TOURNAMENT EXCITEMENT
By Steve Merfeld, Evansville

 

There programs that are making their first-ever appearance in the NCAA Tournament, this season. As they have already learned, to some extent, this is an entirely different deal. There is nothing that compares to the NCAA Tournament Experience.

Belmont’s Rick Byrd has probably received more media requests in one week then he had experienced in an entire season. And I would imagine it has been much of the same for Albany’s Will Brown. This is new territory for those programs.

Coach Brown has the unenviable task of having to face No. 1 seed Connecticut, while Coach Byrd and his Bruins will face Ben Howland and his UCLA Bruins. Neither has an easy chore, but both coaches will tell you that they wouldn’t trade places with anyone. Preparing for UConn and UCLA is a lot better then the alternative.

Then there is Scott Sutton and Oral Roberts, who came within two-seconds of making history last season. Twelve months later a lot of people are suggesting that they actually have a chance of beating Memphis and making history again by becoming the first-ever No. 16 to beat a No. 1.

Such is not the case for teams like George Mason, San Diego State, Xavier and others, who are not making their respective school’s first-ever NCAA appearance. But it is still a new and exciting experience.

And that is about to reach a different level.

I was fortunate enough to be the head coach when Hampton went to the tournament for the first time in school history. It was a great feeling to gather as a team to watch the selection show.

But once that March Madness music came through the television, you knew that CBS was about ready to unveil the brackets and a tingly feeling takes over. And as your school's name goes up on the board, suddenly you feel like now you are somebody.

I am sure that Bradley coach Jim Les doesn't really care about his draw and I know that it doesn’t bother, my former assistant, Hampton’s Bobby Collins that his team is in the play-in game.

The next few days, leading up to tip-off will be like nothing else they have ever been through. We traveled that road at Hampton, in 2001.

We had to scramble to get tapes on Iowa State so we spent the better part of Monday simply working on what we do best, not thinking at all about the Cyclones.

Tuesday morning the tapes arrived and the entire staff went into film breakdown mode. That afternoon we put all of our emphasis on Iowa State. We gave our players a breakdown on what ISU does offensively and what they can expect from them defensively.

And Wednesday we were off to the tournament.

It all happens so fast. Before you know it the brackets seem like they were unveiled a year ago.

We were very fortunate in that we didn't have a lot of distractions that week. Sure there was a lot of media attention, but after a day or so you have to tell your sports information director that you cannot meet any other requests.

You hate to lose the exposure because you know it's only temporary. But it is easy to get caught up in all the excitement and lose sight of the fact that you have a job to do.

Another possible distraction was eliminated in that the University was on Spring Break. This is something that I am sure many coaches are very happy about right now. They don't have to be concerned with their players being overrun by other students.

I greatly appreciated all of the support that the students and administration had given us, but it was a blessing in disguise that no one was around, as we prepared to face Iowa State.

The last and most important thing that coaches are concerned with is containing excitement.

Inside you are feeling great about the opportunity that lies ahead, but you have to contain that emotion. You can wear it on your sleeve. Your demeanor becomes the personality of your basketball team.

Trust me when I tell you that it's so much easier said than done. And right now I am sure that is something that UW-Milwaukee’s Rob Jeter has already given a lot of thought to. He had been to the tournament as an assistant to Bo Ryan at Wisconsin, but now he is making is first appearance as a head coach. There is a big difference.

We were fortunate that we had a veteran team so our kids were not in awe of anything and my demeanor -- one way or the other -- was not going to affect their approach to the game.

Veteran coaches like Pacific’s Bob Thomason and Bucknell’s Pat Flannery have an abundance of veteran leaders on their respective teams, which I am sure, puts them at ease.

All in all, there is nothing like the experience of the NCAA Tournament, especially for those that are making their first trip to the Big Dance.

A month from now, ask any of those coaches about their experience and they will tell you -- as I will -- that it is indescribable. It's impossible to verbalize it or capture it in text.