JB
(I may have re-arranged the order of some of the comments based on the subject.)
Matt Park against congratulated the coach, this time on getting his 903 win to pass Bobby Knight. JB: “I won’t pass the next guy so I won’t have to worry about this again. It hangs over your head when you want to focus on what you are doing. Right now we are focusing on the conference and it’s good to get it done and move on. It’s the intangibles, the relationships with the coaches and players, the trips, the great games that you remember. The rest are just numbers.”
The Rutgers game was “a very surprising game. Rutgers should have beaten St. Peters and they were in it until late vs. Mississippi. They could be 11-0. They lost their inside guy and that hurt them. We played really well and were still behind. It was a very surprising game.
At this point I was trying to call in but there were technical problems and I only heard a little bit of the show for a couple of minutes. They were talking about Eli Carter’s hot start in outside shooting and how when the defense got up on him, he missed “3 or 4 of his last five shots…once a guy makes two you need to make somebody else score.”
Eventually, the gave up trying to get me on and Matt read off my question, word for word. When Jim heard that, (Alex Plavin), had said “we were going to lose anyway” he exclaimed “My goodness” and laughed. Regarding my question: “You are never going to play someone who is overmatched, (he didn’t quite explain whether he meant that you would never have a player out there who is overmatched or that we don’t play anyone who would overmatch our players). He quoted the minutes given to the three freshmen, saying Coleman was playing 16 minutes a game, (I looked it up: 16.6), Cooney 15, (15.0) and Grant 12, (12.1- each has played in every game).
“You never want to experiment in a game. You need to have your best five out there. But they can’t play 40 minutes. We’ve got good big guys. They need to all play. We know who the best players are and who will play the bulk of the minutes. It can change as the players get better. Most improvement comes in practice.”
They talked about Brandon Triche’s game. “He didn’t just shoot well. He played well. He had 6 assists , 4 steals and only one turnover. He and Michael not only had assists but made good passes leading to other passes that led to baskets.”
A caller asked which Rautins Coach preferred in overtime: Leo or Andy? “Andy was pretty good (against Connecticut). Leo had that big basket, (against Villanova). I’ll call it a tie so neither one will be mad at me.” The same caller wondered if it would be a good rule that, on an inbounds play under the basket in the half court, the inbound passer would not be allowed to throw the ball into the backcourt.” Coach agreed, noting that in international ball, “you can never throw the ball into the backcourt. That would be a good rule.”
Then they got a call from ‘Mike in Durham’. The voice seemed awfully familiar. Coach K told Jim that he ought to thank PJ Carlesimo for the opportunity to pass Coach Knight because he won 22 of 23 from PJ. (actually he was 27-4). JB noted PJ was 3-1 now with the Nets and nobody wants to play him.
K: “Only so many guys can last as long as we have.”
JB: “And I’m a lot older than you are.”
K: “Syracuse adopted you at age 3.”
JB: “I don’t have to worry about catching the guy in front of me. He’s going to coach another 10-15 years.”
K: “I don’t know if I’ll be around that long. Did Juli cry?”
JB: “Juli did not cry. They actually had the ceremony at 900. I don’t know why.”
K: “I’m glad they treated you well at Syracuse. You have treated them well. I saw that USA Today article. There was more pictures than you’d have for a Heisman trophy winner. Was it written by a relative of yours?”
JB: “No. it wasn’t even a Newhouse guy. He probably went to UNC.”
K: You guys have it planned better than UNC. Micki and all the girls say hello.”
They talked about their experience with USA basketball which both agreed, rather than being tiring, “rejuvenated” them.
K: “We got to use our brains in the summertime.”
JB: “That can be a good thing. It was great to have the pro guys respond to the coaching staff.”
K: “You are my best friend in coaching. It’s all about friendship and teamwork. Maybe we can meet in the last game of the season. Two coaches with 9 gazillion wins”
JB: (laughed) “But not ten years from now.”
KI: This is an historic phone call. I don’t think there’s ever been a phone call between two coaches with 900 wins.”
(Actually, I suspect there has. I‘m glad they fixed the technical problems before Mike from Durham called.)
JB commented afterwards that this is one of Mike’s best teams “in a while. They’ve got three seniors, the big guy in the middle and good shooting.” He marveled that if you won 25 games a year, it would take 40 years to catch Coach K. Matt cracked that “30 for 30 would be just a start”. (JB, of course has averaged 25 wins a year over the last 36 years).
Don, in his car, wanted to know if JB is thinking of “going pro” as Coach Marrone appears to be. “I won’t go anywhere but here. Age has nothing to do with it. If you are healthy and have the same desire and enthusiasm, you can still do it. Most coaches don’t get the chance: they get fired.” Matt noted that Coach Marrone was “in a different phase of his career” JB: “You do listen to them, look at the landscape. It’s very flattering. It can actually help you with recruiting. The kids think this guy must be a good coach. He’s a loyal SU guy. I’m a big fan. The way Louisville played and the way we beat them and West Virginia (shows he’s done a good job). I hope he’s here for along time. He‘ll handle it in a class way. He‘s not looking to harm the university”
Matt asked if the coach had had a chance to see any of the Pinstripe bowl. “Most of it. We really knocked them around and dominated the game. They will have some key losses but will get a lot back.” Matt said that just as they were coming on the air, Justin Pugh had declared for the draft. “Her was high on the boards. I’m not an expert on the offensive line but he seems to be pretty good.”
Getting back to basketball, they talked about the Big East JB credited Cincinnati with a “really good win” at Pittsburgh. “Pitt is back. They are playing good basketball.” South Florida played Central Florida twice due to scheduling problems. (Syracuse used to play teams twice quite a bit as an independent: why not?) JB described Anthony Collins as “as good a point guard as there is in the Big East”, despite not being a three point threat. “He can score and is good defensively.” (Collins is 2 for 7 from three point range. He’s averaging 10.2ppg and 7.8apg. He has teammates who are averaging 11.1, 11.2 and 11.7ppg. Talk about balance!).
They talked about the Marquette-Connecticut game in which the officials aligned the teams incorrectly for the overtime. “They didn’t know the rule. I didn’t know the rule. You can’t goal tend a shot into the other team’s goal. There is no shot. They should have just started all over again with another jump ball.”
On the national scene, they noted that Michigan was way up on northwestern.” “They could win the Big ten. They might be better than Indiana. Duke Michigan, Arizona and Wyoming are undefeated. Wyoming has some good wins. I’m looking forward to seeing them when they appear on TV.”
Paul wanted to know if this year was “more challenging” because we have less of a bench. JB: “Last year we had James, CJ and Dion Waiters- the NBA’s #4 draft choice coming off the bench. We had Baye coming off the bench. It’s unusual to have so much power coming off the bench.” (Actually James and Baye are still technically coming off the bench, although James plays a lot more than DuJuan and Baye is really part of a rotation at center.)
Matt made some comment about Louisville. JB: “That’s along way off. You can’t look beyond the next game in college basketball. You want to get as many guys playing well as you can. You never have them all playing well. You want to keep getting better if you can.”
Matt noted it was the sixth straight year we’d started out 1-0 in the conference. JB: “You always want to get off to a good start.”
