Talk about your tough acts to follow.
Twenty-five wins, 15 victories in 16 Big Sky Conference games, a league tournament title captured on their home floor, and a second trip to the NCAA tournament in three years ? the Grizzlies have set the bar high.
?It?s exciting,? said seventh-year Montana men?s basketball coach Wayne Tinkle, whose Griz open the season on the road Friday night at Colorado State. ?You try to compare to last year, but last year was one of the more historic years in our school?s history.?
But the expectations are still high. The Griz were picked to win the expanded 11-team Big Sky by the league?s coaches and media. That wasn?t a surprise, considering the Griz return first team all-league picks Will Cherry and Kareem Jamar in the backcourt, along with forward Mathias Ward, who easily could have been selected to that team.
?Our core group should know and understand what it took to put that together from start to finish,? Tinkle said of the Grizzlies? 2011-12 campaign. ?We didn?t panic early when we had some tough losses, we didn?t get too excited over good wins; we just stayed the course. It was a deal that we went to work every day with the ultimate goal of peaking in March. We should be able to carry that forward.?
The Griz received a little bit of a wake-up call last week in their exhibition win over NAIA Lewis-Clark State, which pushed the Griz for most of the game before falling by 18 points.
?The negatives could be a sense of complacency,? Tinkle warned. ?Not only is it the staff?s job, but it?s the players? job to make sure that doesn?t happen, that we continue to bring our lunch pail and hard-hat every day to work, stay focused and stay in the moment.?
Don?t forget that as spectacular as last season ended up, there were struggles at the start, like a one-point home win over NAIA Great Falls and the debacle at Oregon State, where the Griz fell 71-46.
Times could be tough out of the gate this season as well. Cherry, named the league?s top defender and a mid-major All-American, is out with a broken foot until December. Junior college transfer Spencer Coleman, a 6-foot-6 forward who had 16 points and 12 rebounds in the Maroon-Silver scrimmage, will likely miss Friday?s opener at CSU with a sprained ankle.
That will put much of the offensive burden on Jamar and Ward, who combined for 46 points in the exhibition win. Jamar, a 6-5 junior who recorded a triple-double last season, averaged 13.6 points and Ward, a 6-7 senior, averaged 10.9 ppg on 54 percent shooting.
Cherry?s absence, in particular, might limit what the Griz are able to do defensively at the start of the season.
?Maybe we aren?t going to be able to get out and be as aggressive without Will,? Tinkle said of Cherry, already the school?s all-time leader in steals. ?We might have to be more traditional. We?ll have to be more patient on defense and make sure we?re dictating the shots our opponents get. It?s hard because we have some guys that are eager to go out there and pin their ears back. That?s been a little bit of a juggling act early, to see what we are capable of.
?We certainly want to compete and win as many games as we can without Will, but I don?t want to have a season without Will and then change everything and have a season with Will. We?re trying to find a blend of playing the way we want to be playing down the road.?
With both Cherry and Coleman sidelined last week for the game against L-C State, Tinkle started sophomores Keron DeShields and Jordan Gregory in the backcourt. Tinkle said both have taken turns with impressive practices this fall.
?The neat thing is we can play them together, so they can relieve some of the pressure from each other, and there?s always Kareem, who can do that as well,? Tinkle said of the point guard position. ?Jordan is a guy who almost seems more comfortable coming off screens and playing without the ball. Keron?s a guy who wants the ball in his hands, running the show. Versatility there is going to be a strength. Opponents aren?t going to be able to say ?OK, let?s pressure up on this guy.??
Manning the center position when the Griz play their ?tall? lineup will be Eric Hutchison, a 6-9 junior, and 7-foot freshman Andy Martin.
?That?s still a work in progress,? Tinkle said of his centers. ?Hutch looked good early on and we had a talk recently about him getting back to playing with a heightened level of intensity and energy. We?re going to really need Hutch to defend and rebound. What he gives us offensively will be off of offensive rebounds, dump-offs from good penetration, that sort of thing. If he can really buy into that, that?s going to really help.
?Andy, the kid has come so far in just a handful of months and he works really hard. We would have loved to have redshirted him, but I think by throwing him into the fire this year will pay dividends down the road.?
Getting early playing time for Gregory and DeShields, as well as sophomores Kevin Henderson and Mike Wesiner, and redshirt freshman Nick Emerson, could give the Griz a number of interchangeable parts later in the season.
?I don?t think ? knock on wood ? that we?re a team that opponents will be able to pressure in the full court because we have multiple ballhandlers out there,? Tinkle said. ?I think we?ll be a better shooting team from the perimeter; that?s tough to say because we were pretty good last year with Derek (Selvig), Kareem and Art (Steward). Art was a good 3-point shooter because he didn?t take too many; he took good shots, and that?s going to be a test early with this team.
?We have guys playing extended minutes for the first time so they?re going to have to go through some growing pains, hopefully sooner rather than later.?
Tinkle is counting on Coleman to be a force on the boards, an area of concern for the coach.
?Defensively, we?ve been suffering in the paint in our exhibition game and scrimmages,? Tinkle said. ?We have to protect the paint and make teams shoot contested jumpers. Then we have to rebound the ball and that?s a little bit of a concern.?
If everyone comes back and can stay healthy, this team could be every bit as dangerous as last year?s.
Cherry was fourth in the league in scoring last season at 15.8 ppg, seventh in assists and 10th in 3-pointers made per game.
?We feel really good about Will,? Tinkle said. ?The teams that have success in the Big Sky are usually the teams that have good guards. With a healthy Will and Kareem, they will be two of the more experienced guys in our conference. I know I?ll rest a little easier when we have everyone back.?
Ward is as dangerous a mid-range shooter as there is in the Big Sky.
?He?s a great shooter,? Tinkle said. ?He puts in the time. He?s really good out there. We hope he still has the balance of scoring inside because he?s so strong around the basket and can get to the free-throw line. Then he also needs to become a good rebounder from out there.?
Coleman will be needed to hit the boards.
?We feel like that could be a real strength of his, especially when he?s playing out on the perimeter at the three,? Tinkle said. ?He?s going to play inside some too when we go small, but I think that will be a real asset to the team. He?s kind of a finesse guy and we want him to become a little more of a power guy. He can get to the free-throw line by attacking and not shooting fade-aways. But he has such a smooth touch that he?ll definitely be one of our top four options offensively.?
The Griz were the hunters last season, picked second behind Weber State with future NBA lottery pick Damian Lillard. This season the Griz will be the hunted.
?It?s funny how that deal can play games with your head,? Tinkle said. ?Last year our guys had a little bit of a chip on their shoulders. They thought we were slighted, although how can you be slighted by being picked No. 2? ? This year the mindset is that everyone else is feeling like we did last year, so that should be our motivation.
?They had fun hosting that tournament and winning it here, so I know they?d like to try that again, but all the other schools are thinking the same thing. If our guys can stay in the moment and realize these are the steps that will give us that opportunity, then we have to make sure to take advantage.?
Twenty-five wins, 15 victories in 16 Big Sky Conference games, a league tournament title captured on their home floor, and a second trip to the NCAA tournament in three years ? the Grizzlies have set the bar high.
?It?s exciting,? said seventh-year Montana men?s basketball coach Wayne Tinkle, whose Griz open the season on the road Friday night at Colorado State. ?You try to compare to last year, but last year was one of the more historic years in our school?s history.?
But the expectations are still high. The Griz were picked to win the expanded 11-team Big Sky by the league?s coaches and media. That wasn?t a surprise, considering the Griz return first team all-league picks Will Cherry and Kareem Jamar in the backcourt, along with forward Mathias Ward, who easily could have been selected to that team.
?Our core group should know and understand what it took to put that together from start to finish,? Tinkle said of the Grizzlies? 2011-12 campaign. ?We didn?t panic early when we had some tough losses, we didn?t get too excited over good wins; we just stayed the course. It was a deal that we went to work every day with the ultimate goal of peaking in March. We should be able to carry that forward.?
The Griz received a little bit of a wake-up call last week in their exhibition win over NAIA Lewis-Clark State, which pushed the Griz for most of the game before falling by 18 points.
?The negatives could be a sense of complacency,? Tinkle warned. ?Not only is it the staff?s job, but it?s the players? job to make sure that doesn?t happen, that we continue to bring our lunch pail and hard-hat every day to work, stay focused and stay in the moment.?
Don?t forget that as spectacular as last season ended up, there were struggles at the start, like a one-point home win over NAIA Great Falls and the debacle at Oregon State, where the Griz fell 71-46.
Times could be tough out of the gate this season as well. Cherry, named the league?s top defender and a mid-major All-American, is out with a broken foot until December. Junior college transfer Spencer Coleman, a 6-foot-6 forward who had 16 points and 12 rebounds in the Maroon-Silver scrimmage, will likely miss Friday?s opener at CSU with a sprained ankle.
That will put much of the offensive burden on Jamar and Ward, who combined for 46 points in the exhibition win. Jamar, a 6-5 junior who recorded a triple-double last season, averaged 13.6 points and Ward, a 6-7 senior, averaged 10.9 ppg on 54 percent shooting.
Cherry?s absence, in particular, might limit what the Griz are able to do defensively at the start of the season.
?Maybe we aren?t going to be able to get out and be as aggressive without Will,? Tinkle said of Cherry, already the school?s all-time leader in steals. ?We might have to be more traditional. We?ll have to be more patient on defense and make sure we?re dictating the shots our opponents get. It?s hard because we have some guys that are eager to go out there and pin their ears back. That?s been a little bit of a juggling act early, to see what we are capable of.
?We certainly want to compete and win as many games as we can without Will, but I don?t want to have a season without Will and then change everything and have a season with Will. We?re trying to find a blend of playing the way we want to be playing down the road.?
With both Cherry and Coleman sidelined last week for the game against L-C State, Tinkle started sophomores Keron DeShields and Jordan Gregory in the backcourt. Tinkle said both have taken turns with impressive practices this fall.
?The neat thing is we can play them together, so they can relieve some of the pressure from each other, and there?s always Kareem, who can do that as well,? Tinkle said of the point guard position. ?Jordan is a guy who almost seems more comfortable coming off screens and playing without the ball. Keron?s a guy who wants the ball in his hands, running the show. Versatility there is going to be a strength. Opponents aren?t going to be able to say ?OK, let?s pressure up on this guy.??
Manning the center position when the Griz play their ?tall? lineup will be Eric Hutchison, a 6-9 junior, and 7-foot freshman Andy Martin.
?That?s still a work in progress,? Tinkle said of his centers. ?Hutch looked good early on and we had a talk recently about him getting back to playing with a heightened level of intensity and energy. We?re going to really need Hutch to defend and rebound. What he gives us offensively will be off of offensive rebounds, dump-offs from good penetration, that sort of thing. If he can really buy into that, that?s going to really help.
?Andy, the kid has come so far in just a handful of months and he works really hard. We would have loved to have redshirted him, but I think by throwing him into the fire this year will pay dividends down the road.?
Getting early playing time for Gregory and DeShields, as well as sophomores Kevin Henderson and Mike Wesiner, and redshirt freshman Nick Emerson, could give the Griz a number of interchangeable parts later in the season.
?I don?t think ? knock on wood ? that we?re a team that opponents will be able to pressure in the full court because we have multiple ballhandlers out there,? Tinkle said. ?I think we?ll be a better shooting team from the perimeter; that?s tough to say because we were pretty good last year with Derek (Selvig), Kareem and Art (Steward). Art was a good 3-point shooter because he didn?t take too many; he took good shots, and that?s going to be a test early with this team.
?We have guys playing extended minutes for the first time so they?re going to have to go through some growing pains, hopefully sooner rather than later.?
Tinkle is counting on Coleman to be a force on the boards, an area of concern for the coach.
?Defensively, we?ve been suffering in the paint in our exhibition game and scrimmages,? Tinkle said. ?We have to protect the paint and make teams shoot contested jumpers. Then we have to rebound the ball and that?s a little bit of a concern.?
If everyone comes back and can stay healthy, this team could be every bit as dangerous as last year?s.
Cherry was fourth in the league in scoring last season at 15.8 ppg, seventh in assists and 10th in 3-pointers made per game.
?We feel really good about Will,? Tinkle said. ?The teams that have success in the Big Sky are usually the teams that have good guards. With a healthy Will and Kareem, they will be two of the more experienced guys in our conference. I know I?ll rest a little easier when we have everyone back.?
Ward is as dangerous a mid-range shooter as there is in the Big Sky.
?He?s a great shooter,? Tinkle said. ?He puts in the time. He?s really good out there. We hope he still has the balance of scoring inside because he?s so strong around the basket and can get to the free-throw line. Then he also needs to become a good rebounder from out there.?
Coleman will be needed to hit the boards.
?We feel like that could be a real strength of his, especially when he?s playing out on the perimeter at the three,? Tinkle said. ?He?s going to play inside some too when we go small, but I think that will be a real asset to the team. He?s kind of a finesse guy and we want him to become a little more of a power guy. He can get to the free-throw line by attacking and not shooting fade-aways. But he has such a smooth touch that he?ll definitely be one of our top four options offensively.?
The Griz were the hunters last season, picked second behind Weber State with future NBA lottery pick Damian Lillard. This season the Griz will be the hunted.
?It?s funny how that deal can play games with your head,? Tinkle said. ?Last year our guys had a little bit of a chip on their shoulders. They thought we were slighted, although how can you be slighted by being picked No. 2? ? This year the mindset is that everyone else is feeling like we did last year, so that should be our motivation.
?They had fun hosting that tournament and winning it here, so I know they?d like to try that again, but all the other schools are thinking the same thing. If our guys can stay in the moment and realize these are the steps that will give us that opportunity, then we have to make sure to take advantage.?
