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Frustrated college basketball coaches aren't holding back on publicly criticizing their teams
The frustration was obvious for Vic Schaefer after the No. 4 Texas women lost by double figures at No. 5 Vanderbilt.
“We've got no heart,” the Longhorns coach said in a blunt analysis.
He hasn't been alone, on the men's or women's side, when it comes to coaches angrily calling out their teams in the pressure-packed final month of the regular season.
The list has included No. 21 Tennessee's Kim Caldwell on the women's side and Colorado men's coach Tad Boyle. Then there was Kansas State's Jerome Tang, whose postgame comments after a lopsided loss at Cincinnati stood out in their intensity — and were ultimately cited by the school's athletic director when Tang was fired Sunday night.
It's a delicate dance for coaches, finding the balance between tough-love motivation and a softer-touch inspiration. Look no further than Schaefer, who went from letting his players have it after the loss to Vanderbilt to praising their response when they beat Tennessee three days later.
“I do think there's some motivating factors when you get in front of a microphone and talk about ... individual standards and program standards,” first-year Florida State men's coach Luke Loucks said this week. "But I also think it’s our responsibility as coaches to get the most out of our group. That's why we get paid a lot of money to do this.
"If it were easy to do, we wouldn’t get paid as much as we get paid. So we have to find ways to squeeze the orange, so to speak.”
Vocal criticisms
Indeed, it’s a long-running test for coaches in finding the right message to reach their players. Their team might need the firmer assessment that challenges pride and even embarrasses, then the next year's group might need a lighter touch.
That was true even before today’s transfer-portal era creating more yearly roster churn with fewer holdovers. But in any era, saying it publicly rather than in a team meeting or a closed-door practice magnifies the spotlight and potential blowback.
This month has offered plenty of examples:
—Caldwell after a 93-50 road loss to No. 3 South Carolina for the worst loss in program history on Feb. 8: “We just had a lot of quit in us tonight, and that's been something that's been consistent with our team. ... I have a team that will just quit on you.”
—Boyle after a 78-44 loss at No. 13 Texas Tech on Feb. 11: “I'm embarrassed by our performance. ... We deserve to be on a 6 a.m. flight out of Lubbock, commercial, Southwest — whatever airline you choose. We don't deserve a charter plane back to Boulder tonight.”
—Tang after a 91-62 home loss to Cincinnati on Feb. 11: “These dudes do not deserve to wear this uniform. There will be very few of them in it next year.”
—Schaefer after the 86-70 loss at Vanderbilt last Thursday: “I just thought they were tougher, they were more physical, more aggressive, we whined, we complained. We just have no heart. ... It’s probably the softest team I’ve had in years.”
Lasting messages
Some call-’em-out deliveries live on for years.
Notably, Pat Knight held nothing back in February 2012 after his Lamar men’s team lost at Stephen F. Austin, starting when he walked in and dismissed player Mike James from the news conference, saying: “You don’t have a clue what it takes to win.”
“We’ve got the worst group of seniors right now that I’ve ever been associated with. Their mentality’s awful, their attitude’s awful,” Knight said, even referencing off-court problems of “classroom, drugs, being late for stuff.”
Clemson men’s coach Brad Brownell understands the challenge of finding the right message amid rising frustration. Now in his 16th year, he’s the longest-tenured Atlantic Coast Conference coach after a multiyear sideline overhaul that includes retiring Hall of Fame titans such as Duke’s Mike Krzyzewski, North Carolina’s Roy Williams and Syracuse’s Jim Boeheim.
“I think every so often, it’s OK to talk about your guys in a way that, hey, you expect more out of them, we’ve got to do a little better,” Brownell said. “But at the same time, obviously, our jobs are trying to inspire our players. We’re trying to bring out the best in them.
“So there’s a fine line with all of it. Obviously when coaches are winning, hey man, it’s tough love and we enjoy all the banter. But when coaches are losing, everything they say is looked at much more critically. And so I do think as a coach, you better keep that in mind.”
Tang's firing
Tang's comments, in particular, stood out as a viral moment even before the firing days later.
The Wildcats followed the loss to Cincinnati by playing with no names on the backs of their jerseys in Saturday's loss at No. 2 Houston. Tang said he was pleased with the team's preparation after the loss to the Bearcats, and said he even had players Abdi Bashir Jr. and Nate Johnson take the lead on scouting work for the Cougars.
“I thought it was the right message,” Bashir said. “I don't think Coach Tang said anything wrong. I think that people forgot why we're here. I think we needed to be reminded of that, like we're here to play for K-State. I think they responded the right way. Nobody took no hard feelings toward it.”
A day later, Tang was out of a job, coming with the Wildcats (11-15) near the bottom of the Big 12 three years after Tang’s first team made the NCAA Elite Eight. Athletic director Gene Taylor said the school was firing Tang for cause — a designation that could reduce or eliminate Tang's buyout — while pointing to contract terms about conduct that “could potentially bring embarrassment."
Taylor later said Tang's comments about the players “really concerned me.”
“Basically his comments about the student-athletes and the negative reaction to those comments from a lot of sources, both nationally and locally, is where I thought we needed to make the decision,” Taylor said.
Positive responses
Both Caldwell and Schaefer saw some positive response to their tough assessments.
Caldwell's Lady Vols beat Missouri by 45 points four days after the South Carolina debacle. As for Schaefer, his Longhorns regrouped after the Vanderbilt loss to beat Tennessee 65-63. And the coach had gone from saying he would call AD Chris Del Conte to apologize for his players' performance to praising their response.
“This team has a ton of heart,” Schaefer said. “I want to make sure y'all know that, we just didn't play with any on Thursday, in my opinion.”
Schaefer, who turns 65 next month, said he was “too far down the road to change” his belief that he must teach accountability.
“When they leave me, they go out in the real world, they understand: 'Hey, you can't show up for work and give that effort at my job because I might get fired,'” he said. "I think my kids understand that.
“I hope they do. I hope they know how much I love them and I care about them. ... Sometimes you just have to have those real conversations.”
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AP freelancers Al Lesar in Tennessee and Jeremy Rakes in Texas contributed to this report.
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