by CoachAndy » Sun Feb 14, 2016 10:00 pm
Wednesday, November 16, 2015 Northridge, California
Opening day had me nervous. Our guys had looked good in preseason but I knew that could be deceiving. "Alright guys, it's the start of a new season. Let's go get this W." Des stood up with his scouting report. "These guys will be good. It's always tough to play on the road so we gotta be prepared. They play all man, never press. On offense they run a lot of 5 out stuff. Our success starts with stopping their guards, Blake Williams and Karim Cook. They both averaged double figures last year. Offensively, we have a good advantage down low. Work to get it inside and get high percentage looks." We started 3 returning starters, our backcourt duo of Ali Kirklin and Peter Polite as well as SF Derricus Davis. Our frontcourt was Mark Doctor and Marvin Joseph, a pair of big bodies who could really control the glass. The game started ugly, they scored the first 5 points but we turned it on, scoring 12 straight to pull ahead. I was surprised at the offensive ability of my guys when I let them make their own plays. We shot 54% from the floor and 4-6 from deep and led 34-28 at the half. Peter had 8 and we had 11 bench points. It was a great start. Unfortunately, it didn't last. They drilled 8 second half threes and cleaned up the glass finishing +10 with 12 offensive boards as they outscored us 41-25 in the second half to win 65-53. I was frustrated but happy. We could score the ball. Peter had 13, Marvin Joseph had 14 and freshman Bart Odle had 7 in limited minutes.
Saturday, November 19, 2015 Stockton, California
Utah Valley came to town for our home opener with a 1-1 record. They were a decent team, winners of 14 games the year before. We rolled offensively but unfortunately, so did they. We had 4 players in double figures, led by Peter with 16. We came back to win on a last second bucket by Felipe Marshall, 77-76 and I thought we'd really turned a corner offensively. After the game I spoke to my staff "Guys, I think we've figured it out. I know it's early but Peter is hitting big shots and our bigs are really spreading the scoring load. Ali had 5 assists for the second straight game, that's big." Brad: "It is early but we're actually seeing signs of life. Peter already looks like a first team all conference caliber player." Desmon: "We got bigger tests but still, we're looking good and it's early. I like where we're at."
Wednesday, November 23, 2015 Los Angeles, California
This was my first ever trip to the historic Pauley Pavilion and we were expected to get wiped up. UCLA paid us $100,000 to play them and we knew what was expected. Derricus had tweaked his knee and wouldn't be able to play. Felipe Marshall, a senior and key reserve got the nod instead. In the locker room before the game I told the guys to execute and have fun. I have to give the guys credit, they really dug in on defense. UCLA had scored 88 points in a 92-88 loss to Duke, their only other game this season. We held them to 54 and only lost by 6. Felipe played all 40 minutes, scoring 20 points and snagging 8 rebounds in an impressive outing. Peter contributed 15 points and 5 rebounds in what was, for all intents and purposes, a win for us.
Despite our performance against UCLA, we started to skid. We lost at home to Sacramento State by 9 then got routed in all three games on our road trip, culminating in a 69-45 loss at TCU. What had started as a promising season was quickly going down the drain and we were sitting at 1-6. I called my guys in for a meeting "Guys, I know it's been tough but we're right there. We just have to lock up our defense, we gave up 77, 76 and 69 in those 3 games. That's not us, we gotta fix that." One of my captains, 6'3" senior Peter Polite stood up. "Hey guys, this losing thing sucks. We all hate it, you, me, coach. But it's not gonna change if we sit around. I don't know about you guys but I want to win some games." The guys responded well to that and the energy in the next few practices was impressive.
December 14, 2015 Stockton, California
The first thing I noticed when I walked onto the court at the Spanos Center was the crowd. We were 1-6 and struggling but the place was packed. Easily 5,000 people for our game with Southern Utah. The only other time we drew those crowds were when BYU and Gonzaga stomped us on national TV. We decided to go with a little bit bigger of a lineup, they were a small team that liked to shoot and we knew we'd have to bother them with length. Our starting lineup featured 2 juniors and 3 seniors. Our front 3 were all 6'9 and dwarfed their big guys. We did a great job all night of disrupting their shooters and used an explosive second half to pull away. We held them to 10/31 shooting from deep and murdered them on the glass, 34-14. Their 3 post players combined for just 7 points. Marvin Joseph was outstanding, giving us 11 points and 7 boards while Peter matched him with 11 and added 5 rebounds and 3 assists. We could have played better offensively but I couldn't complain about a win.
December 21, 2015 Bakersfield, California
Man, this court is ugly. The electric blue court was hurting my eyes as the guys warmed up for a big matchup with a 6-1 Cal State Bakersfield squad. Bakersfield was deep and they liked to try and exhaust teams by working long possessions and going 10-12 deep to stay fresh. Fortunately, our guys were trained in the grind it out style. We got the game going with back-to-back threes by Peter and Derricus and they called time. The rest of the first half was a battle and they eventually pulled away to lead 24-20 at the break. "Ok guys this is good. Our defense is working, our focus is there. Keep this up and we can get a huge road win." We had shot poorly in the first half, hitting just 3 of 15 from deep. I told the guys to pound it inside more. "Attack off the dribble. Work to get better shots and we'll be able to put some points up." The guys executed perfectly in the second half, Derricus scored 8 of his game high 12 and we did much better from behind the arc, drilling 3-6. We won the rebound battle again, led by Peter with 7 big boards and came out on top, 48-46. It wasn't pretty but it was a road win against a team that would end up top 150 in the RPI.
I met with Wes between non-conference and conference play to discuss our season. "I think it's going good. We won a pair of big games and we've got some momentum going into conference play." Wes agreed. "I knew you could do it, hopefully you guys can keep this up. I'd love to see us qualify for some level of postseason play. As long as you get out of the basement and win 10+ this season will be a tremendous success." We met with a few local boosters later in the day and they also offered their support. I finally felt in control of my program.
December 28, 2015 San Diego, California
I had really enjoyed my week off. Amanda and I had spent Christmas Eve with her family in Stockton before driving up to San Francisco on Christmas day to visit my family. My sister Kelly had flown in from Chicago where she taught in the med school at UIC and it was nice to see her. But now it was back to business. San Diego was 3-6 like us but were a traditional conference power and I knew we had our work cut out for us. Jerry Benton, their sophomore SF, was averaging close to 18 a game, second in the conference. Beyond him they lacked star power, they had guys who could score but not in bunches. We needed to make those guys beat us. We roared out to a 42-33 halftime lead and never looked back, winning 71-64. We did what we could against Benton but he still had his way, scoring 21 points on 7-14 shooting from deep. It was impressive to watch. Peter and Derricus each had 14 for us but more impressive was Bart Odle who had 11 and 8 boards in just 13 minutes off the bench. This kid was gonna be good.
We slugged out an ugly home win against 2-8 Loyola, 54-53. We made a massive comeback after being down 7 at halftime and 11 early in the second half. Once again, Derricus led the way with 15 and Peter, despite a poor shooting night that held him to 3 points, grabbed 7 boards. All of a sudden, we were 2-0 in conference play. We lost on the road against a very good Portland team who scored 32 points in the paint against us. Their two bigs combined for 24 points and 10 rebounds and we lost 62-47.
January 7, 2016 Stockton, California
Santa Clara was in town, one of the top teams in the conference with a record of 8-4. The Spanos Center was sold out and the crowd was as rowdy as I'd ever seen. I was excited for a good game and my guys were too. We came out throwing bricks but so did they. It was 26-18 at halftime and Brad spent several minutes firing them up in the locker room. That was one thing I liked about him, he could really amp the guys up. The second half was the opposite of the first, we scored 45 points and rolled over them. Bart had 10 off the bench, Mark Doctor had 14 and 5 boards. Peter had 10 and 4 and Derricus snagged 9 boards despite being held to 4 points, all at the foul line.
We won at Pepperdine, holding them to 36 points in a fairly dominant win. Peter got back on track offensively, scoring 11 and grabbing 4 boards. Then we hosted and beat St. Mary's. Peter had 17 and Mark had 10 in the huge win that saw us improve to 8-7 and 5-1 in conference play. We were into the top 75 of the RPI and above .500 for the first time. I loved it, the boosters loved it and, the sellout crowd loved it.
January 18, 2016 Spokane, Washington
Gonzaga was good. Really, really good. They had just 1 loss and were #2 in the country. Their band box of a gym was always hard to play at and I knew we could be in for a long night. I didn't expect what came next, their star guard Aaron White drilled 12 threes. 12. He had 38 points and their bench added 21. They shot 20-34 (59%) from deep and crushed us, 83-40. I didn't even have anything to say after that game.
We beat San Francisco then lost at #22 BYU to end the first half of conference play at 6-3. I was pleased with our results and hoped we could get to 10 conference wins. We rattled off 3 straight including a massive 57-47 home win over Portland before the losses hit. The road loss to Santa Clara was tough but they were good. We got murdered by Pepperdine and I was pissed. They shot 50% and we committed 22 turnovers. It was ugly and we went on to lose 3 more in a row, including a bracket breaker at #12 Valparaiso. Fortunately, we rebounded to win at San Francisco before taking BYU down to the wire in a heartbreaking 59-58 loss. We finished the season 13-15 and 10-8 in conference play. We were in a three way tie for third with Portland and St Mary's, both of whom we had split with. The tiebreaker was overall record and we ended up 4th and would play St. Mary's in the first round of the conference tournament.
March 7, 2016 Las Vegas, Nevada
I was oddly pumped for the game with St. Mary's. We had won the opener by 5 at home and lost by 11 at their place. Normally I didn't pay attention to lineups and pregame announcements but today it stuck with me. "Ladies and gentlemen, welcome to the Orleans Arena for tonight's West Coast Conference quarterfinal matchup between the home team and number 4 seed Pacific Tigers and the visiting team and number 5 seed St. Mary's Gaels. Here are tonight's starting lineups. For Pacific: At guard, a 6'1" junior from Los Angeles, California, number 24, Rod Gandy! At forward, a 6'7" junior captain from San Jose, California, number 23, Derricus Davis! At forward, a 6'9" junior from Piedmont, California, number 35 Mark Doctor! At center, a 6'9" senior captain, from Lake Isabella, California, number 42, Marvin Joseph. And, at guard, a 6'3" senior captain from Clovis, California, number 22, Peter Polite! Pacific is coached by Mike Hughes. Associate Head Coach is Brad Woodard and assistant coaches are Jimmy Marshall and Desmon Buchanan." Peter was leading us in scoring at 10.8 a game and assists at 1.8 Marvin led us on the boards with 4.6. Balance was key, we had 7 players averaging 5+ points a game and 5 averaging 3+ rebounds a game. They came out on fire and we couldn't buy a bucket. Kenny Collins caught fire from deep and finished with 24 as they routed us 70-48. I was frustrated but I thought that we might be able to sneak into the CBI. I told our guys to keep their heads up and that we might not be done yet.
We didn't end up getting a postseason bid and I felt bad for my guys as much as anything. They had worked hard and the progress was incredible. Maybe this year we'll win some awards I thought with a laugh.
Tuesday, April 4, 2016 Las Vegas, Nevada
I had never been this nervous in my life. I was going to propose to Amanda that night after the banquet. I only thought it would be right to do it in Vegas, where we had gone on our first adventure together. Vegas was one of her favorite cities and I wanted to make it a special night. But first we had to get through the banquet. We sat with Ken Bell and his wife again, he was probably my closest friend among the conference coaches, we had actually talked frequently throughout the season. "Mike I just wanted to let you know that I voted for you for coach of the year. I'm sure Lionel will win it but I think you had a hell of a season." "Thanks Ken, that really means a lot to me." The ceremony began with Gonzaga's All-American and National Player of the Year Aaron White sweeping the Player, Freshman and Defensive Player of the Year awards, Lionel Williams was named coach of the year for leading the Zags to a 37-2 record and the Final Four. Gonzaga had 3 first team all conference players, Portland and San Diego had one each. Portland, St. Mary's, BYU, San Francisco and Gonzaga all had second team players and I was a little disappointed. I really thought Peter was second team material and leaving with no program accolades hurt. That night we went out to dinner with Ken and his wife and I pulled Ken aside. "Look, I wanted to propose to Amanda in Vegas and this is our last night here. Is that ok with you? I don't want to make this awkward for you and Jen." He grinned "I could tell something was up. You go for it buddy." I'm a terrible romantic so I decided to plant the ring box under the table. Just as we were finishing our meals I dropped my fork and went to pick it up. Instead I came up with the ring and she burst into tears. The restaurant applauded me and the manager gave us free dessert. It was a great night and I couldn't wait for the rest of my life with her.
When I got back to Stockton I had a few busy days. Ken rather sheepishly offered me the associate head coach job at BYU, trying his best not to sound like he was insulting me. I really appreciated the offer but I had to turn it down. Then all hell broke loose. Wes was fired, axed rather suddenly due to the "overall poor performance of Pacific Athletics." I was mad, I tried not to but I ended up in a heated argument with several key university figures. I won't say they fired me but after that meeting I wanted out. Wes headed to the WCC offices in Vegas to serve as assistant director of the conference. I began job hunting and ultimately took the top assistant position at San Francisco. It wasn't ideal but it was the closest job to home. I didn't want to be at Pacific if they were going to treat people like that. USF coach Cory Jones was only 3 years older than me and we were on decent terms. He made me the highest paid assistant outside of Gonzaga and BYU at 85,000 and I was essentially a co coach with him. I appreciated his respect for me and he appreciated my respect for him. I made one phone call back to Pacific after leaving. "Hey Brian this is Mike Hughes, I just wanted to discuss the opening for a head coach at Pacific." Long pause "What about it Mike?" Brian Greene was the new AD, he had been associate AD under Wes and we never really saw eye to eye. "Brad Woodard is a tremendous coach. He was integral in helping me establish what I had going there. Offer him the job. He'll do it and do it well." "I'll think about it, thanks. Anything else?"
Brad ended up getting the Pacific job and retained Jimmy and Desmon while adding an old friend, to the staff. Amanda and I rented out our house in Stockton and moved to San Francisco. She took a job with USF in compliance and we rented a modest 2 bedroom apartment.
(So I accidentally hit apply for job thinking it was the "advance" button and took the USF job. Rather than go back to my mid season save, I've decided to roll with it)