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Thursday, December 27, 2007
Tenn. Tech has a gem in Mike Sutton
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Didn’t get to put any of this in tonight’s Georgia Tech game story, but Tennessee Tech has interesting stories, not to mention seven players from Georgia.
Sorry, Jackets fans, for upcoming references to your dreaded rival. But not really.
I first met TT coach Mike Sutton in 1996, when I covered Tubby Smith and Jim Donnan’s first seasons at Georgia. Sutton was an assistant, an incredibly pleasant man.
Had no clue until tonight that in 2005 he was afflicted with Guillaine-Barre syndrome, with which the body’s immune system goes haywire and attacks parts of the peripheral nervous system. Just a few years after he finally got his break as a head coach after being an assistant for years in places like Virginia Commonwealth, Tulsa, Georgia and Kentucky, it landed him in a motorized wheelchair. He eventually transitioned to the walker he uses now (though he still sometimes uses a wheelchair).
Limited greatly in his ability to move, he still guided the Golden Eagles to a 19-12 record that season, and a third-place finish in the Ohio Valley Conference. Last season, 19-13 and third place in the OVC again.
Tennessee Tech is 4-9, with losses at Florida, Kentucky and Tech, plus a win at Oregon State. But for a few very narrow losses, the Golden Eagles’ record would look different.
Few men could have more to be bitter about yet be so gracious.
Sutton spent the first five or six minutes after the game Thursday night thanking Paul Hewitt for allowing him to bring so many players “home” for a game, gushing about the job Bobby Cremins did years ago in turning around Tech (he attended Cremins’ camps as a high school coach) and complimenting Hewitt as one of college basketball’s most upstanding men.
He went on to reflect on the two years he spent in the state of Georgia, the fun he had — except when Georgia’s G.G. Smith cramped up late in one of the Georgia-Georgia Tech games — and again thank Hewitt for letting him bring half his team home.
The Golden Eagles were led Thursday by senior Anthony Fisher (23 points) of Alpharetta’s Chattahoochee High and Amadi McKenzie (16 points, 11 rebounds) of Washington High, where he would have been a student at the same time as Tech cornerback Avery Roberson.
Daniel Northern of Houston County High — south of Warner Robins — had 11 points and seven rebounds, and Frank Davis of East Hall was limited by a hand injury. Other TT players from Georgia include Mario Stowers (Hartwell), grumpy Ra’shun Bryant (Coosa High in Rome), and Bassey Inameti of Peachtree Ridge (he’s redshirting).
After Sutton’s turn at the microphone, which prompted just two questions from a modest media contingent, he said, “that was easy.” I said, “That’s because you made it easy. Thank you for your great stories.”
Sutton spent a few more minutes in the hallway, reminiscing a little longer, with wife Karen nearby. He recognized me, but probably couldn’t attach a name to my aging face, and held out a shrunken, trembling hand. I re-introduced myself. We chatted a bit more about the Tech-Georgia games as he recalled them (I couldn’t remember a single detail), and I spoke of Dogs’ trip that year to the Sweet 16, where they lost in double overtime to Syracuse as the Orangemen hopped on the considerable back of John Wallace in Denver.
He spoke of former Georgia star Shandon Anderson getting just a fingernail on Wallace’s game-winning shot. Then Paul Hewitt came by, and wondered why the media interview room was empty. Reporters soon followed him back in there.
Mike Sutton was why. Great man, terrible break.
But still incredibly pleasant. Earth could use more people like Mike.
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Hewitt’s deep thoughts on coaching, McHenry
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
If you didn’t read the story in Thursday’s AJC about Anthony McHenry trying to become a basketball coach, I’ll summarize: Paul Hewitt couldn’t be happier.
Hewitt is a deep thinker. That’s no secret. He does not dabble in thoughts; he dives in and surrounds himself with concepts. That’s part of the reason, I guess, that he’s typically so strongly set in his opinions. They run through him like blood rather than over him like water.
He’s been thinking about McHenry as a coach since, oh, Anthony’s sophomore season at Tech, about six years ago. Not for the pursuit of victory does Hewitt think McHenry is a solid candidate for the job. He’s of the opinion that McHenry “gets it,” not to mention that he has a personality that looks like a match for recruiting.
All of Hewitt’s better teams have “gotten it.” The Final Four team “got it.” But when I asked if that team was closer than others he’s had, Paul said it was a close team, but not necessarily his closest. He wanted to make it clear that teams are not close because they win; they win because they’re close.
McHenry said he’s learned the most so far this season about trying to create team chemistry. So Anthony is on the way to “getting” this, too.
“That’s what I think the people who cover our game don’t get or understand,” Hewitt said. “I think we all realize that winning is what keeps you in the job. But if that’s the only thing you’re getting out of it, it’s a real shallow existence.
“I get so tired of reading in the paper that they went to the Final Four or whatever. That thing is long over with. If you stopped 10 people in the street and asked them who was in the Final Four in 2004, they wouldn’t know. They might know Connecticut won.
“That is constantly being thrown up as a benchmark. That really means nothing. Every year is a different year, a different season. What you’re trying to get out of it is on the way to winning, you hope that these guys understand the value of hard work, and they’re getting their education, and they’re building the kind of camaraderie that they can fall back on 10 years from now.”
Hewitt has multiple former Tech players in the coaching pipeline. I may not list all of them here because we did not talk about all of them.
But Jon Babul is assisting former Tech assistant Dean Keener at James Madison. Clarence Moore, whose daughter Ava was born recently, is helping with a high school team in Louisville. Darryl LaBarrie is assisting at East Carolina. Some resist Hewitt’s suggestion. “I thought Marvin Lewis would be a good coach, but he wants nothing to do with it,” Hewitt said. “Willie Reese hooked him up with an interview, he’s a CPA [in Atlanta], married, doing really well. I thought he’d be a great coach. He was like, ‘Coach, no way. I’m not touching it.’ He’s going to be a star in whatever he chooses to do.”
Hewitt also said, ” I’m trying like hell right now to get one of our former players hired by Tech. I’m not going to tell you who. There’s an open job in our administration. He missed one practice in four years, was a Dean’s List guy.”
As for championships, or big victories, etc., “You stash it away, and every once in a while you look at it. The things that are constant are walking in the office and seeing that kid, and saying I know that kid is going to be a great coach one day and he’s pursuing it based on my advice.”
So, does it seem like Paul’s pleased with McHenry’s decision to pursue coaching?
There wasn’t room for this in the story, but I think some of it is interesting so I decided to blog around it.
Matt
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