Sometimes you must wonder how much a picture really can capture.

A thousand words seem like a lot. Because when you break it down, pictures are just snippets in time. Milliseconds. Just one frame. And people live for lifetimes. So what can one millisecond, one clip in a person’s long, millisecond-drenched life really tell you about someone?

Well, there’s one particular shot worth looking at. It’s a glimpse at a celebration. Carmelo Anthony is wearing his national championship T-shirt. Josh Pace has his arms around Anthony and Hakim Warrick, who is bent over and pointing to his chest.

This is a picture. It screams once-in-a-lifetime accomplishment, that this is something that should be remembered.

But there’s more to the picture. Look right. Jeremy McNeil is not smiling. He’s looking into space. He seems bored. At least distracted. Not 15 minutes after the Syracuse men’s basketball team won the national championship, McNeil is practically yawning as he hangs that towel from around his neck.

McNeil spent two hours on the phone with The Daily Orange staff, including the editor in chief, pleading for this story to not run in the paper. Keeping his life private is surely a priority. He hates the spotlight.

But this picture captures a little more than a glimpse of McNeil’s persona. As he’s staring out into space, he’s thinking about his mother, Zohnnie, who died suddenly from a heart attack at age 43. Six months and two days after her passing, this picture was taken. The intimidating, standoffish demeanor McNeil often exudes is lost in the picture. He appears reflective, deep, an attitude many of his friends preach is the real Jeremy McNeil, who is the only graduating scholarship player on the men’s basketball team.

Are they right? Does the photo really say what we think it says – that he hardly thought anything of the national championship SU just snatched?

McNeil didn’t jump out of his seat and rush the court after the final buzzer. He hoisted himself up, walked onto the Superdome hardwood and stared.

He was excited, no doubt. He was a national champion, for cryin’ out loud. And some of McNeil’s family attended. His grandmother, Lillian Vick, was there. So were his sister, Janise, two uncles, an aunt and a cousin. But McNeil felt different. Kueth Duany hugged his mother. Anthony, too. Billy Edelin embraced his parents. And McNeil stared into space.

The picture may reveal more truth than any number of snippets you might see of McNeil from a distance. As a fan watching him on the basketball court as he swats away another attempted dunk. As a student passing him on his way to class. As a reporter writing on deadline, waiting for McNeil, who slipped to the back of the locker room after a 7 p.m. game to lift.

You need to permeate his circle. Because McNeil’s friends call him one of the nicest guys you’ll ever know.

Ethan Cole is just that. He’s a friend and former teammate of McNeil’s. The two came to Syracuse at the same time – Cole as a transfer from New Hampshire and McNeil as a freshman.

‘When I first met Jeremy, he was not trying to be friendly at all,’ Cole says. ‘I was thinking, ‘This guy’s a jerk.’ I usually get along with people, but he was really hard to talk to.’

Cole spent most of his first year lifting, because as a transfer, he needed to sit out a year. McNeil, who was redshirting, spent time in the weight room, too. After some time, McNeil opened up.

‘Initially I was thinking, ‘This is gonna be a long three years together,” Cole said. ‘But I’ve never been more wrong about a person. He gives off the worst first impression of anyone I’ve ever met.’

For some, McNeil remains unapproachable.

But those around him say that notion is wrong.

Kueth Duany, who now plays in Belgium, also became close with McNeil. When Duany’s grandmother died shortly after McNeil lost his mom, the senior only sought out solace from McNeil. McNeil called Duany daily. ‘Are you OK? I’m here for you if you wanna talk.’

‘Nobody thinks that Jeremy is the kind of person who would console somebody else,’ Duany said. ‘He’s a quiet guy. He just sits in the corner minding his business. People misinterpret that.’

Walt Throne is the owner of Walt’s Hobby, where McNeil has raced mini-cars competitively for almost his entire time at Syracuse.

‘He’s very quiet, very laid back,’ Throne says. ‘He was always very courteous. He fit in well here.

‘I wish I could give you more, but Jeremy’s just a really quiet guy.’

However, he did befriend two youngsters, Tom and Eric. They helped McNeil work on his car, and McNeil left them tickets to home games.

He respects his coaches, too. Occasionally, assistant coach Mike Hopkins will pass out an article he wants his players to read.

Earlier this year, one of those articles was from a motivational speaker about changing attitudes. It talked about how the author woke up angry, frustrated and depressed, and how he was able to transform those feelings into positives. Hopkins tried to use it to motivate the team.

‘I gave it to all the guys, and Jeremy read it, I mean really read it,’ Hopkins said. ‘A lot of times, guys will look at it and go, ‘Whatever,’ and throw it in the trash. But he looked at it, read it and started telling me a story about this girl who was on Oprah. It sounds impossible (coming from him). It was kinda crazy. But he’s a deep kid, and I’m so happy he’s matured.’

After the tragedy that shook his life, McNeil’s maturity has needed to grow a little stronger.

Since his mother’s passing, McNeil has become responsible for his siblings, 21-year-old twins Janise and Jason.

McNeil fell into reclusion after his mother’s passing. A little quieter for a time. A little more protective.

Nothing in his life could have hit harder. Still, when McNeil called Cole – the two became good friends after their shaky start – and told him about the tragedy, the conversation surprised Cole.

‘He was asking me how I was, if I was doing OK,’ said Cole, who was playing overseas at the time. ‘It shocked me that something like that could happen and he’d still be concerned about me.’

Published on April 25, 2004 at 12:00 pm