Dreaming Big
March 27, 2005 04:29 PM | General
March 27, 2005
MORGANTOWN, W.Va. – Could anyone in their right minds ever have imagined being disappointed that a West Virginia University basketball team didn’t make the Final Four. Think about that for a minute: disappointed that a West Virginia basketball team didn’t reach the Final Four.
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| Coach John Beilein consoles his players after West Virginia's overtime loss to Louisville Saturday.
All-Pro Photography/Dale Sparks |
From the moment WVU upset No. 7-rated Boston College in the quarterfinals of the Big East tournament until yesterday evening’s agonizingly close loss to No. 4-ranked Louisville, this team gave college basketball fans here, there and everywhere a reason to rejoice. If ever there was a basketball team made for both the red and the blue states it’s the West Virginia Mountaineers – its blue-collar, overachieving team led by a man who before every game reads passages from his bible and says a silent prayer for his late parents.
It has been 46 years when the great Jerry West took West Virginia University to the 1959 national championship game that a Mountaineer team has traveled so far in post-season play. Considering the tremendous distance this program has come in such a short amount of time it is really amazing when you attempt to sum it all up.
If you recall, Beilein said he was going to take the patient route in rebuilding WVU basketball. Progress was to be measured in small steps, going from being simply competitive to having a .500 season and making post-season play in the NIT.
But what Beilein forgot to tell us was that his slow route also included a little bit of Miracle-Gro. Advancing to the Elite Eight and barely missing going to the Final Four was certainly not on anyone’s radar screens way back in October -- or even February for that matter.
Who could have ever imagined Tyrone Sally making game-winning dunks back in 2002 when as a freshman he was regularly getting dunked on by Pitt, Syracuse, Connecticut and even Virginia Tech?
Who could have ever thought West Virginia could go so deep into the national tournament without those top 100 players that every fan covets?
I’ve had discussions with many people who know the game much, much better than I do who had private doubts that Beilein could pull this off with the type of athletes he was bringing into the program. For instance how could these guys ever match up against Rudy Gay or Charlie Villanueva, they asked?
As it turned out it didn’t really matter because Beilein always seemed to come up with a way to get around it anyway.
Maybe the most remarkable thing of all was that he stuck with his plan and stayed the course despite suffering some bad losses to Pitt, Syracuse, Connecticut and Villanova along the way. Never once did he waver from it. And the plan wasn’t a great mystery either. He was happy to explain it to anyone who would listen.
While other programs were gambling on high-reward prospects with the realization that they might be replacing them in a year or two when they left for the NBA draft or getting quick-fix, me-first players, Beilein was going after four and five-year guys that WANTED to grow in the program.
Now this morning I suspect there are some pretty interested prospects dialing up Beilein’s cell phone after having seen his team splashed all over the front pages of the country’s major newspapers the last three weeks.
If you are a basketball prospect and you're interested in being coached by a guy who will make you better, well then John Beilein is your guy.
It’s not an accident that Tyrone Sally went from being a 54.9 percent free throw shooter his freshman season to being a 78.7 percent shooter his senior year. Or that he went from 29.4 percent from three-point range as a sophomore to being a 36.4 percent three-point shooter this year.
It’s not an accident that J.D. Collins has developed into a tough and dependable point guard, even after half the student section was ready to kill him when he took a couple of ill-advised shots in the Pitt game. Beilein stuck with him, encouraged him to keep his head up and look what a tremendous stand-up player he has turned into.
Ask any Mountaineer fan today if they would even consider trading Joe Herber for another player? Name someone else in the country that has been asked to guard the point guard and the power forward in the same game?
Same goes for Mike Gansey. Not only does he win games on the floor but he also wins the post-game press conferences, too.
How about Patrick Beilein and Kevin Pittsnogle knocking down all those incredible three-point shots? Which is more remarkable – them taking the shots or a coach that allows them to do it?
Frank Young and Darris Nichols are two prime examples of Beilein’s positive, can-do coaching approach. You could just see as they gained confidence in their ability that they could play the game at a very high level. Mountaineer fans will now keep their eyes on the progress Luke Bonner makes in the off-season as he gets an opportunity to be Pittsnogle’s backup next year. And don’t forget, the starting lineup Beilein used to beat Villanova in the Big East semifinals with Young replacing Sally returns intact next season.
Beilein’s methods have been universally praised by those who best know the game. Bob Knight’s private post-game comments to Beilein after his Texas Tech team lost to West Virginia Thursday night were the cause of high curiosity in the press room.
Often times after a team has won a difficult game the winning coach can come off in a patronizing way. But you didn’t get that impression when Louisville coach Rick Pittino described his feelings when he had to walk down to the other end of the floor and confront Beilein after his own team won in overtime to reach the Final Four. He's been there, too.
“The only bad thing about the whole incredible performance was having to go down and shake John and the West Virginia player’s hands,” Pittino said. “I remember so well in ’93 we played such an incredible game and Duke beat us like that. That’s the only bad thing because West Virginia was awesome. They’re a classy group and although I’m real proud of our guys my heart goes out to them.”
What the West Virginia Mountaineer basketball team has accomplished this year capturing the hearts and imaginations of fans everywhere just didn’t happen by chance.
To understand why, all you have to do is stop by the Coliseum at about 4 o’clock every afternoon and watch Beilein and his assistants work with these players. It is a daily exercise in positive reinforcement. It’s never been about what his players can’t do but rather what they can do.
And that perfectly sums up John Beilein. While we’ve listened to others outside this great state mention all of the things we can’t do and the reasons why, from the moment Beilein stepped to the podium and accepted the WVU job four years ago he began describing all of the things we could do – all of us intently listening but having our own private doubts.
The late Robert Kennedy’s favorite expression was “some men see things as they are, and say why? I dream of things that never were and say, why not.”
John Beilein and his magnificent group of basketball players are helping West Virginians dream big once again.
That is perhaps their biggest and most important accomplishment of all.
