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The children sat on the floor cross-legged and wide-eyed, staring up at their visitor. Their tiny hands jutted into the air, as they waited to pepper him with questions.

"Can you touch the ceiling?" a little boy asks.

The man, standing every bit of 6-feet-8-inches, does it with little trouble.

"Are you friends with Kobe Bryant?" a girl asks.

"Nah," he says, almost sheepishly. "I hope to be, but not yet. That was one of my favorite players growing up."

Another hand shoots up and a boy in an orange shirt asks, "Can he play in our gym?"

An adult quickly quashes the notion. Rodney Hood has been a busy man ever since he was taken by the Utah Jazz in the first round of the NBA Draft a few months back. There is a schedule to keep. Surely he doesn't have the time to mess around.

This Boys & Girls Club on Salt Lake's west side is a little nicer than the one Hood played in as a child, and more than a thousand miles away. But as he stood and talked with the children one recent afternoon, Hood still felt at home.

"This is where I learned to play basketball," he said.

There was little doubt Rodney Hood would play ball.

His father played collegiately and then nearly a decade as a pro overseas. His mother played at Mississippi State. Big brother would go on to play at Tennessee-Chattanooga. Big sister, too. So when Hood was 2, he was dribbling a ball.

"We knew early on he had a chance to be a special basketball player," said his father, Ricky Hood.

At the start of Rodney's life, his father was running a Boys & Girls Club in a housing project in eastern Mississippi. It was a safe haven for low-income kids, and it had its shortcomings. For one thing, it didn't have a gym.

It took a few years, and donations from the community, but the club eventually moved into the church where Rodney Hood's future would be made.

"He had everything he needed there at that club," his brother, Ricky Jr., said. "He had the game rooms. But, more importantly, he had the basketball court."

Soaking it up

Eight years the elder, Ricky Jr. said his brother was a "sponge," learning all aspects of the game as he watched the older boys.

"I'd play with my friends," he said. "He'd sit there on the ball and watch us with his hands on his chin until we got done. And he would hop up and it was his turn and he'd go and shoot."

He'd spend hours upon hours working on his game with his brother and his father, taking thousands of shots on bent rims.

"I think [the rims] helped me," Rodney Hood said. "You got to keep it on line. If you don't, you're gonna miss."

Hood doesn't miss too often.

Last season at Duke, Hood connected on 42 percent of his 3s. The swingman, who was named a captain despite being just the second player ever allowed to transfer into coach Mike Krzyzewski's program, averaged 19.5 points a game for the Blue Devils.

And heading into the June draft, he projected to be a lottery pick. Hood didn't work out for a team outside of the top 18, and he only went that far because Phoenix also owned the No. 14 pick.

Unwelcome slide

But as draft night progressed, Hood's stock slipped.

The shooter watched as his Duke teammate, Jabari Parker, went No. 2, as the Jazz grabbed point guard Dante Exum at No. 5, and as player after player came off the board. Utah was pleasantly surprised to see Hood, someone who rated much higher, still available when the team's second pick came around at No. 23 overall.

"It was frustrating that night," he said. "You want to hear your name called first. Everybody did. But it's a blessing. After I heard my name called, it was a sigh of relief."

When he finally heard his name and walked across the stage, his mother flashed back to all the hours he'd put in along the way. Hood smiled, put on a Utah Jazz hat and was ushered back to a news conference.

A reporter asked him to reflect on the journey.

"Man, it's just unbelievable. It's just … you think … excuse me," Hood said, overcome by emotion. "You think of this little kid playing in the Boys & Girls Club, wanting to be like your big brother and then getting a chance to walk across that stage and give some people home from where I'm from. It means a lot."

Back in eastern Mississippi, a gym full of kids were chanting Hood's name, waving handmade signs, and dancing.

Long-range outlook

As they embark on a new season, the Jazz desperately need what Hood provides: shooting. The only player who shot better than 40 percent from 3 last year — Richard Jefferson — left in free agency.

So even as a rookie, Hood figures prominently into the Jazz's plans at shooting guard and small forward.

"We want him to take open shots," coach Quin Snyder said. "If he's open, it's a good shot. I don't care how many he's missed or made."

Forward Steve Novak, one of the league's top shooters himself and a new addition to the Jazz, agreed.

"The thing I've talked to him about is just being on that border of confident/arrogant," Novak said. "I feel like as a shooter, you've got to be really confident shooting the ball. And he's such a nice kid that I think it can almost be a flaw for him. He doesn't want to be selfish ever, which is great, but with his skill set you want him to shoot the ball when he's open. … Think in your head that this is going up and going in. Don't apologize. Once he gets that confidence up, I think he'll be a very, very good player in this league."

Hood, quietly, has already started to build that confidence.

In summer league, the shooter went off for 29 points on 7-of-10 shooting from three in one game. And as he starts his rookie season, Hood wants to show that he belongs, that he should have been drafted higher.

"I can play in this league at a high level, just as much as everyone else," he said. "That's something I can prove again and again."

Still feels like home

Back at that Boys & Girls Club in Salt Lake City, Hood fields more questions. He signs autographs for the children, and a pair of basketballs for the club to do with as they will. After the crowd of signature-seeking children has begun to disperse, he looks at ease, like he belongs, as he stands in the corner and chats with the kids.

Ricky Hood, who has worked with the program in Mississippi for 27 years, called the a club "a familiar place for him, no matter where it is."

"This is gonna be Rodney's safe haven," his brother says. "Even during the season, it won't be a shock to see him pop up here."

And as the event is about to finish, Ricky Sr. approaches a club employee and asks for a basketball.

"Oh. These have already been signed," she says politely.

But that's not what he means.

The kids continue to chatter and a TV camera gets packed up, as the Hoods slip away, into the gym and find a ball.

Its bounce echoes off the walls of a place that's always been home.

Rodney Hood file

Vitals •  6-foot-8, 215 pounds

Hometown • Meridian, Miss.

College • Duke

Drafted • No. 23 overall in June

Need to know • Athletic shooter who hit 42 percent from 3 as a senior at Duke. Was a captain on the Blue Devils' team.