A Close Look in at Stanford Robinson - Everyone Ready to Show Stan Some Love?
Anyone ever wonder why Stanford's handle on Twitter and Instagram are @showmelovestan? It's because he wants some love obviously. We are going to assume that he gets all the love he wants from the girls at URI at parties and when he is not practicing and playing in games. Collectively, it is our job as URI basketball fans is to figure out whether he deserves the love that he has gotten and will get in the future as a Rhody Ram. I will state my final opinion at the end of this piece.
On practically all of the 351 D1 college basketball programs, there are comedic players who keep each of their respective teams in good spirits. If that was not evident enough from the social media of Rhode Island's #13, then you could have just watched the NCAA March Madness Snapchat story on November 25, 2016. In my previously written "An Attendee Watches URI Give Belmont the Business on Black Friday", I talked about everything that I learned from watching the Snapchat story. While walking through the locker room, you could tell that this man knew how to make all of his teammates laugh and enjoy the moment, especially since URI is not a team that will often be featured on a national platform such as this one. By and large, he also made the URI basketball program look extremely marketable to anyone watching (say like a future URI recruit). Personally, I saw Robinson bringing the comedy from the very beginning of his time in Kingston. When I was in URI's Rhody Market last year, he was singing along to "Down in the DM" by Yo Gotti while Four McGlynn laughed as he waited in line.
Just like I wrote in "An Attendee's In-Depth Look at the Past and Current Scope of Rhode Island Basketball", Stanford Robinson was the 99th overall recruit (according to ESPN) in the same class of 2013 as Kuran Iverson, Hassan Martin, and E.C. Matthews. He had star potential back then and still has the makings of a star now. After leaving the Hoosiers due to a lack of playing time, Robinson has gotten his opportunity at URI and he has relished the moment. On the court, Robinson has a limitless range for his skill set. Not only does he possess all the capabilities of being a star player on any team in the nation but he is the exact kind of player that Dan Hurley wants.
You can see the excitement when he makes defensive stops and gets steals when the plays are concluded. In URI's first game of the 2016-2017 season, I was laughing in the crowd because Robinson denied Dartmouth's shooting guard on 3 possessions in a row and he cheered towards the Rhode Island bench each time. Every team needs someone that can hype up the team, the bench, and the crowd from on the court. That man for the Rhode Island Rams is Stanford Robinson. In recent times, Robinson and teammate Jared Terrell did their patented handshake several times at the end of their home victory against St. Bonaventure after making big defensive plays to seal the game away.
Similar to many of his fellow URI guards, like I wrote in Christion Thompson's feature, "A Close Look in at Christion Thompson - An Instagram Connection with Rhode Island's #25?", Robinson plays extremely intense defense, rebounds using his speed, and is adept with the 3 ball. And how can anyone forget some of the circus finishes he has made throughout the season - in both games at Mohegan Sun and at Dayton, just to name a few. The luxury that coach Hurley has is that he knows that he can put Stanford Robinson, Jared Terrell, and Christion Thompson on the opposing team's best wing player and they will be locked up. With Robinson's jump shot only improving, his game is developing into a lethal one. Once he has a consistent jump shot that he can always trust, he and Jared Terrell will practically look like the same players, except they shoot from different sides. My only concern as a Rhody fan is that Stan is SO GOOD at defense that he may not try as hard as he should when defending a clearly inferior offensive player. With that said, he can guard anyone on the court, no matter how fast or how big they may be.
While Robinson was labeled as a big risk and a social delinquent after a run in with the law as a freshman at Indiana, I was one of the URI fans who was celebrating when he decided to transfer to play in Kingston, RI. The decision URI made to convince Stanford Robinson to transfer to their team has panned out and they continue to reap the benefits.
My final judgment is that Stanford Robinson is worthy of getting shown love.
