Coaches, players like young basketball Mocs’ potential
At a recent University of Tennessee at Chattanooga men’s basketball practice, new head coach Lamont Paris watched as assistant Tanner Bronson instructed the players on how they were going to do their pregame warmups.
The players ran out to the floor as the UTC fight song played, then assumed four lines around the court while they went through what would be the routine before games this season. The players worked on a passing drill but looked lost as to where they were supposed to go after making the pass. Eventually they got it.
Following was a three-man weave, in which after three passes the final recipient makes a layup, while one player rebounds and the third sprints to the 3-point line on the wing before receiving the ball and laying it in.
“Everyone gets a layup,” Bronson instructed.
It’s the dawn of a completely new era of UTC basketball, which plays an exhibition at 5 p.m. today at McKenzie Arena against NCAA Division II member Francis Marion. Five seniors did most of the heavy lifting on last season’s 19-win team and now are playing professionally.
Paris took the job in April, replacing Matt McCall, who won 48 games in two seasons — his first culminating with an NCAA tournament appearance — before being hired away by Massachusetts. Not too long after that, sophomore Andrew Fleming chose to transfer to Lipscomb and rising senior Trayvond Massenburg left for Division II Texas Permian-Basin, which left this season’s team comprised of all underclassmen.
The coaching staff doesn’t mind the youth. Assistant coach Aaron Fuss said that when he arrived on campus, he observed a bunch of “hungry” players. Assistant Walter Offutt, who played at Ohio State and Ohio, called it “energizing” and “inspiring.”
“It’s been a learning process for sure, not only for the players but our staff,” he said. “Some of the stuff that’s just like opening eyes in the morning is new to them, just as far as little details we’re going to throw. It’s different taking over a program than going to a program where the culture is already established, and we’re establishing our own culture: how we do things, how we dress, what are the guys sitting out wearing on the sideline, what do we do for those guys sitting out, what are warmups like, how we travel, what time we leave.
“All that little stuff, it’s truly amazing to cover, (what we) have to do to actually run a program and for us to be successful as a program, starting from scratch, there’s a lot of value in that. We’re teaching them new things, and I love it and I want to see this thing, because when the product is finished, you’ll feel that much better about it — like when I was at Ohio, the coach took over and we won 25-plus games.
“We’re starting fresh and there’s an energy about it.”
As they continue preparing for the season opener Nov. 10 at Wyoming, Paris and his staff can implement the new culture with the knowledge that every player on this season’s roster should be back for next season as well. The Mocs include three juniors, two sophomores and eight freshmen — three of whom are walkons, two added since the start of practice in October.
As a result of the departures, only five players from 2016-17 are back, and they accounted for 31 percent of last season’s minutes, 23 percent of its points and 24 percent of its rebounds, led by junior Makinde London’s 6.0 points and 3.5 rebounds per game.
“We want consistency to be the main part of the culture,” Fuss said. “Our guys are going to come out every day and they’re going to practice so hard every day that it will simulate a game, regardless of the conditions, and they get that every single day. If we stack together days where we have good consistency, by the time the next week, the next month happens, we’re going to be really happy with how the product looks.”
The roster, which will be the youngest in UTC’s Division I history, wasn’t necessarily supposed to look like it does. In addition to Fleming, Chuck Ester, a key piece on the 201516 NCAA tournament team who missed last year with a torn ACL, chose not to pursue a sixth season. In addition, 6-foot6 Louisiana Tech graduate transfer forward Qiydar Davis visited UTC and committed, only to later back out and decide to go to Indiana State.
The main downside is that players who could have used a redshirt season will be thrown into the fire immediately and be expected not only to play but to produce.
Once he took the job, Paris started the process of studying each individual player, all the way down to their favorite move on the court.
“I’m glad we have the guys that we have,” Paris said. “I like our team, like who they are, what they’re made out of. I like their effort, like their energy — most days. That’s who we have, that’s who we’re going to roll with, and I’m glad we have those guys. I’m not one to second-guess if one player that should have been or could have been on the roster or was on the roster at one time, what they could have done, what they could have brought, I just don’t see the fruits of that.
“We have the guys that we have, that’s great. We’ll continue to try to build and try to add players that fit our culture, fit who we are, fit our style, fit our system, but in the meantime we’ll get these guys that we have right now as good and as disciplined and as synergized as we possibly can.”
Good and bad experiences are expected to follow. The team is likely to win a game it shouldn’t win and very well could lose a game it shouldn’t have lost — such are the pains that come with players so young and a system so different — but the staff and the team seem genuinely encouraged by what’s happened so far and what’s to become in the weeks, months and years ahead.
“You have to stay in the process,” London said. “You can’t get too far ahead about whatever. It’s a day-to-day thing, and that’s what I try to remind the guys: to keep getting better day by day and not worry about the final outcome. Coach told us to focus on the battles at hand, and ultimately if we win enough battles, we can win the war.
“That’s how we’re just trying to go about our whole process as our team goes forward.”
Contact Gene Henley at ghenley@timesfreepress.com. Follow him on Twitter @genehenleytfp.