Dexter Daum is a new man these days.

No longer is the 2009 Fallon grad that tall, lanky kid running up and down the floor. After two years of transformation in both the weight room and on the basketball court, Daum has grown 2 inches and 25 pounds while at Southern Oregon University in Ashland and is now one of the Raiders' go-to guys off the bench.

“Where I am now compared to high school is night and day,” he said. “However, I took a lot of things I did wrong in high school and turned them into positives here at SOU. I wasn't exactly the most muscular kid in high school so I really had to learn how to use my body in basically every sport.”

Daum has turned in a strong performance in his second season at Southern Oregon, which is 15-9 overall and 8-5 in the Cascade Collegiate Conference of the NAIA.

Daum has played in 24 games, including 15 off the bench and averages 15.6 minutes per game and 5.5 points. Daum, who helped Fallon to the second-best record in the 4A in 2009, is shooting 48 percent from the field including 41 percent from 3-point range. His 24 treys are third-best for the Raiders and he's collected 44 total rebounds, five steals and one blocked shot.

“Dex has been a great piece to the puzzle we are assembling at SOU,” Raiders coach Brian McDermott said. “He is a glue guy: someone that does the little things on and off the floor. He is probably one of the more popular players on campus.”

It wasn't easy for Daum when he arrived in the fall 2009.

Not only did he have to increase his weight and become stronger, Daum also needed to adjust on defense after Fallon ran the 1-3-1 zone defense under former coach Corey Williams. McDermott, though, said Daum has come a long way since redshirting his first season.

“While we are playing quite a lot of matchup this year, there are more man concepts and each of our guys has to learn to play every spot, which means that Dex has to guard a point guard, a post and a shooter, sometimes all in one possession,” McDermott said. “Learning to stay in front of the smaller, quicker guys takes time. He is getting better at it all the time.”

Daum knew the challenge would appear monumental — but not impossible to overcome.

“My freshman year was bad, I was slow-footed and just bad defense rules haunted me my redshirt year,” he said. “I really put in the hard hours to improve my feet and speed. Now I'm guarding the team's leading scorer and asked to play a big role on offense and defense.”

Even though it's taken Daum longer to adapt to college basketball, he said that Williams, who left for Lewiston (Idaho) High School to coach basketball, was a big influence. Williams helped turn Daum into one of Northern Nevada's biggest threats during Daum's senior season, which happened to be Williams' last with the Greenwave.

“As my high school coach, he really took me under his wing to improve my game,” Daum said. “I look back at my senior year of basketball and his motivation for our team was, in my opinion, the X factor of that season. We wouldn't have had the season we had if not for coach.”

With this season winding down and two more years still to go, Daum's striving to become an All-American for both basketball and academics.

“I take school very serious,” said Daum, who's studying business and Spanish. “I know I can't play basketball forever, so I take every opportunity in the classroom to better myself for the real world, just like I do on the court.”

But he isn't ruling out basketball in his future, either.

“I would love to work for an NBA organization, L.A. Lakers hopefully,” Daum said.