SWC75
Bored Historian
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Like Coach Marrone’s show, Coach Boeheim’s showis on locally at TK-99 FM but on Thursdays at 7PM, rather than 8PM on Wednesdays. Fans can call the show from 1-888-7GO-CUSE, (1-888-746-2873) or 315-424-TK99, (315-424-8599), or E-Mail the coach from the Radio Mailbox link on the front page of SU Athletics.com They are at the Delmonico’s Restaurant and you can ask questions there live.
There does not appear to be a second hour of the show this year, (which is fine with me- the second hour was traditionally repetitive).
My Questions/Comments
I suggested that if no questions about the Bernie Fine situation would be answered, they should announce that at the beginning of the show so it wouldn‘t seem as if the callers were unaware of or ignoring it. I decide to ask a basketball related question regarding the impact of Bernie’s absence on the coaching staff.
“Coach, a football coaching staff has various assignments designated to each coach, usually reflected in their title. I notice that Mike Hopkins, Adrian Autry and Gerry McNamara are all listed just as ‘assistant coaches’. I also note that they were all guards. What specifically are their individual duties and do we have a ‘big man‘ coach
on the team right now?”
HCJB
Matt Park did begin the program saying that Coach Boeheim would not be commenting on the Bernie Fine situation on the show and there was no further discussion of that on the broadcast.
Matt congratulated Coach on the two wins in New York over “two quality teams. JB: “They attacked us right away and we didn’t get our offense going until late. Stanford is very good- I’m not sure yet how good. They could win the Pac 10.” (They could also win the Pac 12.)
They then got right into discussing Florida, “a tremendous team”. Last year they won 29 games and lots in overtime to Butler in the Elite 8. They have “an experienced backcourt with good guys inside….Florida is a guard oriented team. They will penetrate and shoot. But Patrick Young was a McDonald’s All-American and their other big men are very physical players. They have six players averaging at least 10 points per game. They will miss Murphy a little but they are still a very good team. They have as a good a group of perimeter players as there is in the country. Brad Beal could be the outstanding freshman in the country.”
Matt wanted people to note that the game time of the Florida game has been changed from 6:30 to 7:00. Coach noted that the game after that is Marshall, who beat Cincinnati at Cincinnati, so “there are a lot of good games coming up“
I called in and congratulated the coach on winning his third pre-season NIT, saying I still remembered Sherman Douglas’ hike to Stevie Thompson for the dunk. Coach said Bobby Knight still remembered it too, and didn’t think much of it. I told him that Coach Marrone is still looking for a center that can do that. He laughed.
I then asked my question about how the coaching responsibilities are divided up after the reorganization of the staff. Adrian Autry has been working with the forwards. Mike Hopkins is working with the big men and he’s had experience at that in the World Championship and the Olympic camps. Mike had been working with the guards but that’s now Gerry McNamara’s responsibility. “Nobody understands guard play better”.
Matt noted that he saw in practice that Gerry is wiling to “get in the face” of the guards and that his coaching career is “developing more and more by the month, it seems”. Coach: “He knows the program and what the kids have to do. He understands what I am looking for. To be a good coach you have to understand the game and have an understanding of what we are doing. Even when you bring in an experienced assistant coach from outside the program it takes him a couple of years to acclimate himself to your program. You also have to have a great work ethic. You are scouting, breaking down tapes, working guys out, doing practice preparation. It’s 12-14 hours a day, 6-7 days a week. With Gerry we‘ve got all those things covered.”
A later caller asked why Lazarus Sims wasn’t considered for the position. JB said he’s doing a good job as assistant strength coach and has huge family responsibilities with four kids, where as the increased responsibility was easier for Gerry, (who has a child of his own, per the SU Media Guide).
A caller asked about Fab Melo’s improved play. He knew he’d lost a lot of weight but it surely there’s more to it than that. JB still felt the lost weight was the key. “ When you’re not in great shape you can’t run and can’t get into position to make plays. Now the game becomes more fun. Making plays builds confidence. He still makes mistakes. But big guys will make mistakes for 2-3 years, sometimes all four. It takes a long time for them.” (I will say that the Fab Melo we see this year is basically the Fab Melo I remember from the McDonald’s All-American game. He looks the same and plays the same.
Matt asked about James Southerland, who has been “lights out” in the Dome but not in new York. Coach said “His defense is improved. His rebounding has improved a little bit but has to be better. Some of these teams can’t guard him so they just let him shoot. He can make those. He can make defended shots but he’s got to move more. CJ Fair is more physical and a better weak side rebounder.” He added that “When we take Rakeem Christmas out we a re a small team and the guards have to thinks about rebounding more and that would help us.”
A later caller compared this year’s team favorably to past SU teams, even the national champions, in terms of athleticism and length. Jimmy reiterated that we aren’t really that big of a team. “Craig Forth was 7 feet tall and Carmelo and Hakim were both 6-9. Kueth Duany was 6-6 and when he brought in Billy Edelin, he was 6-4. We also had that team with Coleman, Seikaly and Owens. When we take Rakeem out, CJ Fair is only 6-6, even though he tells me he’s 6-8.”(if you can convince your coach that you are 6-8, then you are 6-8.)
They discussed other players as well. A caller noted that he had had his doubts about Kris Joseph and expressed them on a previous show but JB had predicted that he’d come up big in New York and he did. Coach: “I’m glad that prediction came true or we were looking at a loss.”
Michael Carter Williams “is not quite ready”, although he had a good second half against Eastern Michigan with 5 assists and 0 turnovers. Matt Park noted that he also had no shots taken. Rakeem Christmas is also “not quite ready but will give us another real good big guy by the end of the year.” Coach added “I’m really proud of Trevor Cooney. He works harder than any player we have- and he’s not even playing. It’s good for other players to see that.”
A caller said that Brandon Triche “seems much more comfortable with the ball in his hands.” JB: “He can get the ball at the two guard spot. Wee run some sets for him to start plays from there.”
A caller noted that our depth tends to wear the other teams down. “Yes.” said JB. The caller asked why we didn’t utilize the full court press more or a 1-3-1 defense to put more pressure on the other team. “It’s hard to play too many defenses. We are using the man to man, the press and the zone. We will use the full court press but some of the teams are real good against it and get lay-ups or open shots. Why should we extend our defense if we can play zone and stop them from scoring?”
They noted that St. John’s has a tough game- taking all those freshmen down to play Kentucky. So does Georgetown. “They are better that people thought they would be but Alabama is very, very good.” Matt asked if Jim ever expected to see Duke down by 20. He said it was very unusual- although he thinks they were down by 20 to St. John’s last year. “They played 10-11 guys and that’s always dangerous.” Coach was amazed that Buffalo blew out Dayton, 84-55. He called it “The surprise score of the year so far.” Allen Griffin is an assistant coach at Dayton this year and they had beaten Wake Forest and Minnesota.
They discussed Rob Murphy’s challenges at Eastern Michigan. “He lost his two best players and they only won 6 games last year. (9 actually.) They’ve won 4 so far this year. If you’re not good in that league, you’re in trouble.”
A caller asked when we are going to win the opening tip. Coach said “I’d like to get one, too!” He thought we might have gotten one this year and “had one stolen from us in New York”. He said Melo isn’t getting a good jump and just missed the ball in the last game. “I’d rather start with the ball than not but sometimes it’s not so bad to start off on defense.” Matt asked if Coach was “afraid of that early three pointer” but Jim noted that we tended to stop teams on their first possessions but then not get anything on the other end.
Matt wondered if it was an advantage not to get the first possession and have the possession arrow in your favor and compared it to deferring to the second half in football. At this point JB launched into one of his favorite subjects: not second guessing coaches. He’d obviously heard of the discussion over Doug Marrone deferring to the second half. “It’s very hard to second guess decisions because you don’t have all the details. John Wooden was asked during a game if he would have done what a coach did and said ‘I don’t coach that team. I don’t know their players. I can’t tell what the coach should do. It’s hard to tell people how to do their jobs.’ That’s the greatest coach of all time. I can cook a bit but I’m not going to go into the kitchen of a restaurant and tell then how to cook the Chicken Françoise.” Matt said the staff at Delmonico’s thanks him for that.
They talked about how often we’ve played Florida- 4 times and yet this is the first time either team has played on the home court of the other. (We played them in the 1987 NCAA tournament at the Meadowlands, in New York in 2005, in Kansas City in 2008 and in Tampa two years ago.) Matt asked if the key to this game might be rebounding. JB didn’t think so. “The key is defense- you have to stop people and be efficient on offense. You can overcome bad rounding more easily than bad defense or bad offense. We are still a work in progress. We are young and it’s early.”
There does not appear to be a second hour of the show this year, (which is fine with me- the second hour was traditionally repetitive).
My Questions/Comments
I suggested that if no questions about the Bernie Fine situation would be answered, they should announce that at the beginning of the show so it wouldn‘t seem as if the callers were unaware of or ignoring it. I decide to ask a basketball related question regarding the impact of Bernie’s absence on the coaching staff.
“Coach, a football coaching staff has various assignments designated to each coach, usually reflected in their title. I notice that Mike Hopkins, Adrian Autry and Gerry McNamara are all listed just as ‘assistant coaches’. I also note that they were all guards. What specifically are their individual duties and do we have a ‘big man‘ coach
on the team right now?”
HCJB
Matt Park did begin the program saying that Coach Boeheim would not be commenting on the Bernie Fine situation on the show and there was no further discussion of that on the broadcast.
Matt congratulated Coach on the two wins in New York over “two quality teams. JB: “They attacked us right away and we didn’t get our offense going until late. Stanford is very good- I’m not sure yet how good. They could win the Pac 10.” (They could also win the Pac 12.)
They then got right into discussing Florida, “a tremendous team”. Last year they won 29 games and lots in overtime to Butler in the Elite 8. They have “an experienced backcourt with good guys inside….Florida is a guard oriented team. They will penetrate and shoot. But Patrick Young was a McDonald’s All-American and their other big men are very physical players. They have six players averaging at least 10 points per game. They will miss Murphy a little but they are still a very good team. They have as a good a group of perimeter players as there is in the country. Brad Beal could be the outstanding freshman in the country.”
Matt wanted people to note that the game time of the Florida game has been changed from 6:30 to 7:00. Coach noted that the game after that is Marshall, who beat Cincinnati at Cincinnati, so “there are a lot of good games coming up“
I called in and congratulated the coach on winning his third pre-season NIT, saying I still remembered Sherman Douglas’ hike to Stevie Thompson for the dunk. Coach said Bobby Knight still remembered it too, and didn’t think much of it. I told him that Coach Marrone is still looking for a center that can do that. He laughed.
I then asked my question about how the coaching responsibilities are divided up after the reorganization of the staff. Adrian Autry has been working with the forwards. Mike Hopkins is working with the big men and he’s had experience at that in the World Championship and the Olympic camps. Mike had been working with the guards but that’s now Gerry McNamara’s responsibility. “Nobody understands guard play better”.
Matt noted that he saw in practice that Gerry is wiling to “get in the face” of the guards and that his coaching career is “developing more and more by the month, it seems”. Coach: “He knows the program and what the kids have to do. He understands what I am looking for. To be a good coach you have to understand the game and have an understanding of what we are doing. Even when you bring in an experienced assistant coach from outside the program it takes him a couple of years to acclimate himself to your program. You also have to have a great work ethic. You are scouting, breaking down tapes, working guys out, doing practice preparation. It’s 12-14 hours a day, 6-7 days a week. With Gerry we‘ve got all those things covered.”
A later caller asked why Lazarus Sims wasn’t considered for the position. JB said he’s doing a good job as assistant strength coach and has huge family responsibilities with four kids, where as the increased responsibility was easier for Gerry, (who has a child of his own, per the SU Media Guide).
A caller asked about Fab Melo’s improved play. He knew he’d lost a lot of weight but it surely there’s more to it than that. JB still felt the lost weight was the key. “ When you’re not in great shape you can’t run and can’t get into position to make plays. Now the game becomes more fun. Making plays builds confidence. He still makes mistakes. But big guys will make mistakes for 2-3 years, sometimes all four. It takes a long time for them.” (I will say that the Fab Melo we see this year is basically the Fab Melo I remember from the McDonald’s All-American game. He looks the same and plays the same.
Matt asked about James Southerland, who has been “lights out” in the Dome but not in new York. Coach said “His defense is improved. His rebounding has improved a little bit but has to be better. Some of these teams can’t guard him so they just let him shoot. He can make those. He can make defended shots but he’s got to move more. CJ Fair is more physical and a better weak side rebounder.” He added that “When we take Rakeem Christmas out we a re a small team and the guards have to thinks about rebounding more and that would help us.”
A later caller compared this year’s team favorably to past SU teams, even the national champions, in terms of athleticism and length. Jimmy reiterated that we aren’t really that big of a team. “Craig Forth was 7 feet tall and Carmelo and Hakim were both 6-9. Kueth Duany was 6-6 and when he brought in Billy Edelin, he was 6-4. We also had that team with Coleman, Seikaly and Owens. When we take Rakeem out, CJ Fair is only 6-6, even though he tells me he’s 6-8.”(if you can convince your coach that you are 6-8, then you are 6-8.)
They discussed other players as well. A caller noted that he had had his doubts about Kris Joseph and expressed them on a previous show but JB had predicted that he’d come up big in New York and he did. Coach: “I’m glad that prediction came true or we were looking at a loss.”
Michael Carter Williams “is not quite ready”, although he had a good second half against Eastern Michigan with 5 assists and 0 turnovers. Matt Park noted that he also had no shots taken. Rakeem Christmas is also “not quite ready but will give us another real good big guy by the end of the year.” Coach added “I’m really proud of Trevor Cooney. He works harder than any player we have- and he’s not even playing. It’s good for other players to see that.”
A caller said that Brandon Triche “seems much more comfortable with the ball in his hands.” JB: “He can get the ball at the two guard spot. Wee run some sets for him to start plays from there.”
A caller noted that our depth tends to wear the other teams down. “Yes.” said JB. The caller asked why we didn’t utilize the full court press more or a 1-3-1 defense to put more pressure on the other team. “It’s hard to play too many defenses. We are using the man to man, the press and the zone. We will use the full court press but some of the teams are real good against it and get lay-ups or open shots. Why should we extend our defense if we can play zone and stop them from scoring?”
They noted that St. John’s has a tough game- taking all those freshmen down to play Kentucky. So does Georgetown. “They are better that people thought they would be but Alabama is very, very good.” Matt asked if Jim ever expected to see Duke down by 20. He said it was very unusual- although he thinks they were down by 20 to St. John’s last year. “They played 10-11 guys and that’s always dangerous.” Coach was amazed that Buffalo blew out Dayton, 84-55. He called it “The surprise score of the year so far.” Allen Griffin is an assistant coach at Dayton this year and they had beaten Wake Forest and Minnesota.
They discussed Rob Murphy’s challenges at Eastern Michigan. “He lost his two best players and they only won 6 games last year. (9 actually.) They’ve won 4 so far this year. If you’re not good in that league, you’re in trouble.”
A caller asked when we are going to win the opening tip. Coach said “I’d like to get one, too!” He thought we might have gotten one this year and “had one stolen from us in New York”. He said Melo isn’t getting a good jump and just missed the ball in the last game. “I’d rather start with the ball than not but sometimes it’s not so bad to start off on defense.” Matt asked if Coach was “afraid of that early three pointer” but Jim noted that we tended to stop teams on their first possessions but then not get anything on the other end.
Matt wondered if it was an advantage not to get the first possession and have the possession arrow in your favor and compared it to deferring to the second half in football. At this point JB launched into one of his favorite subjects: not second guessing coaches. He’d obviously heard of the discussion over Doug Marrone deferring to the second half. “It’s very hard to second guess decisions because you don’t have all the details. John Wooden was asked during a game if he would have done what a coach did and said ‘I don’t coach that team. I don’t know their players. I can’t tell what the coach should do. It’s hard to tell people how to do their jobs.’ That’s the greatest coach of all time. I can cook a bit but I’m not going to go into the kitchen of a restaurant and tell then how to cook the Chicken Françoise.” Matt said the staff at Delmonico’s thanks him for that.
They talked about how often we’ve played Florida- 4 times and yet this is the first time either team has played on the home court of the other. (We played them in the 1987 NCAA tournament at the Meadowlands, in New York in 2005, in Kansas City in 2008 and in Tampa two years ago.) Matt asked if the key to this game might be rebounding. JB didn’t think so. “The key is defense- you have to stop people and be efficient on offense. You can overcome bad rounding more easily than bad defense or bad offense. We are still a work in progress. We are young and it’s early.”
