Garrett Lever helping lay solid foundation at Seattle U.

The ink was barely dry on the contract Cameron Dollar signed to coach the Seattle University men's basketball team in the spring of 2009 when Garrett Lever's phone rang.

"I knew as soon as I got the job," Dollar said of when he decided to recruit Lever to Seattle. "You get the job and you are trying to find a rock-solid guy who can help you win. That (calling Lever) was a foregone conclusion."

Pedigree alone indicated it would be a wise choice.

Lever, a senior guard for the Redhawks, is the son of former NBA standout Lafayette "Fat" Lever, and plays a similar game, making an impact even when he doesn't score much. While Garrett Lever averages just 3.7 points per game, he is first on the team in steals, second in rebounds and third in assists. His 5.6 rebounding average is especially noteworthy given that he stands barely 6 feet.

"He has a tremendous ability to affect the game on the defensive end," Dollar said. "He's just so solid."

Height, though, is one thing his father didn't pass down — Fat Lever stands 6-3. And that was among the reasons Garrett Lever wasn't generally regarded as a Division I recruit coming out of Desert Vista High in Phoenix.

Dollar, however, got to know all about him while an assistant at Washington. He recruited one of Lever's Desert Vista teammates, Ty Abbott, who gave serious thought to signing with UW before ending up at Arizona State.

Lever says that UW coaches talked to him about coming along with Abbott and joining the Huskies as a walk-on.

"I was just kind of in the mix and figured we'd both go up there together," Lever said.

Instead, they went their separate ways. Lever ended up at Division II Nebraska-Kearney, where he led the nation in steals as a freshman, averaging 3.6, while also averaging 13 points. That convinced Lever he could play at the D-I level, so he transferred to Midland (Texas) JC to gain the attention of D-I schools.

A year at Midland, which advanced to the title game of the National Junior College Tournament, did the trick. Lever ended up with offers from a handful of mid-major schools, such as Ohio and South Dakota, before joining Dollar at Seattle U.

Lever says "trying to start a tradition" with Seattle U. making the move to D-I was a lure of becoming a Redhawk. Making his own name, however, has sometimes been hard for Lever, as it often is for children of famous parents.

He's the second of three sons of Fat Lever, now the director of player development for the NBA Sacramento Kings. Older brother Anthony Lever-Pedroza played at Oregon from 1999 to 2002, and younger brother Marcus Lever is playing at Division II Cal State Stanislaus.

Garrett Lever says being Fat Lever's son has "been bittersweet. You get the attention with the last name. And you get people trying to go as hard as they can at you to try to prove they are better than a professional athlete's son. It's been ups and downs."

If Dollar has a regret, he says it's that he didn't have more time with Lever and that maybe he didn't have Lever at a different time rather than during Seattle U.'s transition to D-I.

"He'd be even better on a team that has a chance to contend for a championship," Dollar said. "You (would) see his (abilities) even more. You kind of feel like you are wasting his talents a little bit as we are developing."

Dollar even thought about redshirting Lever each of the last two years but decided he couldn't afford it.

And while the 8-15 record Seattle U. will carry into a home game Wednesday night against UC Davis isn't what anyone had in mind for this season, Lever says his time as a Redhawk has more than met his Division I expectations.

"The attention, the publicity we are getting, our fan base," he said. "I didn't know it was going to be this big."

Bob Condotta: 206-515-5699 or bcondotta@seattletimes.com