Wagner on cusp of Dance return
Once the injuries started, they became an avalanche, one after another until Wagner, by the end of December, had lost six players and four projected starters for the remainder of the season.
“I have never seen anything like it,” coach Donald Copeland said in a phone interview. “If you ever got in a situation like this in the pros, you can just sign more players. In college, you’re locked into 13 scholarships.”
At that point, it was about survival. The Seahawks had just seven healthy players. Nobody could’ve expected the team to still be playing at this point, 40 minutes from the NCAA Tournament after pulling off back-to-back upsets in the NEC Tournament. With a third, at No. 2 Merrimack on Tuesday night, they would reach the dance for the first time since 2003.
Wagner (15-15) finished in sixth in the NEC at 7-9, but it easily could’ve done better than that. The Staten Island school had a pair of one-point losses to regular-season champion Central Connecticut and two other setbacks by a single possession. Not bad for a team that hasn’t been able to practice with contact since Dec. 27 and has had to rely on assistant coaches to get in full workouts.
Star guard Melvin Council Jr. rarely comes out, averaging 35.3 minutes, and is the team leader in scoring (14.7), rebounds (5.8) and steals (1.4), and fellow guard Javier Ezquerra is on the floor for 34.1 minutes a night. It even brought on a football player, quarterback Damien Mazil, for a few weeks as an extra body.
“If I told you I knew what I was doing, I would be lying to you,” Copeland, in his second season as a head coach, said. “You kind of make it up on the fly. There’s no one who can guide you through something like this. I never treated them like we only had seven players. I treated them as if we had a full team.
“The expectation every day remained the same. They needed to practice well, whatever we were doing. They needed to be sharp in film. We need to be good culturally, the gym needed to sound a certain way. I held them accountable, like nothing else was going on. That was the best way to kind of normalize the situation.”
The losses were significant. It included the team’s best all-around player, senior guard Rahmir Moore (fractured wrist); experienced junior wing Zaire Williams (torn meniscus); junior forward Rob Taylor II (torn labrum); and transfers Churchill Bounds (Central Arkansas) and Zae Blake (Green Bay), both of whom dealt with knee injuries that never improved. The toughest blow came shortly after Christmas, when sophomore Diandre Howell-South tore his ACL in practice — the last practice of the season without contact. That injury hit Council the hardest. Howell-South was the linchpin to the defense.
“When he got hurt, I was shocked,” Council said. “He was the piece on defense. He brought up our energy.”
Through it all, the 40-year-old Copeland — the former Seton Hall star and assistant coach from Jersey City — wouldn’t let his players feel sorry for themselves. The injuries didn’t change expectations for him. While Wagner had to adjust the way it practiced, he wouldn’t let the healthy players take it easy. The Seahawks were going to play the same way: Physical, tough and aggressive. It showed in them finishing first in the NEC in points allowed per game (62.6) and 3-point percentage defense (29.7) and second in rebounding margin (plus 1.1).
“Coach is like the Coach Carter movie. That’s how he is every day,” Council said. “He doesn’t care about wins, he doesn’t care about losses. He just wants us to maintain as dogs and have heart and be tough all the time. Be the same person every day.”