[media-credit name=’Derek Montgomery’ align=’alignnone’ width=’648′][/media-credit]Devin Harris’ biggest fear is growing up. If given the choice, Harris would fly off to Never-Never Land at the drop of a hat. He enjoys the luxuries of being a young adult, being a little indecisive and a little immature. But he faced the biggest decision of his life after his junior season with the Badgers, and situations of such gravity tend to instill a newfound seriousness in people — even in those who have tried to reject it for most of their lives.

After a dominating campaign in 2003-04, in which Harris was named Big Ten Player of the Year, the NBA came knocking on his door. Harris was going to have to decide whether he was ready to leave school and break the bank, or if another year of college ball and class work would better prepare him for the next level. At its simplest, it was a case of should he stay, or should he go?

Harris understood the seriousness of life after college. He knew the business of professional basketball might take some of the fun out of the game he loved. He was more than comfortable with life in Madison and didn’t want to leave the friends and classmates he knew so well. If he returned, college basketball pundits would tout the Badgers as a Final Four favorite and Harris would be the frontrunner for National Player of the Year honors. But maybe most important to Harris, if he left the University of Wisconsin, he’d have no choice but to grow up.

Harris toiled over his decision for weeks. Initially he was inclined to stay on for his senior year. He enjoyed being the big man on campus and wanted to hold onto college life. He felt so sure of himself that he told his friends he was going to stay and that the NBA would have to wait.

“For two weeks before I first entered my name in the draft for the first time, I was telling everyone I was staying because I didn’t want to go at all,” Harris said.

Little by little, however, Harris saw the seriousness of the choice he faced. He had to be a little selfish, because the situation presented enormous opportunities for Harris and his family. The opportunity was there, but what if it went away? What if he failed to meet the expectations of his senior season? What if he got injured?

Harris toiled over these and many other questions when formulating his decision. Through the support and council of his friends, family and coaches, Harris initially decided to enter his name in the draft, but not sign with an agent, thus keeping a window open for a possible return to UW. He had to test the waters.

Once Harris started working out in the pre-draft camps, however, he marveled the scouts with his quickness and ability to play both guard spots. He silenced those who doubted his size and physicality. His stock rose and Harris was touted as one of the top three guards available in the draft. He was ready to play in the NBA, but was he ready to leave Madison?

“It was very tough,” Harris said of his ultimate decision to forgo his final year at UW. “I think I still could’ve gotten away with staying at UW for another year, but people thought it was the right choice for me. It was very hard. I was just so comfortable in my situation and in the system, in the classroom and everything else. It was just a very tough decision to leave.”

By all accounts, Harris’ decision to leave could not have played out any better. The Washington Wizards selected Harris with the fifth overall pick and then dealt him to the contending Dallas Mavericks on draft day, along with Jerry Stackhouse and Christian Laettener for Antwoine Jamison and cash considerations. As the fifth pick, Harris was guaranteed at least $2.2 million in his first season. He would later sign a three-year, $7 million contract with Dallas, while being plugged as the eventual replacement for all-star point guard Steve Nash. He was signed to a team that had made the playoffs four years running and didn’t show any signs of slowing. For Harris, it was his self-proclaimed “perfect place” in the NBA.

“It was a good starting point,” Harris said of his draft-day experience. “You know, you work so hard going through all those workouts to get to that point. It was just kind of gratifying — but you know, after you get to that point, you still have a lot of work to do. It gets a lot more serious.”

Things began to change for the Dallas franchise soon after Harris was drafted. Indeed, the business of the game was creating a lot of turnover on the Mavericks’ roster — especially at the point guard position. Nash jumped to Phoenix via free agency. Marquis Daniels, the backup point guard from the previous season, signed a long-term deal to return to Dallas. The Mavericks then made a deal with Atlanta that included point guard Jason Terry. Terry was then slated to be the Mavericks’ starter.

Harris, however, wasn’t the least bit worried about the player turnover and where that left his playing status. He was immediately content to be on a contending franchise. The two guards picked before him, Shaun Livingston and Ben Gordon, ended up with the Los Angeles Clippers and the Chicago Bulls respectively — two of the NBA’s more recent perennial bottom feeders.

“We’ve made some moves,” Harris said. “I’ve got some great guys to learn from like Jason Terry and Eric Dampier, and guys who want to win. So making the changes was good. You know, I might not play as much as before, but I still have a bunch of guys to learn from and we’re still going to win, so I can’t complain about that.”

While riding the bench might turn some rookies off, Harris — with newfound maturity — saw it only as an opportunity to learn and get accustomed to the game. It also drove him to show the organization how quickly he can learn.

And just days before the season, Dallas head coach Don Nelson dubbed Harris the Mavs’ starting point guard. Impressed by Harris’ skills and decision-making, Nelson also noticed how the rookie had earned the confidence of teammates throughout the preseason.

Taking the responsibility of teaching Harris the finer points of the NBA game, Michael Finely, the Badgers’ all-time leading scorer, helped ease the rookie’s transition and prepared Harris for what was ahead. Finely took Harris out to dinner the night before the draft in New York City and has provided counsel ever since. Badger fans can’t help but ponder the possibilities an all-Badger backcourt has to offer in the coming years.

“It’s going to be good,” Harris said of the opportunity of an all-Badger backcourt. “I actually played some pick-up games with [Finely] yesterday. He’s helping me, kind of taking me under his wing and showing me what the game is about and giving me pointers.”

It has all played out rather quickly for Harris. One day he is pondering his playing future while juggling his coursework in Madison, and only a few months later he is in Dallas looking for a place to live and getting ready to be a starter in the NBA. Though he’s undeniably excited for what the future brings, he still holds fond memories of Madison and plans to return next summer to finish his sociology degree.

‘The basketball memories are always going to stick out — winning the Big Ten championships and turning around the program like we did on such a short notice,” Harris said. “But some of the relationships I had with some of my classmates and friends around there, that’s what I really miss right now.”

He’s staying in touch with his former UW teammates and talks with Coach Bo Ryan on the phone every two weeks, if not every week. Harris and Ryan will forever be linked, as both came to Madison in the same season: Harris as a wide-eyed freshman who had been under-recruited due to a ruptured spleen coming out of high school in Wauwatosa, and Ryan as an accomplished Division III coach still looking to make his mark in the heavy ranks of Division I ball.

“I knew [Ryan] when he was at Platteville, and I kind of knew him at UW-M,” Harris said. “I was familiar and pretty comfortable with him, especially after he took the job and I had meetings with him. He was going to give me a chance to start, so I didn’t have any complaints with that.”

Ryan and Harris took a program predicted to finish at the bottom of the Big Ten in 2001-02 to a four-way share of the conference championship and a berth into the NCAA tournament. The following season Harris and Ryan took it up a notch, and the Badgers claimed sole possession of the Big Ten title and made it into the round of 16 in the 2003 NCAA tournament. Harris was named second-team all-Big Ten by the coaches that year, and for the second straight season started in each of the Badgers’ 32 games.

The 2003-04 season brought high expectations for the Wisconsin program. Harris was dubbed the coaches’ Big Ten Preseason Player of the Year, something that came as quite a surprise to Harris.

“I remember driving down to Chicago and I found that out on the way down,” Harris said about the award. “It was definitely a shock. I know they rewarded people for winning and such, but there were so many people who I felt were more deserving and that had better seasons the year before. But hey, the coaches picked me for a reason, I guess. I think it brought along some confidence as well as some expectations.”

Harris helped Wisconsin battle through an injury-plagued season last year, where he oftentimes had to put the team on his back. Harris recorded three 30-point games and seven 25-point games over the Badgers’ last 17 contests, capping an astounding junior campaign with second-team All-American honors while also claiming the Big Ten’s Player of the Year Award. The Badgers finished second in the Big Ten and claimed UW’s first Big Ten tournament title. Ryan never once doubted the leadership and talent of his point guard and was always quick to praise Harris in what they were both able to accomplish.

“It started out with him yelling at me a lot, to him yelling at me a little,” Harris said of his relationship with the often-fiery Ryan. “It was a matter of knowing exactly what he wants on the floor and what he expects out of me. It’s more of a friend relationship now as opposed to being a coach. If I need anything, I just let him know. I can ask him for advice as well as what to do in certain situations.”

While Ryan remains a steady influence on Harris’s life, his parents have always been his beacons. Both Terry and Julie Harris will live with their son in Dallas, which Devin characterizes as more of a “demand” on their part, although he understands their need to be with him and the comfort level it will nurture.

“They’re excited for me and it’s good to have family here,” Harris said. “You go to all those games and then you have to travel to your family as well, so it’s made it a little easier on me having somebody here.”

In the meantime, Devin is quickly becoming acclimated with the city of Dallas and adjusting to the cultural differences. There is, after all, a large disparity between life in Texas and life in Wisconsin.

“It’s a bit of a weather change from Wisconsin,” Harris said with a chuckle. “It’s a bit more southern with the rodeos and stuff like that. It’s a little more different — little bit more country style. But it’s still a good city and it’s big enough and I’m going to have a lot of fun here.”

And Devin is still reluctant to grow up, still looking to have fun and still putting off those big, important things adults have to do. While many people would enjoy the stability and luxuries a million-dollar income has to offer, Devin cannot help but find all that stuff just plain tedious.

“Life after the draft is pretty boring. Just doing a lot of grown-up stuff, trying to find a place to live and setting up bank accounts and paying bills — all those grown-up things you have to do.”