The time has come for Rakeem Christmas to come out of his shell. Slowly, the transformation is happening.

He’s graduated from the depths of Jim Boeheim’s doghouse, as well as Syracuse University itself. The graduate-student life for Christmas entails fewer than six hours of class per week and plenty more time to work on his game.

But whether he establishes himself as a consistent threat doesn’t only dictate how much of his transformation is complete; the Orange’s success hinges on it.

When SU’s outside shooting collapsed midway through last season, the team — short on scoring options from the inside — followed suit. The Orange is returning just over 37 percent of its points from last year — the lowest in Jim Boeheim’s 38 years with SU — and it will need Christmas, its lone senior, to be something he’s never been before.

A go-to scorer in the post.

“He was most of the inside scoring last year. We didn’t score a lot inside other than layups,” SU assistant coach Mike Hopkins said. “But he gives you a presence.

“He’s about to have a big year. I really believe that.”

Syracuse knew what it was getting offensively when Christmas came in. Boeheim said SU loved him anyway.

His Scout.com profile summed it up well — listing explosiveness, rebounding and shot blocking as his strengths, and big-time scoring and post play as his weakness.

He wasn’t a basketball player until middle school. And even with his offensive game so undeveloped, he was rated a five-star recruit by ESPN and Scout. Both those outlets and Rivals.com rated him the No. 2 center in the Class of 2011 and plenty of big-time programs came calling.

“I was really surprised about that,” Christmas said. “I wasn’t expecting any of that when I started playing basketball.”

After playing his freshman and sophomore years of high school at the now-defunct North Catholic (Pennsylvania) High School, Christmas transferred to the Academy of the New Church in the outskirts of Philadelphia.

There, he was in a system tailored for forwards on a team that didn’t have as much talent in its backcourt.

Christmas signed his Syracuse letter of intent while his 6-foot-11 teammate Malcolm Gilbert, who’s now at Fairfield, was on his way to Pittsburgh. Savon Goodman, now at Arizona State after playing at UNLV, played the first three years of his high school career at ANC and was a 6-foot-6 small forward on that team.

Even in a stacked frontcourt, Christmas averaged fewer than 10 points per game as a senior.

“He was real athletic, he had moves, he could dunk the ball and things like that,” said Carl Arrigale, the head coach at Ss. Neumann and Maria Goretti Catholic High School in Philadelphia, “but just his overall post game wasn’t really ready to be really effective.”

Using no players taller than 6 feet, 5 inches, nearby Abington Friends (Pennsylvania) School once shut down Christmas during his junior season and defeated ANC.

AFS assistant coach Jon Wessel scouted Christmas and ANC four or five times in addition to playing them four times during the forward’s career.
Abington Friends pulled off the win, Wessel said, with lockdown defense by current Georgetown senior guard Jabril Trawick and a concerted team effort to keep Christmas’ touches away from the basket and doubling him when he got the ball in the paint.

The result was a mere six points on 2-of-5 shooting from Christmas and a 60-49 AFS victory. Florida’s Billy Donovan, Florida International’s Isaiah Thomas and Oklahoma’s Jeff Capel, among other high-profile coaches, were in the gym to see Christmas sputter out.

This upcoming season, Wessel said, will be challenging for Christmas to adjust from the role of a defensive stopper whose points largely came from scrappy rebounds to being a defensive stopper and a go-to scorer in the post.

“I always thought he didn’t have that great a touch offensively,” Wessel said. “He’s never been in a position where he has to be kind of the guy on offense. It seems like that isn’t his strong suit, offensively being one of the first or second options.

“… If that’s his role in Syracuse this year — I don’t know. We’ll see.”

While Kaleb Joseph and Trevor Cooney are far more talented than the guards Christmas played with in high school, Christmas finds himself on another frontcourt-heavy team.

Joseph may not be Tyler Ennis. Cooney’s demise at the midway point last season could very well continue. Only time will tell if Ron Patterson’s breakout in the exhibition win over Carleton on Nov. 2 continues.

If those scenarios play out, Christmas is the best post option for a team that will need points from that area on the floor.

“He’s been a contributor all the way, but now it’s more of an opportunity to contribute on offense,” Boeheim said, “and big guys generally take a little longer anyway, so it’s not a shock that it’s taken him a little bit of time to get there.”

DaJuan Coleman’s season is in jeopardy for the third time in his career, clearing more space for Christmas. The Orange no longer has Baye Moussa Keita’s scrappiness.

Sophomore Chinonso Obokoh missed time in practice with a leg injury and has been thrown into the backup center role without ever appearing in a game for SU. Freshman Chris McCullough has also bounced from forward to center leading up to the season, but Christmas will be tasked with staying out of foul trouble and playing a bulk of the minutes in the center spot.

“I think Rakeem deserves the ball every time down the floor,” Cooney said.

Boeheim’s doghouse now awaits another unsuspecting underclassman, while Christmas, the first player in Boeheim’s tenure to graduate in three years, walks free as a graduate student.

Physically, Christmas is noticeably stronger. The 10 full-court sprints he ran in reps of four or five over the offseason to enhance his cardio will be tested. And so will the up-and-unders, step-backs and hook shots he practiced throughout the offseason.

In his first game action of the season, Christmas exploded for 13 points in the second-half to carry Syracuse past Carleton.

Though he said he’s not any more vocal than he was before, Christmas has grown into an effective leader — one who’s more likely to text or call his teammates after a rough practice than chew them out in front of everyone.

Syracuse’s last true post presence left in the form of Fab Melo two and a half years ago and one hasn’t returned since.

If Christmas can bring that back, his transformation will be complete.

“You see what he’s done in the offseason,” Hopkins said. “You see how he’s working.

“To me those are the signs that, you know what? He’s ready to do this.”