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On the Prowl: Moving On and Wishing Luck
The outcome of the game was in doubt almost the entire time, but for some reason I couldn't help but think that fate was on the Cats' side. Call it intutition. Call it my supersitition (I have noticed that in his four years, UNI hasn't lost a game where Brooks McKowen has made a shot from the floor in two years), but I knew that UNI would walk away the winner.
As the clock ticked away, the result became concrete: a 70-57 win over Iowa State by Northern Iowa. A small throng of over-excited students charged the court. For one young lad in the Pep Band taking off his sousaphone after a long and exhausting basketball game, it was about forgiveness.
Greg McDermott has become a past chapter in a book prepetually being written. The name of the book could be Northern Iowa's Rise to Greatness, Making A Name, or simply We're A Lot Better Than We Used to Be. Either way, the man deserves an acknoweldgement at the beginning of the book, I know now more than ever why that is true.
Take your pick... NCAA tournaments? Excellent recruits? Expiditing the whole McLeod Center process? I choose to use his actions post-departure: telling the recruits to honor their commitment to UNI. Yelling at an Iowa State player Wednesday for a harder-than-necessary foul. Letting the clock run down at the end of the as opposed to prolonging it with fouls (has anyone ever seen this desperate strategy WORK at the college level? Anyone?). When it comes down to it, Greg McDermott is still a classy guy.
As he came out right before the game I yelled, "There goes Greg McDermott! The best coach money can buy!" and other things that were not obscene, but definitely an accusation of character. As soon as the tip-off was underway, it became all about basketball. Gone were the snide remarks about McDermott's departure, it was simply about whether the Cats could get a win.
UNI won in a rare scenario: being projected the favorite against the Big Two. As Mac came off the court after the game, the student section's reaction had changed: now comments like "Good game, Mac" and "Good luck the rest of the year" were being heard. Again, it was all about basketball.
I walked away from the UNI-Dome that night ecstatic for two major reasons: one, we beat Iowa State. No one wins except us in our house. Two: whatever happens, things will go on the way they were intended. Ben Jacobson will continue this program on the path set back in the days of Eldon Miller, Norm Stewart, even L.L. Mendenhall.
And perhaps the most important lesson of all was learned: I can say with certainty that if I ever got the head coaching job at UNI in anything it would take wild horses to drag me away. But Greg McDermott and I don't see eye-to-eye on that. It doesn't make him a bad guy. In the end, I remembered one thing after Wednesday:
It's all about basketball.
The outcome of the game was in doubt almost the entire time, but for some reason I couldn't help but think that fate was on the Cats' side. Call it intutition. Call it my supersitition (I have noticed that in his four years, UNI hasn't lost a game where Brooks McKowen has made a shot from the floor in two years), but I knew that UNI would walk away the winner.
As the clock ticked away, the result became concrete: a 70-57 win over Iowa State by Northern Iowa. A small throng of over-excited students charged the court. For one young lad in the Pep Band taking off his sousaphone after a long and exhausting basketball game, it was about forgiveness.
Greg McDermott has become a past chapter in a book prepetually being written. The name of the book could be Northern Iowa's Rise to Greatness, Making A Name, or simply We're A Lot Better Than We Used to Be. Either way, the man deserves an acknoweldgement at the beginning of the book, I know now more than ever why that is true.
Take your pick... NCAA tournaments? Excellent recruits? Expiditing the whole McLeod Center process? I choose to use his actions post-departure: telling the recruits to honor their commitment to UNI. Yelling at an Iowa State player Wednesday for a harder-than-necessary foul. Letting the clock run down at the end of the as opposed to prolonging it with fouls (has anyone ever seen this desperate strategy WORK at the college level? Anyone?). When it comes down to it, Greg McDermott is still a classy guy.
As he came out right before the game I yelled, "There goes Greg McDermott! The best coach money can buy!" and other things that were not obscene, but definitely an accusation of character. As soon as the tip-off was underway, it became all about basketball. Gone were the snide remarks about McDermott's departure, it was simply about whether the Cats could get a win.
UNI won in a rare scenario: being projected the favorite against the Big Two. As Mac came off the court after the game, the student section's reaction had changed: now comments like "Good game, Mac" and "Good luck the rest of the year" were being heard. Again, it was all about basketball.
I walked away from the UNI-Dome that night ecstatic for two major reasons: one, we beat Iowa State. No one wins except us in our house. Two: whatever happens, things will go on the way they were intended. Ben Jacobson will continue this program on the path set back in the days of Eldon Miller, Norm Stewart, even L.L. Mendenhall.
And perhaps the most important lesson of all was learned: I can say with certainty that if I ever got the head coaching job at UNI in anything it would take wild horses to drag me away. But Greg McDermott and I don't see eye-to-eye on that. It doesn't make him a bad guy. In the end, I remembered one thing after Wednesday:
It's all about basketball.
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