Tag Archives: Roy Williams

PacHoops Two-A-Days: The Bay Schools (Cal & Stanford)

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We’re finally previewing the Pac-12. This week, the last before games actually tip, I’ll post two previews of travel mates (i.e. UW and WSU will appear in the same post) and, in the interest of being fully prepared for Friday’s hoop joy, I’ll post two-a-day. Thus the title. Although it’s 4 previews-a-day. Regardless. Enjoy. (Other school previews)

California Preview

cuonzo-martin

We’re entering year three with Cuonzo which is his average tenure. He stayed three years at Missouri State before earning a Sweet Sixteen and a ticket to Knoxville where petitions were started to oust him. The people demand Bruce Pearl! And now we’re here. He’s got an outbound lottery pick, a four-year-five-star, a Columbia grad transfer, and Marcus Lee on the bench. His athletic department has significant deficits but Cuonzo got a contract. Alas, that’s a grim outline for what’s generally viewed as a promising season. The Bears were picked to finish 4th this season and, despite my run down, all can’t be bad in Berkeley (I have friends that live there!).

Last season on “Everybody Love Cuonzo”

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How to Survive Your Coaching Hunt

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The coaching rumors have begun. From grumblings of Josh Pastner and Jamie Dixon, to Shaka Smart and Brad Stevens, this is the most browser refreshing time of year.

I for one, am not jealous of those programs in the hunt. As a fan, this is the most exhausting thing and something I’ve endured far too heavily in the past decade. After all, it was my Arizona Wildcats that allowed Nic Wise to become the first and only power conference player to have four different coaches (Olson, O’Neill, Pennell, Miller) in four years. Who wants that distinction?

And then of course there was the Miller-to-Maryland threat which was one of the worst 48-hour periods of my life. There’s something to be said about stability and comfort and as it stands today – with regards to the current hunts – Dixon and Pastner have let their signatures do the talking. Each has signed extensions with their current employers ensuring they won’t go anywhere. Or something like that.

But again, take it from me, these things are awful. They’re draining and exhausting and exhilarating and terrifying. They’re a time suck and will drive you insane all to wind up with a guy who you’ll barely see in action for another half-year (#IsItNovermberYet).

Alas, here is a guide to surviving your coaching hunt:

  1. Don’t Hate – Unless the outgoing guy is leaving your program in NCAA shambles, he’s really not as bad as you think. Look at the situation holistically and if you still think he deserves your hate, then so be it. But really assert your energies on the excitement of the next guy.
  2. A “No” doesn’t mean your program totally sucks – There’s probably a long(ish) list of names your AD is going to go through and that list starts with some dream names. He’s going to get rejected. Your school is going to get rejected. You don’t suck that bad.
  3. Do not host out of town friends with no connection to college basketball – They’ll soon realize that you being on your phone has nothing to do with the forthcoming “exciting things” you have planned and that you’re just incessantly reading rumors on Twitter. Never set yourself up to be an asshole (which is more of a life rule).
  4. Be Patient –  It took Oregon a brief lifetime to find Dana Altman. These things take time. Know that your AD – or at least hope that your AD – has been on the Bat Phone for a few months now talking to intermediaries and handlers or World Wide Wes or whatever and whoever the hell else is involved in back room deals where public comments sound a lot like a Johnnie Cochran case: DENY DENY DENY!
  5. Do not sneak into a local resort and get drunk in the jacuzzi – Such a situation lends itself to extreme bouts of nostalgia and Glory-Days-syndrome. Your expectations will be unfairly heightened.
  6. Do not contact former head coaches of your school whose actions warranted NCAA sanctions and then the hiring of the firable Kevin O’Neill – Duh.
  7. Group text – Include only your core and most trusted fellow fans. You do not have to share this conversation with everyone. There’s free reign for discussion here and it’s a safe place. The trust tree…in the nest.
  8. Good Scotch – Just a solid thing to have around.
  9. 80-20 Rule – Believe 20% of what you hear is bullshit. Know that 80% of what you hear is bullshit.
  10. Do not start a plane tracking thread – This is just borderline insane. Your time will be better suited by starting a rumor about a coach’s wife dealing with a local real estate agent. Even that’s weird. In fact, just don’t be a rumor starter. Laugh at those ridiculous rumors publicly and refer back to Rule #7 for discussion.
  11. Your program might not be as tight as you think – Otherwise you wouldn’t be hunting for a coach.
  12. Believe – Give unbridled support to the coach you hire. He’s excited about the opportunity and we can all, for at least one brief press conference, believe that coach’s aren’t hired to be fired and that this guy just might outdo Wooden.
  13. The Basketball season will start at the same time next year – And your team is likely to not be very good.
  14. If your school is a public institution, apply – By law, any state school has to open all state funded positions to the general public (or some other legal jargon way of saying it). Find the job posting on your school’s website and apply. What’s the worst that could happen?
  15. Mike Krzyzewski at Army – 9-17 when he was hired away from that institution. The rest is a pain in everyone’s ass.
  16. Do not trust the following:
  • Message board contributors who’s screen name resembles something like [insert team name]Fan4Lyfe[insert year of school’s best season]
  • Tweets from person’s with fewer than 1k followers
  • Coaches:

Waxing Seniority: Larry Drew II

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With the regular season now wrapped and the Pac-12′s seniors having played their final home games, we’re taking a tour across the conference and bidding this group of seniors farewell.

Drew Murawa is a writer and editor at Rush the Court covering both the Pac-12 and Mountain West. I enjoy his perspective on the Pac and the complex goings on surrounding the UCLA program.

Larry Drew II by Drew Murawa

I don’t like to admit it often (because I like to pretend I can be completely impartial), but I grew up a UCLA fan and have a soft spot in my heart for the Bruins. If I’m covering a game, I’m watching it more as a basketball fan than as a UCLA fan, but the fact is, when I pull up a stool at the bar with some friends to watch a UCLA game, I am going to root – often loudly and obnoxiously – for the Bruins, just as I have done for most of my adult (and I use that tern quite loosely) life.

As such, apart from diagnosing the effectiveness of all UCLA basketball players, I also will always have an opinion about the likability of Bruins throughout the ages. Tracy Murray, I loved. Mitchell Butler, Gerald Madkins, Darrick Martin – all spark great memories. And yet Don MacLean? Sorry, but somehow despite all those points, he never did it for me. Toby Bailey? I’ve got some great memories of the guy, but we just never clicked; I was more of a J.R. Henderson guy, despite his sleepy personality. Cedric Bozeman wormed his way onto my good side in his final season, while Jason Kapono remained on the outside looking in. And, then of course, there are the unimpeachables like Ed O’Bannon, Tyus Edney, Luc Richard Mbah A Moute, Lorenzo Mata, Arron Afflalo and more.

All of which is just preamble to discussing the legacy of Larry Drew II in the lore of UCLA basketball. I’ll admit it: when the announcement came down that he would be spending his final year of eligibility in Westwood after an unceremonious early departure from North Carolina, I anticipated disliking him. The way he quit on his teammates in Chapel Hill, regardless of whatever externalities may have prompted such a rash decision, stuck in my craw. Throw in the facts that I hadn’t seen a whole lot in his game to love and that his UCLA career would be so short, and I was well prepared to push the LDII era to the well blocked-off corners of my mind haunted by figures like Trevor Ariza, Michael Fey and Jerome Moiso.

Well, I’m happy to say that, as I reflect on Drew’s time at UCLA in advance of the Senior Night celebration of his career, Drew’s going to go down on the good side of the ledger. First and foremost, after at least three years of a significant downturn in the artistry of Bruin basketball, Drew was the floor general – and a key cog – in the return to watchability. Sure, plenty of that has to do with the fact that he was fortunate enough to come along at a time when guys like Shabazz Muhammad, Jordan Adams and Kyle Anderson were capable offensive threats at the end of Drew’s passes, but make no mistake – Drew has helped each of those guys achieve what they have.

But there are a lot of other facets to the Drew story that make him likable Bruin. On a team that has often displayed some sketchy body language when things weren’t going right (and sometimes even when it was), Drew has been a rock – a mature leader on a team with some emotional youngsters. And slowly but surely, as the season has gone on, some of that has rubbed off on his teammates as wins have piled up. Then, of course, as I just alluded to, in order to really earn a spot up among the favorites, you gotta make some big plays. And that game-winner against Washington (despite the rest of the game being an abomination against the sport of basketball) was a memorable moment.

But as I look back on Drew’s career from this vantage point, what strikes me the most is one of my favorite storylines in the sport we love so much: personal growth. We first got to know Drew as an 18-year-old kid,  probably a little bit spoiled, with plenty of expectations on his head, expectations he failed to meet out of the gates. After a year playing spot minutes in relief of Ty Lawson on the way to a National Championship, Drew inherited the starting spot as a sophomore and, frankly, was a weak spot until Kendall Marshall usurped his spot in the middle of the following year. And the kid, a continent away from home and experiencing failure for the first time, made an abrupt decision to quit on his team. In other words, he made the type of immature decision that 20-year-old kids like me, and you, and everybody else, makes from time to time. The difference is, he made his decision in the full glare of the public spotlight. And regardless of the reasons for that decision or the story behind it, nothing is ever going to change that decision or make up for it or make it right. And you know what? That’s all right. Because one of the reasons we love sports is to watch redemption. And one of the reasons we love college sports in particular is because we love seeing these kids improve. And one of the reasons we love seniors most of all is because we’ve had a chance to see these kids grow up before our eyes in a crucible of pressure and attention.

And, framed that way, Drew’s career arc is irresistible. Kid was highly regarded as a high school player, with the famous father. Kid signs on with a blueblood program, wins a national title in his first year as little more than pinch-hitter, then repeatedly strikes out over the next couple seasons. Kid disappears from the public eye, woodsheds while he works on his game and works on his life and when kid reappears (at another blueblood, no less), he is a kid no more. He is a leader of the next wave of kids.

As a Bruin fan, Larry, it was damn good to get to know you.