Izuki Shun is smart, funny, and serves as Seiren’s point guard. An excellent strategist, he has the ability of Eagle Eye. He also has a habit of making puns, which greatly annoys both Hyuuga and players on other teams.
He is specialized in passing, dribbling, and stealing the ball on court, and off-court he is specialized in firing off 100 puns in succession. Izuki’s family–as in his mother and his two sisters–show the same tendencies in regards to puns. I think even if he wanted to, Izuki couldn’t stop saying puns because it’s so deeply ingrained in him.
Matter of fact, he is the most popular with girls out of the players on the Seiren team, but they run away when they see his joke books.
When we first meet Izuki, he’s handing out flyers to the underclassmen to try to recruit members for the team. He doesn’t seem that significant then, but that rapidly changes.
During the practice game with Kaijo, Riko calls him “calm and collected,” and adds afterwards that he has a strange sense of humor.
He is revealed to have started playing basketball during second grade, and therefore has very high technique in passing, shooting, and dribbling. Even though he isn’t extremely athletic like Kagami, he is agile, making him ideal for Seiren’s run-and-gun strategy while making fastbreaks, changing direction, or tricking the opponents.
He’s not that flashy of a player, but he’s the core of their offense with the nickname “control tower.” Without Izuki, they would be lacking in strategy and in observation on court. Matter of fact, without him, the team wouldn’t have gotten to the Winter Cup finals to begin with because of how important his steals and decisions are during games.
Even Kasamatsu acknowledges him as the playmaker of Seiren; he controls the court while watching with his Eagle Eye.
One of his greatest fights is when he guards against Takao in the Shutoku-Seiren game in the final of the Interhigh preliminaries. Takao, having Hawk Eye, has a more developed sense of the court than Izuki does. Although both Takao and Izuki are fast, he concentrates on beating Takao’s strength with the team rather than taking him down himself.
That’s really important to who Izuki is as a character. Even though he’s challenged multiple times by several different characters (Kasamatsu, Takao, Imayoshi, etc.), he never truly goes one-on-one with them before the team is aware. After Takao blocks Kuroko’s pass, Izuki tells Hyuuga about Takao’s Hawk Eye and the effect on the team before trying to take him down again.
Like all of the upperclassmen of Seiren, he has a great value for teamwork, which is what makes Seiren so successful.
During the Touou game, he’s challenged by Imayoshi. During the team meeting, he isn’t determined to take Imayoshi down but is rather determined to take Touou down with the Seiren team when he says that they’re stuck in a rough battle field.
His care for his teammates is partially due to his Eagle Eye, since he is constantly watching them on court. However, the majority is from how he is as a player. Because he’s not a very flashy player despite being highly skilled in technique, he requires teamwork to succeed. Out of the starting players at Seiren, he’s often labeled as the most unremarkable (even though that opinion often changes after Izuki steals).
Because he’s such an integral player while being cool and collected, he often calming the team while making several key plays.
Matter of fact, his ability to remain calm under pressure is one of the key reasons that Seiren wins over Touou during the Winter Cup.
Because of Riko’s dad, Kagetora Aida, Izuki was labelled “Pretty boy” and learned Eagle Spear. Although he also calls Hyuuga the “lifeline” of Seiren, I have to partially disagree because I really do think that Izuki calls the shots (pun intended) as much asHyuuga does in games.
Izuki is one of the most important characters to Seiren’s growth and development as a team. You have to love his jokes and the determination he brings to the table. His sense of teamwork is ridiculously strong and he balances the seriousness of Hyuuga and the “Ditzy boy” (Kiyoshi, as labelled by Riko’s dad). He is undoubtedly one of the greatest supporting characters in KnB, and possibly even the most important to Kuroko’s and Kagami’s sense of a true team.
Just for fun…
Fun fact…
interestingly enough, he is voiced by the same actor who voices Nigou.
just moving along like everyone else 