By George, the athletic director never loses faith in Coach Boyle
B OULD E R » Rick George bolted from his arena seat in Los Angeles last week when the final buzzer rang. He called what happened next purely “spontaneous.” It was a moment caught on the television broadcast and replayed online by thousands.
The Colorado men’s basketball team completed a West Coast sweep — 84-73 at UCLA and 6965 at USC — when George could no longer contain his excitement. CU coach Tad Boyle returned to his bench from the Galen Center handshake line to discover a hard-charging George on the hardwood. Then came a bearhug of epic proportions. George, 58, lifted Boyle, 56, into the air, turned him to the left and dropped him back to the court.
“That dude is strong,” Boyle said.
“It was great to be able to celebrate that moment,” George said.
“Rick knew how important that game was for our team,” Boyle continued. “He showed it.”
There is plenty to appreciate about CU hoops as the Buffs welcome Arizona to Boulder on Sunday night. CU swept a Pac-12 road series for the first time since 2013 and completed its only four-game regular-season conference win streak since joining the league, and it marked the first time in program history the Buffs reached the .500 mark in conference play after previously being four games down. Optimism reigns supreme.
“I’ve got faith and confidence in where we’re going,” George told The Denver Post, “and Tad is going to be coaching here for a long time.”
Now, hold up. Sorry to interrupt the Tad-rick love fest. But an analysis of CU’S recent surge also requires a wide-lens perspective of Boyle’s nine seasons in Boulder. Here are some facts that won’t illicit many impromptu bro hugs: CU has reached one NCAA Tournament over the last four seasons, has advanced past the first round just once during his tenure, and will need an underdog run through the Pac-12 Tournament to secure a 2019 berth.
In November, George fired CU football coach Mike Macintyre and told reporters at a news conference: “I want to win Pac-12 championships. I want to win national championships. I’m committed to that.”
But does the same standard exist for men’s basketball?
“My expectations for the hoops program are no different,” George said. “I think we ought to be able to win championships. Certainly, we have challenges in everything that we do, but I think there’s an opportunity for us to do that.”
“Gym was empty”
Long before Josh Scott cemented his legacy as a Buffs basketball legend (1,709 points, 974 rebounds and 162 blocked shots), he was growing up in Colorado Springs during a mostly forgettable era of CU hoops. Coach Ricardo Patton reached NCAA Tournaments in 1997 and 2003 — previously, the school’s only bids since 1970. Then coach Jeff Bzdelik left Boulder after three consecutive losing seasons.
“I remember when I was a kid and CU teams were getting blown out by 20 every night in the Big 12,” Scott said. “The gym was empty.”
Boyle provided the Buffs instant life, winning 20-plus games in five of his first six seasons at the helm while reaching the Big Dance in 2012, 2013, 2014 and 2016. Former CU guard George King, selected No. 59 overall by Phoenix in the 2018 NBA draft, played on a pair of those tourney teams.
“We had vet players who made mature decisions on the court,” King said. “You didn’t necessarily see a lot of wild plays, which didn’t make a lot of room for young guys like myself who were still trying to find their way and playing time. There were guys in front of me who had done it before at a high level. That definitely helped. We were talented.”
Scott, who reached three NCAA Tournaments and now plays professionally in Japan, added: “All those teams had talented individuals, but to me it’s about being mentally strong enough to look at the goal and putting individual aspects of what different players want aside in terms of trying to get to the NCAA Tournament.”
“A little disappointing”
Erick Bulow, 19, and Mason Leonard, 20, are CU sophomores who sprinted down the north bleachers inside the events center last month roughly an hour before tip to secure a front-row seat in the student section against Oregon State. Call them hardcore outliers. Only about 100 students joined them when the midweek night game started — even with the lure of a free sandwich with student ID.
CU lost 76-74, with overall attendance listed at 6,839.
“It’s a little disappointing,” Bulow said. “The only game it was really packed was CSU.”
The Buffs aren’t alone in their struggle to attract fans. Even blueblood Kentucky, winner of eight national championships, is reducing 3,000 seats from Rupp Arena amid dropping attendance. But the roar inside CU’S building wasn’t always subdued. The Buffs set a program record for average attendance (10,392) during the 2012-13 campaign. Last season, it dipped to 7,449.
“My job is to put a team on the floor that is worthy of support,” Boyle said. “And if we’re not worthy of support, I don’t blame our fans for not coming.”
Frank Dubofsky, 76, is a longtime Boulder resident and men’s basketball season-ticket holder of 15 years. His view midway up the east stands hasn’t changed much. He figures the formula for bringing back the noise is related directly to victories. CU fell shy of 20 wins in each of the past two seasons.
“(Boyle) is the kind of person you’d want your kid to play for, but that’s not all there is in this business,” Dubofsky said. “You’ve got to win. And how much you’ve got to win? I guess that’s up to the athletic director to decide.”
Added Leonard: “It’s not like we have the same historic success, so I don’t think people really appreciate what Tad did. I know I’d be sad to see Tad leave.”
“Started with Coach Boyle”
This year’s Buffs could easily have thrown in the towel had they succumbed to circumstance. CU lost two starters indefinitely to injury in center Dallas Walton (knee) and guard Namon Wright (foot), and there was an academic suspension for guard Deleon Brown. Then starting forward Evan Battey left in the first half Wednesday night against Arizona State with back spasms and did not return.
CU’S remaining seven scholarship players didn’t panic, and when star sophomore point guard Mckinley Wright drained a dagger 3-pointer with the shot clock expiring to seal the game late, the events center’s roar returned momentarily. Wright said: “I don’t know how to describe it. When I hit that shot and saw Buff nation go crazy, it was exciting.”
The inspiration for CU’S impressive four-game roll?
“It started with Coach Boyle,” Mckinley Wright said. “He told us that he will never give up on us and that he loves us. When you hear that from your head coach, it gives us the confidence to go out and do our thing. We’ve just been trying to win ever since (the Oregon State loss), and that’s what we’ve been doing.”
The university’s commitment to Boyle also hasn’t wavered. The CU Board of Regents approved his automatic one-year extension rollover this week, which included a total pay bump of more than $380,000, increasing his annual pay to just north of $1.8 million.
“It gives me a lot of confidence as the coach here that I don’t have to worry about the future,” Boyle said. “I said when I got hired here, ‘This is a destination job, this is where I want to be and this is where I want to finish my career.’ We’ve got a lot of unfinished business.”
George empathized with fans frustrated over Boyle’s recent lack of NCAA Tournament appearances — “I think we’d both like to be in a better position than we are today,” he said — but added that’s no reason to hit the reset button. George foresees several more bearhugs in Boyle’s future.
“I have incredible confidence in what Tad brings to this,” George said. “I look at everything in that program, and I think we’ve got really good talented young men. But they’re young. Now we’ve got an opportunity to make a real run.
“The last four wins were great, but we’ve got a lot left to do this season.”