket as good as anyone in the Big Ten and is one of the league's best dunkers. This off-season he's working on shifting gears as he runs up and down the court.

"This year I'm also working on playing at a different pace, trying to go from slow to fast, fast to slow," May said. "Not just playing at one speed and making it tough for guys to guard me. If you're going one pace the whole game it's going to be an easy defense.

"You've got to understand where you're going to be and be focused on the game the whole time. Know when to make the right cuts, when to explode, when to walk into a pick and split out of it. It's lot of surveying on offense and defense."

May, a Dubuque Wahlert graduate, averaged 7.8 points and 2.9 rebounds a game last year. He did have 60 turnovers and only 38 assists, hence the reason for his ball-handling work. He has started 48 of his 62 games played the last two years.

But there's loads of competition for his position. Marble, son of Roy Marble, Iowa's all-time leading scorer, started seven games last year and has improved greatly since last year. Newcomer Anthony Hubbard, a second-team junior-college All-American, expects to compete at that role, along with incoming freshmen Aaron White and Josh Oglesby.

May has no plans to shirk from the competition and said it's only strengthens the roster.

"We have a lot of guys in that position, and it's motivation," May said. "We want to keep bringing guys in. Everybody should want competition. You're not going to get any better if there's not."