I made my first road trip with the Demon basketball team in a month Friday, riding the bus with the boys to Conway, Ark., for Saturday's game at Central Arkansas.
There was an obvious upswing in the vibe around the team all day long, despite their on-court struggles. The players now seem closer and clearly are having fun while they work toward improving their performance in uniforms.
There was frequent laughter during the evening shootaround at the Ferris Center, capped by the entire squad mimicing injured freshman James Hulbin, who has torn ligaments in his right elbow he sustained in a practice fall at the outset of the SLC season in early January. Now that's not funny, but by now, watching the right-hander work left-handed has become commonplace and quite amusing to his teammates.
The frivolity included head coach Mike McConathy, who led the team on the court with a stumbling, exaggerated imitation of the on-the-move 3-pointer that his son, Michael, hit to end the first half of last year's dramatic win at UCA. Clumsy would be a kind description of Coach Dad's version of Michael's awkward but on-target buzzer beater last season.
Michael later tried to replicate Colby Bargeman's game-winning running 8-footer, leaning in and off glass, with 0.5 second left in overtime last year. Let's just say that the shot is a lot easier if you are 6-foot-6, not 5-9.
I had driven on my own to Nicholls and Stephen F. Austin, and due to football's National Signing Day haul on Feb. 4, was unable to get away in time to make it to Lake Charles for a 7 o'clock game that night. I was happy to miss that one, as it turned out, except for missing the chance to visit with friends like Cowboys coach Dave Simmons, McNeese SID Louis Bonnette and Cowboys AD and former Demon footballer and javelin thrower Tommy McClelland.
Seeing this group enjoying each other's company, which was not the case earlier this season, was refreshing and encouraging. Let's hope it carries over to good play Saturday. I think it will.
BTW - the team watched the movie "The Express," the story of the late, great Heisman Trophy-winning Syracuse running back Ernie Davis, on the drive up. It's not the best sports movie ever, but it was inspiring and pretty well done overall. The ubiquitous shots of the sports media are laughable at every turn ... writers weren't really pounding their typewriters at the outset of an afternoon football game, for example; and the thuggery of opposing players, with the Cotton Bowl game against Texas breaking out into a bench-clearing brawl, was far past cinematic license. But the bottom line product was a solid B.
Just wish that the movie folks would let a real great story be told completely truthfully. The message would have been just as effective.
Friday, February 13, 2009
Tuesday, February 10, 2009
Address changes, accolades for ex-Demons
Former Demon offensive line coach Blake Miller, whose coaching ability might have been exceeded by his considerable culinary talents during his two years (1998-99) on the NSU football staff, is moving west.
Miller has been on the staff at Rice for the past three years. He's been hired as the O-line coach at Utah.
Miller will be in the capitol of the Morman religion with the Utes, coaching in a stadium the world knows as the site of the 2002 Winter Olympics ....
... NSU three-sport athlete and former academic advisor extraordinare Julie Lessiter is back in the business. Lessiter left NSU last January to enter private business, to see if she would enjoy living a "normal" lifestyle working managing a medical practice in Shreveport-Bossier.
She's been announced now as the associate AD for student services and senior woman administrator at Arkansas State.
There she'll be working again with some old friends, head football coach Steve Roberts and several of his staff who were at NSU before heading up to northeast Arkansas in the winter of 2001.
The Southampton, England native made a huge difference in the lives of many student-athletes during her time at NSU, serving nine years as the "academic coach" for Demons and Lady Demons.
She played tennis, ran cross country and ran track for NSU during her undergraduate days. She has two undergraduate degrees from Northwestern ....
...The 1995 Southland Conference baseball player of the year is turning into a heck of a football recruiter. Terry Joseph was spotlighted by Rivals.com for his job as recruiting coordinator at Louisiana Tech, where he is also the secondary coach.
TJ was listed as one of the top 10 recruiters at non-BCS schools in the bowl subdivision.
Miller has been on the staff at Rice for the past three years. He's been hired as the O-line coach at Utah.
Miller will be in the capitol of the Morman religion with the Utes, coaching in a stadium the world knows as the site of the 2002 Winter Olympics ....
... NSU three-sport athlete and former academic advisor extraordinare Julie Lessiter is back in the business. Lessiter left NSU last January to enter private business, to see if she would enjoy living a "normal" lifestyle working managing a medical practice in Shreveport-Bossier.
She's been announced now as the associate AD for student services and senior woman administrator at Arkansas State.
There she'll be working again with some old friends, head football coach Steve Roberts and several of his staff who were at NSU before heading up to northeast Arkansas in the winter of 2001.
The Southampton, England native made a huge difference in the lives of many student-athletes during her time at NSU, serving nine years as the "academic coach" for Demons and Lady Demons.
She played tennis, ran cross country and ran track for NSU during her undergraduate days. She has two undergraduate degrees from Northwestern ....
...The 1995 Southland Conference baseball player of the year is turning into a heck of a football recruiter. Terry Joseph was spotlighted by Rivals.com for his job as recruiting coordinator at Louisiana Tech, where he is also the secondary coach.
TJ was listed as one of the top 10 recruiters at non-BCS schools in the bowl subdivision.
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