When men's basketball head coach Brian Gregory recruits in the offseason, it doesn't take much to convince some high school prospects to come to UD. Although for other recruits, the sales cycle is a little longer for Gregory. It becomes more of a process. He has to put in a little more work to convince a recruit that becoming a Dayton Flyer is the right choice for him.

Senior guard London Warren falls into the latter of the two categories. When Gregory traveled to Orlando, Fla. to see Warren play for the first time in an AAU tournament, he was enamored with the young point guard from Jacksonville.

"We were looking for a point guard," Gregory said. "I saw [London] play about three or four times, and I loved his quickness, loved his energy. I thought he could really push the ball. That was the first thing [that stuck out to me]."

Unfortunately for Gregory, the feelings weren't mutual.

"I talked to his coach after the tournament, and there wasn't a lot of interest on [London's] end in Dayton," Gregory said. "And then he started doing a little more research and the interest grew."

That's when Gregory upped his efforts to ensure that the young point guard deemed the "Jacksonville Jet" would be at Dayton in the fall of 2006.

"I went to Jacksonville two separate times and spent some time with him and his family," Gregory said. "And that's really when we started to think that he would be a good fit here."

"They did a good job of informing me about the program," Warren said. "They showed me how good this program was. And I had a great opportunity to play as a freshman, and that's what I really wanted to find - a place where I could play as a freshman."

And just like Warren's recruitment, elevating his game to the Division I level his freshman year was a process, as well. Any seniors at UD remember Warren's erratic play his freshman year. Often he threw bullet passes into the crowd without a teammate, or any opposing player for that matter, anywhere near the ball.

Many of the aforementioned instances happened because Warren had not yet learned to harness his speed. It's a style of play that his teammates and Warren himself sum up in one phrase.

"One hundred miles per hour," senior guard Marcus Johnson said. "I mean all the time. He uses his quickness in all aspects of his game."

Johnson has been roommates with Warren since their freshmen year and he summarizes Warren as a roommate in one word. "Junky," Johnson said with an ear-to-ear grin. "He occasionally cleans up when he has company - every eight months."

But with hard work and maturity Warren has learned to control his speed and clean up the "junk" in his game. It's the one item that his teammates and coach point to as the biggest change in four years.

"He takes care of the ball more," Johnson said. "As a freshman he made a lot of turnovers and mistakes. But now, he gets his teammates involved, dishes out assists and takes care of the ball."

Gregory couldn't agree more.

"He's become a much better student of the game," Gregory said. "He used to just play. He understands the game better now, understands our system inside and out. He's grown up quite a bit."

Part of what makes Warren a great player and teammate is the acknowledgement of his growth from his freshman year.

"My maturity [is the biggest difference]," Warren said. "My decision making skills on the court and knowing when to go 100 miles an hour and knowing when to go 30 miles an hour. When I first started playing I was all 100 miles an hour all day, every day."

So with just three regular season games left, the home stretch of the 2009-10 season is on Dayton's doorstep. Every win and every loss from this point on for the Flyers is crucial to their NCAA Tournament hopes. And if Dayton is fortunate enough to earn a bid to the Big Dance, the Flyers - ust like Warren when he has company - will be looking to clean up all along the way when they get there.