Though the Kansas University men’s basketball coach is used to fine-tuning his college players, he said it was no tougher to get the younger players to listen to his advice.

“I’d say they’re both pretty easy (to coach),” Self said. “The challenges with some young campers is they want to try to do what’s right, but physically they can’t quite do it yet. The challenges with our players is that they can do it, but sometimes they don’t do it the exact way that a coach would expect them to.

“For one week, I’d say the campers are probably easier to coach, but if you had the campers for a whole season, you may change your mind about that.”

The first session of the weeklong camp started Sunday and will run through Thursday morning. The event will occupy 16 gyms in the Lawrence area. After a couple of days off, a second camp session begins next Sunday.

Rylan Howe

Self doesn’t have to look far to see the impact the camp has on young Kansans.

Brett Ballard, who played for the Jayhawks from 2001 to 2002, now serves as camp director after attending the Jayhawk basketball sessions as a child. He said he still remembered the day he was wide-eyed after meeting his favorite KU players, Rex Walters and Adonis Jordan, for the first time.

“It’s pretty cool when you see guys that you grew up watching,” Ballard said, “and that you get to meet in person.”

Former All-American Wayne Simien of the Miami Heat also attended the camps as a youngster.

In addition, ex-Jayhawks Nick Bradford, Ron Kellogg and Jeff Carey all have come back at different times to help with the sessions.

Self said the week provided an opportunity for the kids to experience all that the university had to offer.

“It’s a great way to get them all at a relatively young age to think about the Jayhawks – not just for basketball, but they’ll hopefully want to go to school here,” Self said.

With the spots mostly taken by local players, Self hopes that the talent level will continue to increase. During his years at Illinois, the coach would have as many as 15 Division I prospects that would attend his camps in the summer.

Self sees potential from some of the campers he’s seen.

“There’s some young kids in this area, if they keep developing and growing,” Self said, “that we’ll certainly recruit.”

Especially if they continue to listen to the instruction given to them.

“The reason kids come to camp is because they want to be around ball,” Self said. “Hopefully they’ll want to be coached and want to be corrected.”

All but two members of the KU basketball team signed autographs for campers. The exceptions were sophomore Mario Chalmers and freshman Sherron Collins.

Chalmers missed because of a family function in North Carolina, while Collins was a no-show because his high school graduation was Saturday. Both were expected to be on campus by Sunday night. Collins, whose eligibility had been in question his senior season, is eligible to play college ball, Self indicated.