Odd couple enjoy their shots ... at each other

The most recent Tennessee freshman basketball players to arrive in Knoxville might just as well be named "Felix," and "Oscar," for they are quite the odd couple as far as suitemates go.

Forwards Emmanuel Negedu and Renaldo Woolridge have been sharing space - and appreciably different personalities and backgrounds - since enrolling at UT the second term of summer school in early July.

Negedu, who hails from Kaduna, Nigeria, was raised in barracks as his father served as a Nigerian soldier. A soccer player since he could walk, Negedu didn't start playing organized basketball until he was 15 and didn't like it until he discovered the joy of dunking.

Woolridge, from North Hollywood, Calif., and the son of former NBA great and WNBA coach Orlando Woolridge, was born to play basketball. He attended Harvard-Westlake, one of the most prestigious high schools in Southern California, and has started his own record label.

"We both feel foreign here in a way,'' the well-spoken Woolridge said. "He's literally foreign, and for me it (Tennessee) is a whole different culture, so we can relate to the same issues.

"Once we step on the same court, though, we really share the same thing.''

Negedu, discovered at an NBA-sponsored camp in Africa, speaks in somewhat broken English, though clearly intelligent. Negedu left Nigeria for New Hampshire his high school years, attending the highly acclaimed Brewster Academy prep school.

Negedu unleashed a deep, reverberating laugh when asked about the differences he saw in Woolridge the first few days they were paired at UT.

"Renaldo always wears shoes with lots of colors, or ice cream shoes,'' Negedu said. "He also has those small, tight shirts and California clothes.''

Woolridge chuckled at his suitemate's observations before being asked about Negedu's telling characteristics.

"The main thing is that accent; it's real thick and real loud,'' Woolridge said. "I can tell when he's on the phone in the room next to me. One time he showed me a tribal outfit he wears; I was confused because it looked like a robe.

"I think one of the reasons we get along is we have the same goofy personalities.''

Their playing style is as different as their backgrounds.

Woolridge is a svelte 6-foot-8, 215-pounder who plays with grace, knifing in to grab rebounds and shooting from the outside with a soft touch.

Negedu impresses with athleticism: At 6-7 and 231 pounds, he runs a 4.4-second 40-yard dash, has a 40-inch vertical leap and an 84-inch wingspan.

Woolridge, second to commit among UT's six newcomers, was excited about Negedu's recruitment, even though they'll compete for playing time in a roundabout way.

"We'd gotten to know each other on the AAU circuit and get along real,'' Woolridge said. "We play the same position on paper, but he's more of a 'rip-the-rim-off' when he dunks guy, and I shoot the outside shot.''

Neither player enrolled in time to play in the Pilot Rocky Top League this summer, but both found ways to improve their games.

Negedu played five games in the (Washington) D.C. Summer League with teammate Bobby Maze, along with NBA players Kevin Durant and Michael Beasley.

Woolridge went to Houston, where he played and trained with his father.

Daniel West, an incoming freshman from Sagniaw, Mich., who is the suitemate of Scotty Hopson, of Hopkinsville, Ky., said Woolridge and Negedu definitely assume the crown of odd couple.

"Those two are just crazy together,'' West said. "They go at it, but in a real good way.''