<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE </div><div class='quotemain'>For Bulls second-year guard Thabo Sefolosha, this training camp might as well be finishing school.</p> ‘‘The big thing with him is I want to see him, with his length and athleticism, attack the rim and go toward the basket on offense and finish over people,’’ general manager John Paxson said of the 6-7, 215-pound Sefolosha. ‘‘He has the capability with his body type to do that.’’</p> Sefolosha, hoping to prove Paxson and coach Scott Skiles correct, stayed on the court working with assistant coach Ron Adams long after the team’s veterans had headed home from practice during the first week of camp.</p> ‘‘They both have talked to me about that. I know it’s important when I go in the lane to be able to finish and just be more of a threat offensively,’’ said Sefolosha, who averaged 3.6 points in 71 games as a rookie. ‘‘I just need to be more aggressive, thinking more about finding my shot and do what I do well. Then I need to work on the things that can complete my game. Last season, it was my first year, and I didn’t really know what to expect. Now I’m more prepared, and I know what to expect.’’</p> Sefolosha spent significant time on the court throughout the summer. He and fellow sophomore Tyrus Thomas participated in both Bulls summer leagues in July. Sefolosha then returned home to Switzerland and opened his first basketball camp. He also starred for the Swiss national team, a role quite different from the backup minutes he clocked in his first NBA season.</p> ‘‘It gave me an opportunity to work on my offensive game a little bit and focus on that,’’ said Sefolosha, whose Swiss team ultimately lost to the Luol Deng-led Great Britain squad, which kept its 2012 Olympic-qualifying hopes alive by advancing to the A Division of FIBA. ‘‘Confidence is important, and I think that’s what playing with the national team in the summer gave me.’’</p> Deng said he has seen Sefolosha’s summer play pay dividends in the Bulls’ first week of training camp.</p> ‘‘In practice, he’s shown a little more maturity,’’ Deng said. ‘‘I had guys who had been doing it for years; he had younger guys. So he was put in a position where he had to be a leader. I think that’s just going to help him.’’</p> The confidence Sefolosha said he gained resonated with Paxson.</p> ‘‘My reference points always are what happened to me,’’ Paxson said. ‘‘My first year in the league at San Antonio, I didn’t play very much. So I went and played in summer league. I played all the time and got confidence back. Hopefully, that’s what Thabo got out of this summer because he was in and out of the rotation last season and his minutes were scattered.</p> ‘‘I think Thabo, deep down, is a creative player. And creative players are going to make some mistakes. Thabo sometimes gets himself off-balance, and a lot of his mistakes come from that. Sometimes you have to close your eyes when he makes a mistake or two when he’s too anxious. But that’s a growth process which will come with experience. And because he’s creative, his potential is very high.’’</p> Sefolosha knows there will be a battle for backup minutes in the backcourt, particularly with the team expected to add the 6-9 Deng to the guard mix.</p> ‘‘It’s going to be interesting,’’ said Sefolosha, who averaged 12.2 minutes in 71 games as a rookie. ‘‘But I think it’s going to depend upon me to show the coach and my teammates that they can rely on me — that if they give me the ball, I can make something good happen.’’</p> Having Sefolosha and Thomas play better in their second season is something Paxson said the Bulls are counting on.</p> ‘‘We’re at that point now that with Lu, Ben [Gordon] and Kirk [Hinrich], you kind of know what you’re going to get most nights,’’ Paxson said of the team’s top three scorers, who accounted for 57 percent of the scoring last season. ‘‘That’s always a comforting thing for a staff. We’re going to need Thabo and Tyrus to have really good years.</p> ‘‘There’s no way of getting around it. They both have a year under their belt, have worked hard over the summer and are coming back with the confidence that they can play in the league.’’</div></p> Brian Hanley / Suntimes</p>
