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Saturday, March 10, 2007
Lowe’s ‘Pack show its true colors
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Jeff Schultz
Tampa — The jacket was freshly dry-cleaned for Saturday’s game, which pretty much douses the whole superstition thing. A team goes on a winning streak, and sometimes nobody changes socks. Not Sidney Lowe. He keeps sending out the lucky red jacket to have the sweat stains removed.
Mojo, apparently, is unaffected by Martinizing.
Not this team.
Not this week.
Not yet.
N.C. State won another game Saturday, another game it wasn’t supposed to. First it punts Duke from the ACC tournament. Then it vanquishes the state of Virginia (Virginia and Virginia Tech). Win today over North Carolina and you might want to check the odds on the Wolfpack in the NCAA tournament. And ignore them, and plunge.
Another win. This time, the bunch that won five conference games all season overcame the odds on Jim Valvano’s birthday. Of course.
“I pay some visits to his [grave] site,” Lowe said of his former coach, who died of cancer in 1993 and is interred in Raleigh.
Maybe the first 5,000 State fans into the arena today should be given Ouija boards and incense.
Valvano, it seems, is returning Lowe’s visits.
This team has not yet won the ACC title, as Valvano’s did in Atlanta in 1983. It hasn’t even made the NCAA field, which Valvano’s “Cardiac Pack” somehow conquered that same year.
Remember? Lorenzo Charles stuffing home the missed shot by Dereck Whittenburg to beat Houston in the championship game. Valvano running around the court.
That team’s leader? That would be Sidney Lowe, then the point guard, now the ‘Pack’s first-year head coach. He has brought back the ‘Pack’s flair for the dramatic, and wrapped it in the same red sports coat made famous by predecessors Norm Sloan and Valvano.
In many ways, this team is like that one. Players overachieve. They hit key shots. They make free throws (21 of 24 in the second half of the win over Virginia Tech). They hung together this year when they lost starting point guard Engin Atsur for 12 games with a hamstring strain. They’re both tough and cool under fire — a reflection of their coach.
“The way we’re doing it right now is very similar to what our fans saw in 1983,” Lowe said.
When Atsur was out, Lowe said, “I just told them to keep fighting, stay together and good things will happen. I had no idea that we would be playing in the ACC championship game. But I told them that every game here special things can happen in the tournament every year. Whether it’s a player who emerges or a team that does something special. And I told them, ‘Why not be that team?’ “
It would take one more miracle. N.C. State would be the lowest seed (10th) ever to win the ACC tournament. It also would be the first to do it winning four games in as many days. Something outer-worldly will have to carry them today against North Carolina if their legs don’t.
Lowe is doing his part. Sometimes, he is overdoing it. He suffered severe dehydration at halftime of a game against North Carolina earlier this season and had to be taken to the hospital by ambulance.
He received fluids — and scoring updates.
“When I had tubes running in my nose,” he said, “I had somebody relaying the score to me.”
State fans love that. They never warmed up to Herb Sendek, who took the team to the NCAA tournament five straight years. Sendek was perceived as aloof. Lowe is gregarious, like Valvano was. Sendek wouldn’t even wear the red jacket.
Lowe won as a player. Now he’s winning as a coach. He said he “has to hold his emotions in check” more now for the sake of his players.
But the winning?
“The feeling is the same,” he said.
Valvano might have said that.
He would’ve been 61 on Saturday. He was 47 when he died, the same age Lowe is today. The late coach and the current coach had a strong bond back in 1983. They’re still connected.
Lowe was asked how their conversation would have gone Saturday. Easy answer. “I wouldn’t have been able to get a word in,” he said.
Permalink | Comments (4) | Categories: Jeff Schultz, Tech / ACC
Gators’ best player? Nobody, everybody
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Mark Bradley
Today’s topic: Who’s Florida’s best player?
Said Larry Conley, the former Kentucky player who’s now a commentator for Lincoln Financial: “[Al] Horford. Or [Corey] Brewer.”
Said Bill Raftery of CBS: “Their most important player is Taurean Green, followed by [Joakim] Noah.”
Said Tom Hammond, longtime voice of televised SEC basketball: “Maybe Taurean Green. Or maybe Horford.”
Said Perry Clark, the former Georgia Tech assistant who was head coach at Tulane and Miami: “Taurean Green is the one they need most. I don’t know who their best player is — I think I would say Horford.” Said Sonny Smith, the former Auburn coach who’s now a TV commentator for CSS: “Corey Brewer is their best player. He’s the player I’d pick if I were starting a team. He’s the toughest matchup in the league — you can’t match him big and you can’t match him small.”
Said Joe Dean Jr., once the coach and now the AD at Birmingham-Southern and a commentator for Lincoln Financial: “Corey Brewer. When he was out early in the year, they lost to Kansas.”
Statisticians will grasp that six considered opinions yielded four different names, with no player being mentioned more than three times. And the player who received only one salute is Noah, the reigning Final Four MVP and the most recognizable collegian in the land. This tells us something we knew already but still might not fully appreciate: Florida is a great team because it has no single star but a veritable constellation.
And this constellation isn’t a mismatched collection. (UConn was a mismatched collection last year, with too many shot-blockers and not enough shot-makers.) Florida is as close to a perfect team as can be assembled in amateur basketball. There’s a true point guard (Green). There’s a dual inside presence (Horford and Noah). There’s an all-court wonder who changes games defensively and offensively (Brewer). And the starter not mentioned above (Lee Humphrey) is nonetheless essential; his shooting balances the floor for Green and Brewer to drive and Horford and Noah to post up.
There’s such a thing as having too much talent, too many egos. The beauty of Florida is that it actually functions like Mike Krzyzewski’s finger vis-à-vis fist metaphor. (One finger isn’t overly mighty, but five fingers balled into a fist can be.) Every starter averages between 13.2 and 10 points, and every starter save Humphrey averages at least two assists. No player averages more than 10 shots. Over 33 games, nobody has led the Gators in scoring more than nine times.
Florida’s best player? Even those on the inside are unsure. Said Larry Shyatt, whose addition to Florida’s staff helped galvanize the program: “That’s a great question, and that [the absence of a real answer] is probably what has separated us the past two years.”
Said Billy Donovan, the head coach: “I would say our team. It’s all working parts, all of them feeding off each other, all of them benefiting from each other. If I look at us, I can’t see an MVP. We’re a team.”
And here’s Andy Kennedy, whose Ole Miss Rebels lost 80-59 to Florida on Saturday: “Beauty is in the eye of the beholder. I’m a huge Joakim Noah fan because of his energy. Al Horford has made himself into a top 10 pick. Taurean Green may be the most underrated guard in the country. Lee Humphrey is the best open shooter in the country. Corey Brewer is probably the most versatile player in the country.”
Please note: Asked to identify the best Gators player, Kennedy named five. And there’s your answer. The best Gator is nobody, and the best Gator is everybody.
Permalink | Comments (8) | Categories: Mark Bradley, UGA / SEC
