Month: November 2009

There was nothing automatic about tonight’s Opening Night win over the Southwestern Athletic Conference’s favorite Tigers. It may have been a life-changer for rookie head coach Josh Pastner — “I’m only 799 behind Jim Boeheim,” he cracked after the game — but it was no automatic win. With seven scholarship players in his rotation, and only two players you’d classify as “big men,” Pastner will count the wins from his first season in the big chair like a 2008 stock broker counted his coins. None taken for granted, and every last one counts.

After jumping out to a 17-6 lead, the U of M went four minutes without scoring — allowing JSU to close within two — before putting 14 on the board in the next three. Sophomore guard Elliot Williams (making his Tiger debut after a freshman season at Duke) drilled two three-pointers in the spurt, on his way to leading Memphis with 19 points for the game. Jackson State started the second half on an 11-3 run to make things interesting again, only to watch Williams and another Memphis rookie — juco transfer Will Coleman — impose themselves in such a way that the final score did seem to fall in line with recent lid-lifters against the likes of Savannah State, UT-Martin, and Fairfield. A huge disparity in free throws — Memphis made 30 of 48 while JSU hit 7 of 13 — reflected the push-it-to-the-rim offense Pastner is urging out of his undersized team.

• Wesley Witherspoon

“We can’t afford lapses,” said Pastner after the game. “It can’t be 28 minutes, 32 minutes . . . it’s gotta be 40 minutes.” The challenge, though, is maintaining a lapse-free, frenetic pace that can hide the team’s lack of size, with a bench not deep enough for many reinforcements. “It’s going to be a fine line,” added the coach. “Conditioning, while also staying fresh — physically and mentally — with our lack of numbers.”

A few things on my mind as we close in on the start of the 89th season of Tiger basketball (tip-off at 8 pm tonight, FedExForum):

• How will Josh Pastner manage what is essentially a two-man frontcourt? Pierre Henderson-Niles — in a new body, it should be noted — and Will Coleman are bound to get in foul trouble (and often) this season. “Going small” isn’t a bad idea when you can put Willie Kemp, Elliot Williams, Roburt Sallie, and Wesley Witherspoon on the floor together. But when the other team “goes big” and they have to be defended? If I were to track any one variable for the 2009-10 Tigers, it would be the development of Henderson-Niles and Coleman as this team’s backbone.

• Josh Pastner

• Is Willie Kemp ready for a leadership role? He was the starting point guard as a freshman for a team that went 33-4. But playing behind Derrick Rose and Tyreke Evans the last two seasons, Kemp found himself clinging to the periphery of John Calipari’s rotation.