Amatchup made in marriage
When UConn needed a game, Ralph simply asked her husband
Shea Ralph was making her way down the hallway recently, set to leave the UConn basketball offices.
“One of our administrators was in the hallway, talking about how we had lost games,” the UConn women’s assistant coach said Thursday. “I said that my husband just lost another game, too. I’m literally walking past. I wasn’t even part of the conversation.
“I’m not looking at him and he said, ‘Ask him if he wants to play us.’ ” “Really?”
“Yeah.”
Ralph went home. Tom Garrick was watching a basketball game. Shea took a seat on the couch.
“Hey, would you like to play us?” Ralph said.
“Sure, we can do that,” the UMass-Lowell head coach said.
That’s it, Ralph said, a two-sentence conversation.
“I was excited to go back and say, ‘Hey, this might work.’ ”
So No. 3 UConn — which had three games canceled and its Big East opener against Seton Hall postponed by a positive COVID-19 test — will make its much-much awaited opener Saturday afternoon against
UMass-Lowell at Gampel Pavilion. Paige Bueckers’ college debut has been delayed so long, rumor is she’s already a 21-year-old junior.
This is college athletics in a 2020 nutshell: On March 3, after substantial planning and negotiation, UConn announced a football game at Ohio State in 2025. Ohio State will pay UConn a $1.955 million guarantee. 2025? That’s nothing; UConn has games scheduled for 2029.
A week later, COVID hit. Nine months later, it’s “Hey Shea, ask your husband if he wants to play.”
After that positive test to a member of the program, not a player or coach, UConn was forced to cancel its opener against Quinnipiac and games against two top teams — Mississippi State and Louisville. Bubbleville burst.
“It was a timely predicament,” Garrick said. “We both had games canceled. We both had been paused for a while. It’s one of those things out of necessity. You look for any port in the storm.
“When Shea came home and asked if we would like to play, I said sure, we’d be interested in playing anyone at this point, never mind one of the best teams in the country.”
UMass-Lowell also paused its program with a positive test. The opener against UMass was canceled. After the Dec. 5 game against Merrimack was called off, the River Hawks did play Boston College on Sunday, an 88-38 loss. A scheduled game Wednesday also disappeared when Northeastern called off winter sports until Dec. 18.
Think about it. Between the two teams, seven of the eight scheduled games aren’t being played. Hold on! UConn just postponed Big East opener II on Tuesday. Butler tested positive.
This must be hammering at the athletes’ mental health.
“We said we’re going to play (UConn), they looked at us and they’re like, ‘OK, show me,’ ” Garrick said. “When we get on the bus and we arrive at Gampel,
we’ll know. Until that time, we’ll just prepare. My kids have been great. We’ve asked a lot of them physically and mentally. We try to, but we can’t understand as coaches what we put these kids through, and continue to put them through, to get this season in. They have been pretty much on lockdown for three, four months. We’re asking them to hang tough, have hope.
“They’re excited about the prospect of shooting a basketball against other people. Until that actually happens, until we’re in the warmup line, I just don’t think they’re going to try to set themselves up for disappointment anymore.”
Garrick was talking 46 hours before tipoff. Crazy, isn’t it?
That’s why Ralph, in the middle of explaining what it’s like to be married to a coach and playing against your husband, said, “If we get a game in and they get a game in — at this point — to me that’s a win.” Amen.
One certainty is that their 2-year-old daughter, a bucket of energy, won’t be at Gampel.
“If any game I could have brought Maysen to, I would have loved to have brought her to this one,” Ralph said. “With the restrictions and how early we need to be here, the fact I need someone to take care of her but can’t get anyone into our building, makes it impossible.”
Ralph met Garrick when they were recruiting the same player. Ralph was an assistant at Pittsburgh at the time. Garrick, a star at Rhode Island who spent four years in the NBA and several more abroad, was coaching the URI women. Neither got the player. They found each other.
“We’re very similar in a lot of ways when it comes to our work ethic and drive,” Ralph said. “We’re very different in that I’m much more high-strung. He’s much more laid-back. There are times when I’ll be very frustrated with a certain player not getting better at something. Or frustrated with myself for not figuring something out. Even if we’re looking at a play, he has had so much experience at the highest level, sometimes when I’m looking for this answer that I think should be a difficult one, it’s much simpler than that. The answer is in front of your face.
“My husband has a way of delivering information … short, simple, precise and to the point, it makes perfect sense. He’s made me more even-keeled and patient as a coach. You guys watched me play. That’s how I coached early in my career. One thing I learned from him is high energy is important, but it’s also important to show some calm when everyone else is that way.”
Ralph calls Garrick, in his third year at UMassLowell, technically one of the best coaches she has engaged in conversation.
“He’s an amazing coach,” said Ralph, 42. “I know I am biased, but we were friends for a long time before we came together as a couple and I learned a lot from that friendship about player development and X’s and O’s. He’s very smart. Don’t tell him I said that. I’ll totally deny it.”
Ralph was the 2000 Final Four MVP. She won the
Honda Award as the best college basketball player. She also fought through two ACL tears and anorexia. Few in women’s college basketball ever showed more fire, more determination.
“I don’t learn a lot about X’s and O’s from anyone other than the experiences I’ve had,” said Garrick, 54. “Everything I learn from coaching is about the character of people. Shea has worlds of experience character-wise to help me not only be a better coach, but a better person, better husband, better father. All the things I’ve learned from her about life, that we shared together, to be the best person I can be on a daily basis — when I give my kids that person, they benefit basketball-wise. It’s not a play or strategy or structure. It’s about how you deal with people and how you get people to understand and interpret your messages. And will people want to follow? Being around Shea has made me better in that way.”
They talk basketball. Every day, Garrick said. They’ll verbally jab at each other now and again, Ralph said, not much, though. They try their best not to bring their work home and keep their professional and personal lives separate. Saturday’s game? They keep that out of the house, Garrick said. Written on the family calendar, that’s it, Ralph said.
But not talk basketball? Are you kidding? Ralph talks about how Garrick will be watching NBA videos, say something like, “You still talk to Katie Lou? This would be a good move for her in the pros.”
“Basketball is a labor of love for us,” Garrick said.
“It’s not a burden. It’s a game we grew up playing and found so much joy in. We kind of bring the elation of basketball and competitive spirit into our house.”
Speaking of elation. Has Maysen, who has been at practices and games with Ralph since infancy, had a ball in her hands yet?
“You better believe she has,” Garrick said. “She’s athletic. She really is for a little kid. I laugh a lot at myself, that’s just the way I’m wired. When Maysen was able to stand and walk on her own, I started tossing a little foam ball at her chest. I had a blast. It would hit her chest, drop, she’d look at it, bend over and pick it up. I’m like, ‘You’ve got to figure this out.’ When she was able to catch it, it was better than any game I’d ever won in my life. She’s picking up things quickly. It’s like a game for us. Nothing serious. But when she picks things up there’s an elation throughout the house.
“She has brought spirit into our lives. Although we’ve had it, it’s a different kind of kinetic energy. Having a 2-year-old running around is different than just being alone with another adult. She has enhanced our lives beyond words. That joy every day, her learning curve every day. It’s a joy we share together. She has brought a different level of love into our lives.”
Like Shea Ralph said: Someone’s not going to be happy after the game Saturday, but if you get 40 minutes of competition in during a pandemic and a healthy Maysen waiting at home, it’ll be a good day.