THE SECOND HOUR (with Gomez from "Gomez and Dave")
Gomez took over for the second hour. JB joked that Gomez would have to look elsewhere for his free meals next week. Gomez said he was preparing to do his tax returns and pulled out a receipt for a restaurant in new York where he and his friends had run up a $779 tab at the last BET. JB: “You must have had a couple bottles of wine. Most of it’s drinks. You can’t claim that. I know you didn’t pay for it.” Gomez admitted that was true.
Naz in Clay called in with a “soft” question and a “hard” one. The soft question came form his wife: why does Jim wear his wedding ring on his right hand rather than his left? “Because I broke the wrong finger on my left hand and it got too large for the ring. I had another ring made and it was too large for the finger. So I wear the old one on the right hand. It would take a woman to notice that.”
The ‘hard’ question was what happened in the second half vs. Connecticut: “Did we get lazy? Did we get sleepy? And why didn’t Michael Carter-Williams get in in the second half?” (It took a man to ask that.) JB: “I can assure you we didn’t get ’sleepy’ in the second half. We played about the same but didn’t make shots. I’m gonna go with the veterans down the stretch. When we shoot it well, we’re a pretty hard to beat. When we don’t shoot it well, we’re pretty hard to beat, too, but it’s closer.”
Dave in Liverpool wanted to know how coaching has changed over the years. JB: “You change all the time. You evolve. Some changes are for the better, some not. You adapt to the players you have. Some teams shoot the ball well. Some have a good inside game. Sometimes you change your defense. You change your system to help the player play better.” Dave asked if the bench or the play of veteran player sis more important. JB said “the bench is important, especially in the regular season when you might have 3-4 games in a week. But veteran leadership is the big thing in the spot season. And talent is important whenever you are playing.”
Another caller asked if Coach tailors practices to individual opponents. He said they did, that this week they are working on Louisville’s match-up zone and press. “We work every day on pressure. It’s unusual to have an entire week to prepare for it. We work on what they like to do against us.” Gomez asked if they assign guys in practice to mimic certain players. “We do that a little bit.” Who has been the toughest to replicate? JB didn’t answer that. “The great thing about being in this league is that you face so many different styles- the press, man to man, zones, etc. you are prepared for anything.”
Bryn, (sp?), in Clay asked about Dion Waiters. Are defenses keying on him more than they did early in the season? JB: “No, the only difference is that he isn’t making three pointers. He’s been playing well, driving well. His defense has slipped a little bit. We’re facing tougher competition and the teams are holding the ball more so the games are lower scoring. It‘s important for him and James to shoot well. Bench scoring is why we‘re such a good team.”
Gomez asked if there was any change in mental preparation this time of year. JB: The key is to play the way you did getting here, not to press and try to win big. Just play well.”
At this point Gomez reminded listeners of the number to call into for his part of the show: 315-437-7644. But started giving out his home phone number before he caught himself. He said “And you can talk basketball with my wife.” JB: Nobody wants to call that number.”
I then called in my second question about whether we are playing well enough to win a national title now. I supplemented it by noting that, since the tournament went to 64 teams, the national champions had won 162 tournament games and only 68- 41% - were won by less than 10 points. In our last 11 games we’ve won by double figures just three times and one of those was the Rutgers game, which was close game that only became a ten pointer at the end. He pointed out that we’d won a lot of games by solid margins before that. “You need to play at least the same level as you have. Getting back to our peak would be helpful. You’re right- it’s hard to get a lot better at this point in the year. There are no guarantees that you’ll even win in the first round. You’ve got to play well every night.. We need to rebound better, shoot a little bit better. We know we can win and can beat everybody.” He reviewed what happened in 2003. He didn’t think we played well vs. Manhattan. We had to make the big comeback vs. Oklahoma State. “Auburn had upset Wake Forest so that was a little easier game. We matched up very well with Oklahoma, even though they were the #1 seed. Texas was a great team. Kansas was a great team. We played our two best games of the season in the Final Four.”
That’s a big key- peaking at the right time. You have to get better as the competition gets better. If you play your best game first, you have no where to go but down while the opposition gets better. I asked coach if it was possible to coach the team to peak at the right time. JB: “There are no buttons to push, no magic words. You just have to work hard every day.”
I thanked the Coach for answering all my questions over the course of the season. He said they were easy to answer because they were good questions. I guess good questions are easier to answer than bad ones.
I would add that another big key is the emergence of a player who had not been a consistent contributor into one. It gives the team an other dimension, another answer. Chris Sease in 1975. Derrick Coleman, (who had a rough first Big East season), in 1987, Todd Burgan in 1996, Josh Pace and Billy Edelin in 2003. Candidates: Rakeem Christmas, James Southerland, Michael Carter-Williams.
Gomez asked if the Coach had thought of changing anything at this point in the year to make the team better. “Really, you can’t do that. You just want to play well every time out.”
A caller asked if the big thing the recruits like these days was the Melo Center or was it still the Dome. “We double up on them. First we show them the Melo Center, then we take them to the Dome. The players really love the Melo Center. Everything they need is in one place and they can work out any time of day. It’s not about whether the Dome or Manley is available. That’s why we’ve been so good recently. The last three years we’ve won more games and in any other three year period.”
Gomez asked the coach to describe Scoop Jardine and Kris Joseph. He said Scoop had been a “tremendous leader” and had “improved as much as any guard we’ve ever had here.” He kept searching for words to describe Kris and just kept saying “steady”, finally saying that he “was a steady player who made a lot of big plays for us“. He also wanted to make sure that the senior walk-ons were not forgotten: Brandon Reese, Nick Resavy and Matt Tomaszewski, were not forgotten. “They kept pushing everyone in practice. The public doesn’t really know their contributions.”
They talked about the impact of players leaving early for the pros. “It made the game more even not to keep players for four years.” Gomez noted that John Calipari said he doesn’t like the “one and done” rule. JB laughed. “He should like it. It’s made his program. I’m shocked he would say that. He’s had great success with a couple every year. He sells that like crazy. “ Gomez said that Calipari has said his coaching style was to “not get in the way.” JB: “He’s a very good coach. During the course of a game. You have to make adjustments.”
Gomez said that “A year ago, none of the Final Four teams were ranked in the top 15 at this point.” JB went into his spiel about how balanced the game was these days, noting that teams like Pittsburgh and Villanova were at the bottom of the conference and Connecticut had to win another 2-3 games to get in the tournament this year.
Gomez noted that during the evening the Coach had signed several autographs for fans- on basketball programs, on basketballs and even a sonogram!
He said that a local New York Station celebrated the 30th year of the BET being in Madison Square Garden by listing the greatest games in the tournament in that period and the 6OT game won. JB : “it’s hard to beat that. Gerry’s ‘06 run was great but that has to be #1.” They also had a list of the outstanding “Leap Year Sports Highlights” and the 6OT game came in third. Gomez didn’t say what was #1-2 on that list.
A caller wanted to know how JB would “attack Kentucky and Anthony Davis. JB: “He’s a great shot blocker. We’d have to avoid giving him opportunities. If we did get in close, we’d want to get into his body and not give him much space to work in. They have a great defense and a great shot-blocker when they need him, which often they don’t. Indiana was very lucky to beat them. We’d like the opportunity to play them.” The caller asked if the coach would like his advise on how to play the Wildcats. JB: “I don’t usually take advise from fans. But go ahead, shoot.” The fan suggested that Fab stay outside and draw Davis away from the basket with those jump shots he can make. JB: “that’s great but in practice, he’s making one of every ten of those. Do you really want him taking ten shots and missing 9 of them?”
Another caller asked about “the emotional state” of the 2003 team at this point vs. this year’s team. JB: “We are clam, confident, not feeling any pressure. In 2003 we didn’t play great in New York and got beat by a very good Connecticut team. Then we got into the tourney and played better. This team ahs been as consistent as any team can be.” The caller wanted to know if there was any sense of “unfinished business” from last year. JB: “We just want to go farther.. It would be much better for us to play a team we haven’t played yet, a team that hasn’t already beaten us.”
They talked NBA for a while. Kobe tried wearing a mask for his nose and then ripped it off. “They don’t like to wear it much”. The Celtics are looking to trade Rondo. “They can’t get comparable value. Teams don’t want to trade All-Stars. There are no great draft picks who could turn a team around like Kevin Durant this year.” The heat: “If they don’t win this year, it will get harder. Lebron is not a great shooter and you can’t be a great player that wins championships that wins championships with out a jump shot. The NBA measure great players by championships won- they want to see 3-4 of them.” The Knicks, “have a great bench. They’ve got a good team. They have a big front line. They’re not physical by nature. But they need to be physical. They have ten guys who can play. They are a legitimate threat. But it’s tough to get past Miami and Chicago.”
Gomez said Jay Bilas had declared that Syracuse was the “best match-up for Kentucky due to the zone defense.” JB: “We would have a more than reasonable chance. The tournament is set up to make big teams fail. Little teams have nothing to lose.” Gomez said that Bilas had advocated getting rid of automatic bids. JB: “Jay’s right, [Doesn’t he coach Villanova?], but we’ll never have it. Autobids are good because the players on those teams will get the experience of being in the NCAA tournament, even if they aren’t going to win it. That’s why I want to expand the tournament. I don’t care what the number is- it doesn’t have to be 128. There are 6-8 teams that get in that have no chance. Just add 6-8 teams. They will be done in the first weekend and then we’ll have the best 64 teams for the second weekend. It would be easy to do.
Gomez said he’d hear predictions that the Big East would get ten teams this year. JB doesn’t think so. He repeated his prediction that the selection committee would be hard on the conference after getting eleven invitations last year and that teams that had had bad starts or finishes were very vulnerable. He thinks the Big East will get 7-9 teams in the tournament.
Gomez asked Jim why he doesn’t like the double-bye. JB: “You sit there too long. I’d rather play Tuesday and have a day off.” With a straight 16 team tournament the top four seeds could play Tuesday against he bottom four. Then the second four would play the other four on Wednesday.
The predicted crowd for the Louisville game will be 32-33,000. JB: “it should be a great game. Louisville will be ready to play.” Gomez said that there will be renewed calls to have a game with the court in the center of the Dome. JB: “We’d wind up with 50,000 bad seats and I’d be the one to hear about it.”
And with that, Jim Boeheim’s Thursday nights belong to him again, (unless we have a game), and mine belong to me.
