Honeymoon over for Tubby
James Pyle pulled up and drained a 3-pointer with less than a minute to go. Pyle is a former student manager. His jumper gave SMU 103 points for the game.
So now you know. What the end of a coaching honeymoon looks like.
It looks like former President George W. Bush sitting courtside, gleefully watching a rout unfold.
It looks like the ESPN broadcast team bringing in Dallas Mavericks coach Rick Carlisle and former SMU coach Larry Brown to help them talk about anything but the absurdly one-sided game.
It looks likes the SMU fans cheering “GO FOR 100! GO FOR 100!”
It looks like SMU’s Jarrey Foster slamming home a put-back dunk to give those fans the triple figures they were lusting after.
And it looks like Pyle calmly dropping in that 3-pointer for the final ignominious score. SMU 103, Memphis 62. No, I am not making that up. It was the worst Memphis loss since 1947, when Delta State beat the Tigers, 76-35. And, yes, it was the end of the honeymoon for Memphis coach Tubby Smith. If he ever had one in the first place.
I’m not persuaded that he did, not the way most new coaches do. Some of this was because of the initial skepticism that Smith was the right fit for the job. Some of it was the work of Smith himself.
He didn’t seem to give a flip about promoting the program. He didn’t manage to bring in graduate transfers who could really bolster his shorthanded team. And his first real season of recruiting has so far produced a class that is ranked just 57th in the country by 247 Sports.
So Memphis fans comforted themselves by repeating the positive things you always hear about Smith. You know how they go. He’s a Hall of Fame coach. He’s won everywhere he’s been. He’’ll take lesser players and coach ‘em up.
For a while, this season, that’s exactly what Smith did. It was impossible not to notice the difference in the Tigers, both individually and as a team. Markel Crawford was better. K.J. Lawson was better. Jeremiah Martin was better. Dedric Lawson was better, too.
The Tigers beat Oklahoma at Oklahoma. They beat South Carolina at home. When they defeated South Florida just about a month ago, they were 17-6 overall, 7-3 in conference play.
No, that wasn’t an NCAA Tournament season, but it was enough to keep the skeptics at bay.
And then everything went to heck. The Tigers have lost six of their last eight games. They gave up that unfathomable 28-2 run in a home loss to Temple. They blew a 17-point lead to lose at Connecticut. They lost to Cincinnati after falling behind by 24 points in the first half. They couldn’t execute well enough down the stretch to beat Houston at FedExForum and then had to rally from a halftime deficit to beat a putrid Tulane team.
Oh, and on top if it, former basketball beat writer Jason Smith reported that Dedric Lawson plans to leave after the season, and current football beat writer Tom Schad reported that Memphis basketball now brings in less revenue than Memphis football.
Which gets us to Saturday’s regularseason finale against SMU, a game that nobody expected Memphis to win. But to lose by 41? The worst loss for the program in 70 years? At least it wasn’t as bad as 1928, when Memphis lost to the Elks Club, 79-30.
But it was nearly that bad. I bet the Elks Club loss wasn’t on national TV. And what was the response of the man who is supposed to coach ‘em up?
“What are you supposed to do?” Smith told The Commercial Appeal’s Mark Giannotto. “Nothing was working. That’s what it was. What can you do?”
It was a dispiriting shrug of the shoulders from a guy who is supposed to make up for his recruiting and public relations weaknesses with unrelenting coaching competence.
So, naturally, over on Twitter, Tiger fans were already asking if it’s too early to fire Smith.
Answer: OF COURSE IT IS. Let’s not be delusional. Smith deserves the chance to bring in his recruits and build the program his way. Indeed, if the Tigers can win just one game in the conference tournament, they’ll have 20 on the season, which is about all anyone expected heading into the year.
But the historic nature of the SMU beatdown gives it an emotional impact beyond the win-loss column. So does the 2-6 record down the stretch. This is not the way to build momentum heading into next season. Nor is it the way to persuade the Lawsons to stick around.
So let’s hope for a a redemptive showing in the American Athletic Conference tournament. Let’s hope for a productive offseason after that. If Smith can bring back the Lawsons and add some impact recruits to the current class, there’s no reason Memphis can’t be in the NCAA Tournament as soon as next year.
In which case, Saturday’s loss to SMU will be forgotten. Or if not forgotten, dismissed as a low moment in what everyone expected would be a down year.
Nobody is saying the Tubby era is doomed to failure. Just that the honeymoon — such as it was — is over now.